Quotes of the Day:

“Probably the battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton, but the opening battles of all subsequent wars have been lost there. One of the dominant facts in English life during the past quarter of a century has been the decay ability in the ruling class.”


– George Orwell

"It is never too late to be what you might have been." 

– George Eliot

Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.

– Lou Holtz

1. After primacy: US military options in contemporary East Asia

2. Trump Announces Colby, Duffey and Feinberg for Defense

3. How Ukraine uses Mossad tactics to hunt down Russian war criminals

4. Part I: Why we have the Voice of America

5. Here’s what to know about China’s alleged spy scheme in L.A. County and beyond

6.The Battle of Lyptsi: Robotic Land Combat

7. Ukrainian M1 Abrams Commander Talks Tank's Major Vulnerabilities, Advantages In Combat

8. Does the Fall of Assad Re-Open Turkey’s Kurdish Pandora’s Box?

9. Philippine Armed Forces

10. Russia, Iran, and North Korea Unite Prompting U.S. Special Forces Prepare for Next-Gen Challenges

11.  Elbridge Colby: the brain behind Trump's foreign policy

12. Paper Urges Leaders to Embrace Nontraditional Commands

13. The Rise and Fall of Economic Statecraft

14. How Iran Lost Syria

15. Army faces balancing act in quest to raise fitness test rigor for combat jobs, study finds

16. Outlook Dims for British-American Relations as an Aide to Trump Calls the New Ambassador to Washington a ‘Moron’

17. Ukraine’s Elite Special Ops: Top Missions of 2024 – From Black Sea to Kursk

18. 2024: 10 Events That Changed The World

19. CIA Behavior Control Experiments Focus of New Scholarly Collection | National Security Archive

1. After primacy: US military options in contemporary East Asia

 We continue to make the same mistakes in planning. How can you talk about contingencies in East Asia and deliberately leave out Korea? (well the authors do below).

But i'm sure this will play well with the newly nominated USD(P) Elbridge Colby who believes the sole focus of US defense policy must be on CHina.

Neither the NDS nor the extensive collection of concepts of operations and military plans that implements it can capture all possible adverse events. There are nonetheless discernible types of conflicts of interests that expert analysis and U.S. government documents treat as consequential and as likely enough to occur that the DOD needs to have a ready response. This analysis therefore uses a set of stylized contingencies to represent these general categories and to generate a set of feasible alternative military responses to them (Table 1). The set does not include a crisis precipitated by a North Korean attack on South Korea or consider a scenario in which North Korea is directly involved. This omission is not a statement about the probability of such a crisis occurring but rather reflects the analytic conclusion that the United States does not have near-term, feasible alternatives to a conventional, expeditionary power projection response.

Table 1

Foreseeable near-term security contingencies in East Asia

Table with 2 columns and 8 rows.1Blockade of Taiwan2Unrelenting gray zone campaign3Invasion of Taiwan4South China Sea feature occupation5Diaoyu/Senkaku crisis6Control of regional sea lanes7Cyberattack on the United States and Taiwan8Surgical decapitation and political subversion of Taiwan

After primacy: US military options in contemporary East Asia

Melanie W. Sisson and Dan Patt

December 20, 2024

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/after-primacy-us-military-options-in-contemporary-east-asia/?utm_campaign=dfn-ebb&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sailthru

Editor's note: This piece is part of a series titled “The future of U.S.-China policy: Recommendations for the incoming administration” from Brookings’s John L. Thornton China Center.

The United States has an enduring interest in supporting conditions that minimize the likelihood of war in East Asia. Since 1945, this has meant maintaining robust defense alliances that temper intra-regional insecurities and dispatching the U.S. military to underwrite the unimpeded transit of goods and people through the region’s seas and skies.

For decades, the United States achieved these goals by being able “to transport overwhelming air, sea, and land power to far-off places.” The operation of this model of expeditionary power projection in East Asia was enabled, in part, by the United States’ clear military technological advantage over the People’s Republic of China (PRC). This fact allowed the U.S. military wide latitude, as described in the 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS), to “deploy our forces when we wanted, assemble them where we wanted, and operate how we wanted.” It also allowed policymakers to be confident that the U.S. military could be used to address acute conflicts of interest, often without requiring significant trade-offs across cost, risk, reputation, and the ability to maintain operations elsewhere around the world.

The military balance in East Asia no longer clearly favors the United States and is not likely to again. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is becoming an increasingly professionalized and well-equipped force capable of contesting U.S. action across a broad range of military contingencies.

This loss of U.S. regional military primacy does not mean that the threat or use of force has lost all utility in the defense and pursuit of U.S. and allied interests. It does, however, mean that the United States no longer should expect its established military strategies and concepts of operation to be sufficient to prevent challenges to its interests from arising. When they do arise, moreover, using the armed forces to produce the outcome the United States prefers now requires policymakers to make difficult choices about when, how, and why to expend limited resources, accept political costs, and tolerate military risks in East Asia and elsewhere.

China’s regional operational advantages and U.S. fiscal realities mean that doing more of the same—awaiting more resources to be available, anticipating a technological revolution in international affairs, and expecting current systems and operational concepts to be sufficient in the meantime—is not likely to work. Policymakers will instead need options beyond those that fit neatly within the model of expeditionary power projection to responsibly and effectively protect and promote U.S. interests in East Asia for the foreseeable future. The exercise presented here represents one of many needed efforts to stimulate thinking about what some of those options might be.

Continued at this link: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/after-primacy-us-military-options-in-contemporary-east-asia/?utm_campaign=dfn-ebb&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sailthru

2. Trump Announces Colby, Duffey and Feinberg for Defense

​I wonder if the incoming Trump administration will reprise Acting Secretary Chirs Miller's memo to remove ASD SO/LIC from under USD(P) and make it report directly to the SECDEF for all special operations and low intensity conflict actions (i.e., irregular warfare). The nominated USD(P) is all about building a conventional military to deter China and I do not think he is a fan of special operations at all. Even if he is, he won't have time for SOF since his sole priority will be China policy.

From Chris Miller in 2020 (note that Secretary Austin reversed half of this with ASD SO/LIC reporting to USD(P) for all SOF policy and to the SECDEF for other special operations activities).

As we implement the president's orders, we also recognize that transitions and campaigns are fraught with risk and unexpected challenges and opportunities. That is why I am here today to announce this -- this is an omen -- uh oh. I'm here today to announce that I directed the Special Operations civilian leadership to report directly to me instead of through the current bureaucratic channels. This historic step finalizes what Congress has authorized and directed, and will put Special Operations Command on par with the military services for the first time.

This reform will immediately improve agility to the department and the command, and will enable us to streamline information flow, enhance decision-making and more adaptively and adeptly support our commanders and their superb soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. Change is often tectonic in the Department of Defense. This is by -- this is by design, and as our history shows, has served the nation very well.

Today's reforms is directly aligned with all three of my priorities, as outlined in my message to the force on Monday. First, bring the current war to an end in a responsible manner that guarantees the security of our citizens; two, continue implementing the National Defense Strategy with an emphasis on transforming the department for great power competition; and three, accelerate the department's activities to contribute to our whole-of-government effort to combat transnational threats.

https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/2419853/acting-secdef-announces-osd-changes-at-fort-bragg-nc/

Trump Announces Colby, Duffey and Feinberg for Defense

State of the Union: Colby and Duffey, in particular, have been heralded by foreign policy realists and restrainers

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/trump-announces-additions-to-defense-team/

President-elect Donald Trump announced the addition of Elbridge Colby, Stephen Feinberg, and Michael Duffey to his incoming Defense team. In two posts to Truth Social on Sunday evening, Trump said the triumvirate will work with Secretary of Defense Nominee Pete Hegseth to revitalize the military, drive change at the Pentagon, and advise Hegseth on matters of national defense.

Stephen Feinberg is set to serve as Deputy Secretary of Defense, Elbridge “Bridge” Colby will serve as Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, and Michael Duffey will serve as the next Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition & Sustainment. 

Feinberg is a graduate of Princeton who founded the investment firm Cerberus in 1992. He previously served as Chairman of Trump’s Intelligence Advisory Board. Colby served in the Pentagon during Trump’s first term and the 47th president stated he will work with Hegseth to “bring peace through strength.” Trump stated that Duffey will be tasked with “work to revitalize our Defense Industrial Base.”

Trump also tapped Emil Michael to serve as the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering. Trump noted Michael’s work in rebuilding the ride-sharing app Uber. Michael is a graduate of Harvard University who later earned a law degree from Stanford.

3. How Ukraine uses Mossad tactics to hunt down Russian war criminals

Mossad: World class manhunters.

How Ukraine uses Mossad tactics to hunt down Russian war criminals

thetimes.com · by Maxim Tucker

MAXIM TUCKER | IN DEPTH

The assassination of a top Russian general in Moscow is part of a campaign to track and kill Kremlin war criminals wherever they are in the world

Akhmad Kurbanov, an Uzbek citizen alleged by the FSB to have killed Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov

NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Maxim Tucker

Friday December 20 2024, 5.00pm, The Times

With cuts and bruises on his face that suggested his confession had been made under duress, Akhmad Kurbanov, a 29-year-old Uzbek, explained how he came to plant a bomb in the heart of Moscow that killed the highest-ranking general targeted by the Ukrainian secret service.

According to Russia’s FSB security service, Kurbanov said that on the promise of $100,000 and a European passport, he had planted 300g of explosive in an electric scooter that he parked outside the home of Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, the chief of Russia’s Radiation, Biological and Chemical Protection Forces.

He placed a dashboard camera on his rental car opposite the apartment to stream the blast to his handlers in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, the FSB alleged.

Kurbanov was said to have planted explosive in an electric scooter outside the general’s home

PAVEL BEDNYAKOV/AP

Ukraine’s state security service, the SBU, which claimed responsibility for the attack, and Ukraine’s military intelligence, HUR, have already carried out a number of extrajudicial killings of Russian officers, Kremlin officials and collaborators. However the general’s killing, on a weekday morning in President Putin’s capital, represented the most brazen assassination to date.

To Kyiv, it means no Russian is safe. The assassination, intelligence sources told The Times on Friday, is part of a campaign to hunt and kill Kremlin war criminals wherever they are in the world. “We are the new Mossad,” said a Ukrainian special forces officer involved in the targeting of Russian officers behind enemy lines. “No matter where you hide, or how long it takes, we will bring justice to you.”

Mossad, the Israeli national intelligence agency, is credited with dozens of overseas assassinations over the past six decades, killing weapons experts helping hostile powers and Nazis suspected of atrocities, from Brazil to Belgium.

Given the invasion of Russia’s Kursk region, President Zelensky’s pursuit of a ballistic missile programme and an increase in the number of long-range drone strikes on airbases, ammunition depots and oil refineries inside Russia, Kirillov’s death should demonstrate to President Putin that the cost of his war on Ukraine will increasingly be felt at home, a senior Ukrainian intelligence official said.

Kirillov was the head of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Protection Forces

RUSSIAN DEFENCE MINISTRY PRESS SERVICE/AP

Kurbanov’s confession to the FSB must be treated with caution, but even if he is the “fall guy” being used by either Kyiv or the Kremlin, his alleged recruitment would fit a well-established pattern in intelligence operations: enlisting disaffected young men for minor tasks and grooming them for a major operation.

The Ukrainians use anti-Putin Telegram channels to cultivate a following, then reach out online to those who are particularly engaged with promises of cash for minor tasks, such as spraying anti-Putin graffiti on government buildings. Often the channels are advertised on gambling websites.

The payments are made using cryptocurrencies and they grow as the risks the agent is asked to take increase. Agents can graduate from graffiti to spotting for artillery or missile attacks, then to more daring activities, such as an arson attack on an army recruitment centre, pouring sand in the petrol tank of a Russian military vehicle or sabotaging a railway junction.

Over time a relationship is formed and a proficient agent can be asked to take on still more complex and higher-risk tasks, such as delivering explosives. The Russians have used similar tactics to recruit agents inside Ukraine, with each side learning from the other’s methods.

Disaffected Ukrainians are recruited initially to carry out tasks such as spraying anti-Putin graffiti

VADIM GHIRDA/AP

On other occasions, such as the SBU’s attack on the Kerch bridge in October 2022, the person who ultimately delivers the bomb is duped into believing they are conveying a harmless item to the target. The driver of the truck bomb that severely damaged the bridge was killed in the blast.

Ukrainian special forces have also been tasked with killing Russian officers and Kremlin officials deep behind enemy lines. Last year the “Shaman” battalion, overseen by HUR, revealed to The Times that they had ambushed and killed a series of senior Russian officers, infiltrating Russian territory by flying low over the border in six-man teams using a Black Hawk helicopter.

A Russian missile attack on Kyiv on Friday after the killing of Kirillov

VALENTYN OGIRENKO/REUTERS

HUR special forces teams have also been deployed to Mali, Sudan and Syria to kill Russian members of Wagner suspected of torturing and executing Ukrainian civilians during Russian occupation, intelligence sources said.

Mali cut diplomatic ties with Kyiv after HUR admitted it had assisted Tuareg-led separatists in ambushing and killing dozens of regime fighters and Russian mercenaries. The Tuaregs said in the aftermath of the attack that they had killed 84 Wagner mercenaries and 47 Malian soldiers.

The killing of Kirillov, carried out a day after he was charged with war crimes related to chemical weapons attacks on Ukrainian troops, and the fact that it was immediately claimed by the SBU, was designed to send a message to the Russians, an SBU source said. “Kirillov was a war criminal with an absolutely legitimate goal, having given orders to defend the chemical defence against the Ukrainian military. Such an inglorious end awaits everyone who kills the Ukrainians. Payment for war atrocities is inevitable,” the source said.

thetimes.com · by Maxim Tucker

4. Part I: Why we have the Voice of America

​No one knows more about Voice of America and public diplomacy and psychological warfare than Matt Armstrong.

I also would like to note that the Korean Service of Voice of America (and Radio Free Asia) provides the most factual reporting on Korean events than any other new source (though I admit my bias since I support their work).

We need Voice of America (and Radio Free Asia, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) to support US national security.

I would venture to guess that most critics of VOA, et. al, have never really watched, listened to, or read their reports. They only parrot words of pundits who criticize their work for political purposes. Yes, there have been issues with vetting and political views inserted into some of the services but that does not mean we should throw the baby out with the bathwater.  It is important that critics of VOA read this thoroughly before making uninformed criticism. 

Introductory excerpt:

Let me start by putting my cards on the table: USAGM has been and continues to be poorly managed, and similar poor management at VOA. Both have long been unfairly attacked by people whose motivations range from sincere to ignorant to malice. Leadership at various levels, starting at the top, has failed to address valid criticism and concerns about the agency and its operations. I have personal, first-hand experience of severe unpublicized problems as well as significant unpublicized successes. I also firmly believe the agency is more important to US national security than it was from the 1970s through the 1990s.

I write this based on my experience as a Governor on the Broadcasting Board of Governors, USAGM’s prior name, including my extensive interactions with the networks’ chiefs and the operations of the networks in the field, my time in an oversight & advocacy role for international broadcasting operations as the executive director of the Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, and the twenty years I’ve spent examining, writing about, speaking on, and assisting the US international information activities of several government agencies, including this one, often from inside the respective operations.

Conclusion:

In short, you just read a mere glimpse into the discussions around establishing VOA. Are you aware of any serious and inclusive inquiry on remaking the network and its parent agency today? I’m not.7

I would be remiss not to note that it doesn’t take many aggrieved VOA personnel to change the network and umbrella organization radically. Senator Joseph McCarthy’s attacks on VOA relied heavily on one disgruntled VOA employee. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles used this to eagerly eject the broader information service, which Secretary of State Dean Acheson placed within a semi-autonomous organization within the department called International Information Administration. At the time, IIA included half of the State Department’s personnel and more than 40% of the department’s budget. The result was the US Information Agency, “an organization with fewer authorities and less integration than what it replaced.” Dulles believed the information function distracted from his and the department’s diplomacy. We may be on the same track today.

Part I: Why we have the Voice of America

Recalling the realization that delivering factual news & information was a matter of national security

https://mountainrunner.substack.com/p/part-i-why-we-have-the-voice-of-america?r=7i07&utm

Matt Armstrong

Dec 23, 2024

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Network map of VOA shortwave and medium broadcast capabilities in 1952. VOA transmitted 49 hours daily in 42 languages.

Today’s US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) has a simple and essential purpose: to deliver news and information to undermine the effects of disinformation, misinformation, and the lack of information, including outright censorship, in support of US national security. As to where it does this, since the transition of the Office of War Information’s (OWI) radio broadcast operation to the State Department, directed by the President’s executive order issued before the USS Missouri sailed into Tokyo Bay and effective two weeks later, the basic parameters have been intentional, purposeful, and simple: to supplement, not replace or compete with, private and commercial press. While applicable to other elements of the US government’s international information operations, including those under the United States Information Service (USIS), there was an explicit and intentional emphasis regarding the operation of the radio broadcast element: its operations would be supplementary and facilitative to that of the US press.

There never was a time, even in the midst of war, when it was so necessary to replace prejudice with truth, distortion with balance, and suspicion with understanding... we shall not seek to compete with private agencies of communication, nor shall we try to outdo the efforts of foreign governments in this field. – Secretary of State James F. Byrnes to President Harry S. Truman, December 31, 1945

This is the first part of a (likely) three-part series discussing why we have the Voice of America (VOA) and its sister networks. Part I, what you’re reading now, examines why VOA was kept after World War II. Part II puts forward the argument that had VOA been separated from the government, as the State Department sought, an effort that began in November 1945 and lasted through the summer of 1947, there may not have been a Radio Free Europe (established 1949), Radio Free Asia (first established 1951, reestablished 1996), and Radio Liberty (established 1953). Had the radio operation been separated, the many law review analyses of the Smith-Mundt Act would have to be revised since, though they claim to speak broadly, they are narrowly focused on the unique issues that surrounded VOA. Part III examines the consequences of the disinformation, misinformation, and lack of information on why today’s USAGM continues to exist and its actual and potential value to US national security.

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The purpose of this series is to foster a better understanding of why the US had and continues to have one of the largest news agencies in the world, where it operates and why (spoiler: places where accessing or sharing news can lead to jail or death), and what is meant by telling America’s “story” (spoiler: it’s about countering disinformation, not self-promotion or encouraging tourism).

Let me start by putting my cards on the table: USAGM has been and continues to be poorly managed, and similar poor management at VOA. Both have long been unfairly attacked by people whose motivations range from sincere to ignorant to malice. Leadership at various levels, starting at the top, has failed to address valid criticism and concerns about the agency and its operations. I have personal, first-hand experience of severe unpublicized problems as well as significant unpublicized successes. I also firmly believe the agency is more important to US national security than it was from the 1970s through the 1990s.

I write this based on my experience as a Governor on the Broadcasting Board of Governors, USAGM’s prior name, including my extensive interactions with the networks’ chiefs and the operations of the networks in the field, my time in an oversight & advocacy role for international broadcasting operations as the executive director of the Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, and the twenty years I’ve spent examining, writing about, speaking on, and assisting the US international information activities of several government agencies, including this one, often from inside the respective operations.

In 1945, keeping the radio operation VOA was a tricky concept for the upcoming peacetime.1 There was a clear threat of unfair competition between the deep-pocketed government and the US’s private broadcasters in hiring talent, whether on-air talent, notably non-English editors and speakers, engineers, or anyone else needed to produce and broadcast content. During the war, private stations and broadcasting facilities were commandeered, and now, with peace on the horizon, decisions had to be made for what came after. Complicating matters was international competition for the finite radio spectrum, a looming problem that would worsen. For example, should VOA disappear from the airwaves, even briefly, for whatever reason, there were valid concerns that some other country would fill its place.

On August 31, 1945, Truman issued an executive order that transferred the international information programs of OWI and the Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA) to the State Department. The President gave the department until the end of the year (only four months) to figure out what elements “should be conducted on a continuing basis.”

The executive order drew from OWI’s advice, delivered two weeks earlier, regarding the “Complete liquidation of the Agency” and transferring the functions that should be kept to other agencies. OWI “emphatically” recommended keeping and placing the general information programs under the State Department, including the United States Information Service (USIS). The radio program, however, was a different beast that needed further discussion.

OWI’s memo, in turn, echoed a State Department 241-page report completed the month before that asked whether the government should have a postwar information program and, if so, what organizational, operational, and fiscal considerations should be considered. The inquiry was based on extensive discussions with offices across the government and included discussions with those in the private sector and academia.2 Archibald MacLeish commissioned it in January 1945. Just a few weeks earlier, in December 1944, MacLeish had been sworn into the newly created position of Assistant Secretary for Public and Cultural Relations (renamed in early 1946 as the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs).3 In Congress, Representative Karl E. Mundt, Republican from South Dakota, introduced a bill to promote the interchange of school teachers across the Americas on January 24.4 In short, there was a lot of thinking about the nation’s international information and broader engagement needs, and this was even before Russia’s political warfare, and specifically their disinformation efforts, took off and were recognized.

“It would not be too much to say that the foreign relations of a modern state are conducted quite as much through the instruments of public international communication as through diplomatic representatives and missions.” — ” Archibald MacLeish during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on December 12, 1944

Keeping a government radio broadcasting operation faced legitimate questions with the clear potential for direct conflicts with private industry. Challenged faced other commercial efforts to reach abroad. For example, affecting magazine, newspaper, and book publishers and the motion-picture industry, “the shortage of dollars abroad and blocked currencies are among the important barriers to the greater diffusion of information about the United States and threaten the continued or expanded selling operations of America’s mass communications industries abroad.”5

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That 241-page State Department memo suggested four post-war scenarios for the radio operation: (1) a private corporation with government funding; (2) a government-owned and -operated broadcaster; (3) a mixed government & private operation; and (4) completely stepping away from radio and hoping private and commercial media would step up.

The department opted for option 1: a private corporation with government funding. Work toward this end began in November 1945. The plan and organization took shape over the next several months. A not-for-profit would be funded, at least initially, by the government. A bipartisan Board of Trustees would provide guidance and oversight to the operation. Fourteen of the fifteen Trustees would be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, with the fifteenth being the Secretary of State or a designated Assistant Secretary. The board would “ensure the character of the broadcasts” and “help win the confidence and support of the Congress and the American people by helping to guarantee the objective and non-partisan character of the broadcasts.” Funding could be supplemented by selling broadcast time, receiving outside contributions, and receiving or contracting for programs produced outside of government.” The board would oversee a full-time Chief Executive Officer (paid a market wage) providing operational leadership. Articles of incorporation were drawn up (naturally, it would be a Delaware corporation), as were lists of potential Trustees and CEO candidates.6

Several Members of Congress, notably Senator Joseph Ball, Republican of Minnesota, tried to privatize the entirety of the information and education programs, not just the radio operation. However, deep concerns over the “disloyalty-subversive question” of possible “Reds” infiltrating the information programs led to other problems. The suggestion that the FBI would conduct “loyalty checks” for the National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC), the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), and whichever other private companies participating in the program created more qualms about taking on a venture that would not be profitable for the foreseeable future. (The Smith-Mundt Act required that the FBI conduct a “loyalty check” on every current and future staff working on the information and education programs authorized by the Act.)

Whether private or public, the need for the radio operation was clear. Frank Stanton, the president of CBS, wrote that CBS’s work with OWI and OIAA during the war “convinced us that one of the best ways of enhancing and maintaining the prestige of the United States among the peoples of the world is by making available to these peoples day-by-day uncolored, undistorted, and truthful information about our own country and our people.” Stanton argued this effort could and should be run by private broadcasters, who “could take over the entire job of broadcasting and programming within sixty days.”

Philip Reed, chairman of the board of General Electric (one of the half-dozen US international radio broadcasters), had a different view:

I am convinced that our country must maintain [an] adequate foreign information broadcast service… I believe that the operation of an international broadcasting service should be in private rather than government hands. The immediate problem appears to be that the private owners international broadcast facilities would be unable to render anything like an adequate foreign broadcast service without incurring very large operating deficits… This means, for the present at least, if an adequate broadcasting program is to be maintained the Government will have to shoulder most of its costs.

The hard reality was when the rubber hit the road, the networks acknowledged they could not do this job alone. The “emergency” situation required some government role. In August 1947, CBS’s Edward R. Murrow told a confidential House Committee on Foreign Affairs inquiry “that private industry could not at present take over completely the job of international dissemination of information. He felt that as long as the competition with Russia in Europe and with Great Britain in parts of South America continued, first-hand information possessed only by the Department of State was essential for the successful guidance of any program of information.”

In mid-1947, the bill to support this organization and thus remove VOA from the State Department was a higher legislative priority for the department than the yet-to-be-passed Smith-Mundt bill that would authorize the rest of the information programs and expansive exchange/interchange programs sought by the department and much of the federal government. Senators had a different opinion.

After the State Department became interested in Mundt’s January 1945 bill, the Democrat Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee took over the bill. Now called the Bloom Bill, it was amended in October to include the information programs following Truman’s executive order of August 31. There were plenty of hearings and a lot of attention to the details. This bill passed the House by a two-thirds vote on July 20, 1946, almost the last day of the Congressional session.

The bill was introduced in the Senate only eight days earlier. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee recommended the bill, stating in its report,

In recent years the major nations of the world, including the United States, have begun to pay attention to the attitudes of other peoples and to the information available to them. It has been increasingly evident that wars start in people's minds, and that free interchange of public information, and of persons and skills, would contribute to an understanding between peoples.

The United States was the last of the major nations to enter this field of public information abroad and educational cooperation. Even now, many of the activities of this sort conducted by the Department of State are sanctioned only by appropriation acts and by Executive Order.

However, the complete lack of preparatory work in the Senate meant the Senate’s Republican leadership blocked any further discussion, let alone a vote, on what they considered a wholly Democrat bill.

In May 1947, in the Republican-dominated 80th Congress (which Truman nicknamed the “Do Nothing Congress”), the State Department asked Mundt to reintroduce his bill, alongside which the department submitted its bill for the private radio corporation. A Senator co-sponsor was sought to avoid the previous year’s debacle. Senator H. Alexander Smith, Republican of New Jersey, agreed to be that cosponsor, provided the radio stays wholly in government and “right in the lap of the Secretary of State, where it seems to belong.” Smith was not alone in his view.

“I am not willing to turn over to Mr. Sarnoff [of RCA and NBC] and Mr. Paley [of CBS] the determination of American foreign policy.” — Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. (July 15, 1947)

For some Senators, the private corporation—to be established as a “foundation”—moved the radio too far from the center of government, even if the Secretary of State was one of the overseeing Trustees. Moreover, events had overcome Stanton’s claim of easy privatization.

In 1947, though CBS and NBC produced more than 40% of VOA’s programming, the broadcasters were content to lease their transmitters and sell content to the government because there was little to no profit in the target markets. In addition to the continuing issue of blocked currency (i.e., profits could not be repatriated), Russia’s active disinformation campaigns were now joined by information blockades.

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The editor of one of the nation’s largest weekly magazines conducted research and advised the State Department on the question of private enterprises taking over radio service and other elements of the information program. In October 1947, he said it “is naive to say ‘Let private enterprise carry the ball’ and at the same time ignore the fact that there are widening areas in which private enter can no longer operate in a normal manner.” He described a three-part classification system to explain the situation. He called the first group the “Free Zone” where US media “can carry on approximately as usual.” He listed Canada, Cuba, and Mexico as examples. Second was the “Iron Curtain” where “private operation is virtually impossible,” with Russia in this group. Third was “Mixed.” These were “shaky” countries, like France and Italy, “where combined and expanded efforts of government and private agencies are desirable. This group included those with blocked or non-convertible currency, dollar shortages, various resource shortages, etc.

While the government needed to fund efforts into the Iron Curtain and Mixed countries, private enterprises could still provide content. This was written into the Smith-Mundt Act with clear direction from Congress to avoid, or at least reduce, competition with the private sector over personnel and programming. The State Department was directed “to utilize, to the maximum extent practicable, the services and facilities of private agencies, including existing American press, publishing, radio, motion picture, and other agencies, through contractual arrangements or otherwise.”

This led to less department oversight, which, in turn, permitted VOA to broadcast material produced by the private agencies without review. The Smith-Mundt Act was signed into law on January 27, 1948 (three years and three days after Mundt introduced his bill), and within a few months, the limited oversight led to a major embarrassment.

The problem program intended to introduce the US to people abroad by telling America’s so-called story. The audience heard a kind of travel program in 15-minute broadcasts in Spanish with a narrator and two “visitors” exploring the many US states. “Don’t you have a saying that Texas was born in sin but New England was born in hypocrisy?” “Oh, Utah, that’s where men have as many wives as they can support.” “Nevada has no interest in itself—it’s a land of cowboys, and its two principal cities are in competition. In Las Vegas, people get married, and in Reno, they get divorced.”

In the Wyoming chapter, “The frontier day celebration is the most extraordinary festival of the West….” “Look! What magnificent Indian girls!” “Feathered and naked.” “What are they going to do?” “Let me see the program. It’s the 100-meter race…”

The fallout emphasized the importance of government oversight and control and how corporate media may have different objectives and interests than the government. Sharing America’s story could not be a willy-nilly or clumsy endeavor; it required attention to detail and purpose.

Information freedom—both to access and share information—was viewed as a necessary path toward international peace. The key lesson of Nazi propaganda at the time was not the impact of the messages but the Nazi’s elimination of alternative voices that called out the disinformation and corrected the misinformation. To support this, there was a clear need for a radio program to reach into countries where information was difficult to receive or overwhelmed by disinformation or misinformation. The radio complemented the broader information efforts, including those of USIS and the many kinds of exchanges, which were a different form of influence operation. These other information efforts and educational, scientific, or technical exchanges were severely reduced in or ejected from the key target markets, leading to a greater emphasis on the radio.

Subscribed

The international political situation then was remarkably similar to the present, far more so than the structured and routinized 1970s or 1980s. More recently, widespread access to the Internet, like shortwave before it, promised information freedom. The reality is far different, with fantastic manipulation of facts and curtailment of the freedom to access information and speak. More information does not necessarily equate to better information.

For the 1944 presidential election, the Republican and Democrat platforms supported worldwide press and information freedom worldwide. In his article “Pillars of Human Rights,” former Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles wrote that the United Nation’s charter “should contain the specific stipulation that no nation may become a member of the new international organization unless it is able to demonstrate that by its constitution, or by its basic legislation, the citizens of such nation are granted inalienable rights of freedom of worship, of expression and of information.”

While the criteria didn’t materialize, the value of information freedom persisted. VOA was one means of supporting information freedom.

“It cannot be emphasized too strongly that the Soviets and the Communists are today conducting aggressive psychological warfare against us in order thoroughly to discredit us and drive us out of Europe. In order to prevent this, to safeguard our national security, to promote world peace and implement our own foreign policy, based primarily on economic reconstruction, and political freedom, a strong and effective information and educational exchange program is essential… Our Information Service cannot effectively explain our point of view nor deny vociferous falsehoods in a whisper… Hundreds of millions are being expended by the Soviets; and the United Kingdom, although heavily in debt, supports a program employing some 8,700 persons as against our less than 1,400 and costing three times ours. Even little Holland is spending nearly a quarter of a million dollars this year, and spent half a million last year in the United States alone to defend and explain her policies. We are spending just over $30,000 in the Netherlands. It is the opinion of the committee that America is old enough and strong enough to warrant a change of voice—a voice that will rise confidently above the false call of communism.” — Report of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the US Information Service in Europe, January 30, 1948

The legislative authority for VOA has always included a sunset clause (Sec 502 of the original Act, 22 USC 1462 today), directing the government “shall reduce such Government information activities whenever corresponding private information dissemination is found to be adequate.” VOA continues to operate in many places worldwide because the “private information dissemination” is not found to be adequate.

However, the lack of real oversight, the absence of leadership accountability, and general confusion by even the well-meaning on how (and even whether) VOA provides value to US national security over many decades have placed the network and the umbrella agency in jeopardy.

As you ponder the purpose and potential value of the agency and its networks, be mindful of the impact of mismanagement, the lack of Congressional oversight, decades of apathy from the executive branch, and the irony that agency narratives are fueled by disinformation, misinformation, and personal grievances on what you think you know about the agency and whether it should continue, and if so, in what form.

In short, you just read a mere glimpse into the discussions around establishing VOA. Are you aware of any serious and inclusive inquiry on remaking the network and its parent agency today? I’m not.7

I would be remiss not to note that it doesn’t take many aggrieved VOA personnel to change the network and umbrella organization radically. Senator Joseph McCarthy’s attacks on VOA relied heavily on one disgruntled VOA employee. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles used this to eagerly eject the broader information service, which Secretary of State Dean Acheson placed within a semi-autonomous organization within the department called International Information Administration. At the time, IIA included half of the State Department’s personnel and more than 40% of the department’s budget. The result was the US Information Agency, “an organization with fewer authorities and less integration than what it replaced.” Dulles believed the information function distracted from his and the department’s diplomacy. We may be on the same track today.

Part II, which will be shorter than this (and will definitely not appear for several weeks), looks at the privatization discussion and asks whether Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and Radio Free Asia would have been separately created if VOA had not been under the staid control of the State Department. This discussion means to tee up the conversation of streamlining USAGM’s five networks into two, or possibly one, to eliminate expensive back-office redundancies that inhibit collaboration and coordination and reduce resources available in the field.

No parting shot (picture) today. This was long enough.

As always, thanks for reading and I welcome your comments, questions, and even criticisms.

1

I intentionally refer to the pre-State Department VOA as a “radio broadcast operation” or similar because that is how the radio operation was referred to in internal documents. The operation ran a program called the Voice of America, but the VOA name didn’t customarily apply to the entire broadcast operation until early 1946.

2

The author of this report, Dr. Arthur MacMahon, was a prominent political scientist focused on public administration, primarily teaching at Columbia University. At the time, he was a consultant to the department. He was president of the American Political Science Association, editor of Political Science Quarterly, and founding member of the American Society of Public Administration. Unfortunately, his insights into the department have been largely forgotten. I recommend his book Administration in Foreign Affairs (1953).

3

Before this office was established, the public information role was held by the department's assistant secretary in charge of administration. If you think this is odd, consider that Woodrow Wilson’s second Secretary of State, Robert Lansing, placed this responsibility under the department’s counter-intelligence chief.

4

Mundt sent his bill to Nelson Rockefeller, head of OIAA, who forwarded it to MacLeish. MacLeish discussed the bill with Dean Acheson, a close friend from their days at Yale. MacLeish followed up with Mundt on February 7, writing that he was “tremendously interested” in the bill and that the “whole matter of international student exchanges relates very closely…to the work of some of the Divisions” under his office. MacLeish continued that he would like to have lunch and get more of Mundt’s ideas, “not only as a Member of Congress, whom even Dean Acheson holds in awe, but as a man with a long, practical experience in education.”

5

Addressing this problem temporarily stalled the Smith-Mundt bill in the Senate. However, Senators decided perfection was the enemy of the good, so they chose to pass the bill that the House passed months earlier and amend the Act later. That later amendment created the Informational Media Guarantee program.

6

The “Top List of Preferred Names” included Mark Ethridge (“Very respected by the Broadcasting industry” and “A liberal journalist…regarded as a southern journalist”); Roy Larson, President of TIME; Ed Murrow (“Paul [Porter, former FCC chairman] and I [Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs William Benton] are afraid of Bill Paley [head of the Columbia Broadcasting System] because of the [David] Sarnoff [head of RCA, which owned the National Broadcasting Corporation] angle, and Ed Murrow seems to be a very happy idea.”); Milton Eisenhower; John Foster Dulles (“That would be a typical British appointment, I think, trying to educate a possible successor.”); Anna Rosenberg; and Oveta Hobby. The “Class B” list included Arthur Sulzberger, C.D. Jackson, and Joseph Kennedy. George Kennan and Loy Henderson were floated as CEO candidates.

7

Not to mention the successor to the Assistant Secretary of Public and Cultural Relations, renamed in 1946 as the Assistant Secretary of Public Affairs, is the current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs (with the Director of the US Information Agency inserted in there 1953-1999), a position that has been so disregarded that it has been without a confirmed officeholder more than 40% of the time it has existed.

5. Here’s what to know about China’s alleged spy scheme in L.A. County and beyond

Here’s what to know about China’s alleged spy scheme in L.A. County and beyond

Los Angeles Times · by Ryan Fonseca · December 23, 2024

A criminal complaint provides details of an alleged local Chinese spy operation

All politics is local, as the saying goes. It appears some espionage is, too.

Federal prosecutors allege that Chinese spies have been operating in the San Gabriel Valley, seeking to influence local political leaders in hopes of cultivating allies amiable to China-friendly policies, including opposition to Taiwan‘s independence.

A criminal complaint filed in federal court last week accused two men of illegally acting as agents of a foreign government or official in a conspiracy stretching back decades.

The reach of the alleged spy ring is unclear, but a federal indictment and sources familiar with the probe who spoke with Times reporters said it involved at least one local council member.

“The indictment is more a window into routine municipal politics than the stuff of an international spy thriller,” my colleagues Richard Winton and Hannah Fry reported Sunday. “But experts say the case sheds light on Chinese tactics and the scope of how they are attempting to gain influence in America.”

What’s in the indictment?

The complaint followed the arrest of Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 64, who has been charged with acting as an illegal agent of a foreign power and conspiring with another man.

That man, John Chen, was arrested in 2023 and pleaded guilty earlier this year to acting as an illegal agent of the Chinese government.

When the FBI arrested Chen, they also seized his phones, which the complaint states led to the discovery of “extensive conversations with [a Chinese government official] about his efforts to influence politicians in Southern California.”

The complaint cites a 2008 article by The Times about an anti-CNN protest in which Chen is quoted and described as an organizer and a patio furniture manufacturer living in Diamond Bar.

“Chen has an honorary position with the Chinese government as an overseas consultant,” the story noted.

Authorities said Chen’s messages also mentioned Sun, whom he described as his “helping hand in the Chinese community since 1997.” Sun and the local city council member — identified only as Individual 1 in court records — were members of a “team dedicated for us” that Chen assembled, according to the complaint.

Chen messaged Sun about the council member, who he wrote “has lots of contact with mainstream politicians,” according to the complaint. A major goal was to get local political leaders to oppose Taiwan‘s independence, authorities said.

Though not named in the indictment, sources with knowledge of the investigation confirmed to The Times the person is Arcadia Councilmember Eileen Wang.

Arcadia Councilmember Eileen Wang at Arcadia City Hall.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Wang is engaged to Sun, who reportedly acted as her campaign manager in the 2022 City Council election that she ultimately won.

Wang has not been charged, and officials said it’s not clear yet if she was aware of Chen’s or Sun’s alleged ties to China.

A local-level ‘long game’

In films, international espionage usually happens at the federal level as spies attempt to infiltrate the Pentagon, the Kremlin or other influential institutions.

Most of us probably don’t picture foreign agents working their way into the city hall of a municipality with just over 54,000 people.

But the focus on local governments is an intentional effort by Chinese operatives to “play a long game,” said Horace Frank, a former assistant chief of the Los Angeles Police Department who oversaw the counterterrorism bureau.

“They don’t look for a big bang right away,” he told Richard and Hannah. “They are going to build from the ground up.”

It’s part of a pattern, Frank explained to them, adding that Chinese-linked individuals have been known to offer smaller cities funding for local projects in a bid to spark friendly relationships.

China “understands that U.S. state and local leaders enjoy a degree of independence from Washington and may seek to use them as proxies to advocate for national U.S. policies Beijing desires,” the National Counterintelligence and Security Center wrote in a 2022 bulletin sent to local officials nationwide.

How wide is the net cast by Chinese spies?

Federal authorities don’t know but note the conspiracy is not isolated to the San Gabriel Valley.

Chen’s phone messages also mention a former L.A. County supervisor who Chen said was “friendly to China.” He sent his contact in China the name and a picture of the politician, who was not named in the complaint.

The government official responded a few days later: “I personally agree that we can go through the current [supervisor] from the former one, so we internally are willing to provide the preliminary funding for you to socialize with the former county supervisor, but not a lot at once, it will be enough for meals and conference.”

A similar incident received national headlines in recent years, as Richard and Hannah noted.

“Last year, the House Ethics Committee closed a two-year investigation into allegations that Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) had ties to a suspected Chinese spy, Christine Fang, who had worked as a volunteer on his congressional campaign.”

Los Angeles Times · by Ryan Fonseca · December 23, 2024

6. The Battle of Lyptsi: Robotic Land Combat

​Excerpts:

But in most military institutions, multiple challenges remain in realising a fully integrated human-robot-AI land force. Ensuring that human-machine teams are mission capable, logistically supportable, survivable in multiple environments and highly lethal (to the enemy) will require continuous technological innovation in autonomous ground navigation, energy conservation, secure networked communications, protection against other UGVs and hardening against electronic warfare.

But not every military has the existential driver to transform that the Ukrainian military does. There will be many who will obstruct or slow down aspects of wider use of ground uncrewed systems. While debate is useful, and we should not rush to failure, we will also need to move quickly in a manner informed by battlefield and experimentation evidence. These changes to the culture of armies will demand excellent institutional leadership.

Notwithstanding this challenge, the pace of change in this field which blends advanced technology, human performance, military operations and human-robotic teaming, is moving very rapidly. It has progressed much more quickly than many of us believed possible even a few short years ago.

The Battle of Lyptsi is likely to be just the leading edge of a much larger wave of military transformation that is about to wash over land forces around the world. Armies are now at the dawn of a new era in ground operations. Those who continue to mark time in absorbing these technologies will be rapidly overwhelmed and will find themselves unable to win on the future battlefield.

The Future of War

The Battle of Lyptsi: Robotic Land Combat

Ukrainian robotic forces recently conducted an uncrewed, air-land assault on Russian positions in the Kharkiv region - and won. An assessment on what this tells us about the future of land combat.

https://mickryan.substack.com/p/the-battle-of-lyptsi-robotic-land?utm

Mick Ryan

Dec 22, 2024

∙ Paid

Source: @Maks_NAFO_FELLA

This year we purchased several thousand ground platforms, and next year, I believe, we need tens of thousands. Mykhailo Fedorov, 2 December 2024

In the past 48 hours, reports have emerged of a Ukrainian attack on Russian positions near the village of Lyptsi in the Kharkiv region. According to the Kyiv Independent, the attack utilised dozens of uncrewed ground combat vehicles (UGV) and FPV drones. The ground vehicles deployed in the assault conducted several different missions, including surveillance, mine clearing and direct fire using machine guns.

The UGVs were apparently supported throughout the activity by FPV drones. While this doesn’t make the attack fully autonomous – the vehicles need human operators – it is one of the more significant examples of drone combat in this war.

This combination of ground and aerial recon - attack capabilities means that the operation was in effect an air-land operation. But it was probably one that was very different to that envisioned by the architects of the Cold War era Air-Land Battle doctrine.

The information on the attack provided about the attack was provided by a spokesman from the Khartiia Brigade. This brigade formed in March 2022, and is assigned to the National Guard of Ukraine, which is a military force under the command of Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs. In August this year, the National Guard established its Typhoon specialised unit which only operates uncrewed systems. They were sure to have either been involved, or supported preparations for, the attack.

The Battle of Lyptsi may yet prove to be a milestone in the history of human conflict. That is for future historians to decide. But it is fair to state that it is an important step in the transformation of the character of war from a purely human endeavour to something quite different in the 21st century.

Uncrewed Systems on the Land

From the beginning of the large-scale Russian invasion in February 2022, uncrewed aerial vehicles have been used in a wide range of missions by both the Ukrainians and Russians. As the war progressed, the Ukrainian navy began to experiment with, and has now mastered, the development and employment of uncrewed maritime strike systems. A range of small boats and semi-submersibles have been employed to strike Russian naval vessels in the Black Sea, forcing the Russians to restrict their operations in the western parts of that body of water. For coverage of this, see this report from Covert Shores.

However, until late in the second year of the war, uncrewed ground systems in Ukraine were relatively scarce on the battlefield. There have been several practical reasons for this.

First, autonomous and remotely operated vehicles have difficulties with navigation and crossing many forms of terrain. It is one of the major obstacles to widespread use of uncrewed ground systems.

A second reason for their later appearance on Ukrainian battlefields has been that the ground environment normally has a higher density of military forces than the air or sea. Deconfliction is an issue. And the last thing ground forces want is to be accidently shot by their own armed ground drones. This is a technological as well as an organisational issue that needs resolution.

Third, ground systems also consume larger amounts of on-board power than those in the other environments because of the need to travel across bumpy, vegetated terrain at slow speeds. Power and recharging ground systems in the tactical environment can be a problem, and this needs practical and scalable solutions that can be used, with minimal training and support, by large numbers of units.

Finally, trust by humans in these systems is a challenge. I mentioned earlier the problem of humans being shot by their own robots. But equally, if robotic systems are being employed to hold part of the line in a defensive scheme of maneuver, other soldiers want to ensure they can trust them to do so and not let the enemy through. Trust, that the UGVs will perform as designed, and only target the enemy, is a significant issue for military institutions.

Many commercial companies have been developing solutions to these challenges. The greatest contemporary driver for using UGVs is that both sides are seeking solutions to a more transparent and much more lethal ground combat environment, while at the same time they are trying to manage deficiencies in manpower (a bigger problem for Ukraine than Russia). The low signature, ability to use in large numbers and their expendability makes them very attractive in the mass casualty environment of the Ukrainian front line.

Ukrainian D-21-11 UGV. Source: Brave1

Robotic Ground Combat: Ukraine as a Battle Lab

The deployments of UGVs in Ukraine comprises a large, real-time battle laboratory. It is an important element of the larger adaptation battle which is occurring across multiple aspects of the war.

While Ukraine has generally led the way in deploying uncrewed ground systems, the Russians have also been experimenting with them and deploying them on the battlefield. Last year, American expert on uncrewed systems, Sam Bendett, produced a detailed exploration of Russian developments in uncrewed ground vehicles (UGV). Among systems being tested were the Marker UGV. The Russians have apparently also tested other uncrewed ground systems for armed reconnaissance and sentry operations as well as casualty evacuation.

Battlefield experimentation, some formal and much of it informal, is providing insights into the applications of UGVs, the variety of capabilities needed to make them feasible in the land environment such as power, sensors, propulsion, running gear and weapons, as well as how changes to land tactics are needed. This process is informing the deployment of successive generations of uncrewed ground systems for both Ukraine and Russia. Inevitably, their lessons are also leaking out further into armies around the globe to inform their development of uncrewed ground systems.

The battlefield experience of soldiers will be central to this adaptation. The most innovative person in the world is a soldier whose life is at risk. The environment that soldiers live in drives learning and adaptation, as well as risk taking that is not possible in peacetime. Soldiers are likely to produce an extraordinary range of use cases which those who occupy laboratories - or cubicles in national capitals - are unlikely to consider.

There are many battlefield missions where uncrewed systems are already being used in the land environment. There are sure to be many others yet to be imagined. Current and future robots will be employed most in that space between humans and tactical threats. This includes their use in ground assaults; in mine and obstacle mapping, clearance and marking; explosive ordnance disposal and recovery of other drones; as well as in close reconnaissance, surveillance and sentry missions.

But the use of uncrewed systems for support roles will also be crucial. We will see uncrewed ground vehicles being used in lower signature resupply and casualty evacuation. Trials of this are already occurring in Ukraine as well as in other armies.

Uncrewed ground vehicles might also play an important role in sustaining and adapting ground communications networks through retransmission, establishing dummy or decoy networks, or attacking enemy networks through electronic warfare. Finally, UGVs might have application as mobile recharging stations for other drones or used as motherships for small ground or aerial vehicles deployed on sensitive, low signature missions.

The Imperative Now for Institutional Change

None of the battlefield functions envisioned for uncrewed systems will be effective without the transformation of military institutions that wish to use them. This includes armies but also the civilian bureaucracies that support them and undertake important functions such as research and development, procurement and sustainment. These changes are required now, not in some future budgetary environment. Current capabilities will probably need to be cut away to allow for much larger investment in human-machine teaming.

The key areas where transformation will be needed are in training, education, leadership development, tactics, organisational structures, and procurement.

Training. Uncrewed ground systems will be used in increasing densities in combat, combat support and combat service support functions. Training will be needed for specialists and generalists. Operating uncrewed ground systems will become a baseline competence for all soldiers; they will need to be as proficient in using uncrewed ground systems as they are employing their personal weapon.

The Ukraine War has demonstrated that effective drone training can significantly increase the likelihood of mission success when drones are used, as well as the survivability of the drones and their operators. As Oleksandra Molloy notes in her recent study of lessons about drone warfare in Ukraine:

The effectiveness of drones’ use largely depends on the skills and experience of their operators. Accordingly, ongoing training and education is essential to ensure a high level of competence in drone operation and utilisation.

The increasing ratio of uncrewed ground systems to humans in ground forces will also change how training of humans is conducted by military training institutions. Drones will need to be ubiquitous not just on the battlefield but in training schools. Training variants of all kinds of uncrewed ground systems will be needed, as will realistic simulation systems that can virtualise battlefield and other operating environments so trainees can master human-machine teaming.

Ukrainian soldiers during drone training. Source: DefenseOne

Armies are also likely to shift from operating individual uncrewed ground systems to orchestration of multiple uncrewed systems by individual soldiers. But perhaps an even bigger step than orchestration will be a shift to true partnering with uncrewed ground systems. When sophisticated AI is built into these systems, human-machine interfaces will possess many characteristics that look like human cognition. Armies must henceforth teach humans to shift from ‘users’ of machines to ‘partners’ of machines. This will take a change in military training systems as well as in military culture.

Evolved leadership development. Evolved models for developing leaders in a 21^st century human-machine military will be required. Contemporary leader development models have evolved over the past two centuries of industrial era conventional conflict. These models have a focus on preparing humans to lead and influence other humans.

However, in armies where there will almost certainly be a different ratio of humans to machines, and where those machines have AI that replicate some elements of human cognition, land forces will require leaders to have different skill sets. This will result in the requirement for military leaders to possess an evolved mix of human empathy and technological understanding.

Battlefield leaders, who will be operating in increasingly transparent, lethal and high-tempo environments brought about largely by drones, will need augmented decision support tools to effectively wield masses of uncrewed ground systems. Future leaders must be effective in using AI-enabled digitised command and control systems in future land combat.

Land force structures. The proliferation of uncrewed ground vehicles will force changes to the tactical organisations that armies are comprised of. Because of this, platoons, companies, battalions, brigades, divisions and other forces will increasingly look different to traditional units and formations.

This is an institutional force design issue, and will demand concept development, testing and experimentation to refine the capabilities of uncrewed ground systems continue to evolve. An important outcome of this experimentation will be revised tactical constructs incorporating different types of units and tactics. Another outcome of this experimentation is to build trust in new organisations and the uncrewed systems among soldiers, NCOs and officers.

Land tactics. Concurrent with the development of new land force structures, new tactics must be developed and incorporated into army training systems. Current tactical manuals used by different armies fortunately provide a start point. My current favourites are the Australian Army’s Formation Tactics, and the 2023 version of the US Army’s FM 3-90 Tactics. We must not entirely dispense with the generations of wisdom encoded in these publications; they are a foundation for evolved ground and air-ground tactics that must be developed for the coming decades.

A key driver, besides the proliferation of UGVs and aerial systems in the land environment, is the major shifts in the signatures and survivability of ground forces. This is a key operational challenge which has been observed in Ukraine and the Middle East and is an important change in the character of war. The recently released U.S. Army document, The Operational Environment 2024-2034, notes that:

Historically, high-quality targeting data and widespread surveillance has been limited to well-resourced state actors. However, the increasingly universal availability of emerging and disruptive technologies has allowed lesser combatants to utilize commercial technologies and data to find, fix, and finish high-value targets.

The consequence of this is that land forces, to conduct survivable land operations, must transform their tactics to deny their enemy enhanced battlefield visibility and exploit their own enhanced visibility of the battlefield. Tactics must evolve and they must do so from the squad level through to joint task forces.

Translated Russian doctrinal publication on new FPV drone tactics.

Military education. The proliferation of uncrewed ground systems must pervade the curricula of professional military education systems. For example, when army personnel are taught planning processes, how might risk considerations change when a much larger proportion of a deployed force is non-human? Will human planners take more risk in endeavours such as attacks?

Perhaps more importantly, how does a shift to a different quantity of non-human ground systems, with embedded AI, change the strategic and political risk calculus of national leaders? It is bound to have an impact on military strategy as well as upon civil-military relations. These shifts in strategic decision-making must also be incorporated into evolved professional education models.

Finally, military education must place a larger emphasis on technological literacy for mid-rank and senior military leaders. Senior leader development courses must incorporate literacy in uncrewed systems, so they might better use this knowledge in the development of evolved policy and strategy related to advanced civil and military technologies.

Procurement. More rapid procurement is needed as each generation of uncrewed ground systems improves. The more that are built the cheaper they might become. Standing partnerships with drone developers and manufacturers may also be needed for rapid adaptation rather than undertaking a myriad of individual purchases under separate projects. A transformed procurement system needs to provide defences against enemy uncrewed ground systems as well. We must deny this capability to our adversaries or at least degrade their use of them.

The Future of Land Power is Here

By the middle of the 21st century, ground forces will employ tens of thousands of robots, and the decisions of human commanders will be shaped by artificial intelligence. Although the future is impossible to predict, trends in technology and warfare make this a near certainty. Mick Ryan, Human Machine Teaming for Future Ground Forces, 2018

There is much we don’t yet know about the Battle of Lyptsi. The role of support forces on the flanks of this attack are not yet known. Nor do we know the degree to which indirect fires, electronic warfare and other systems were employed. However, the Ukrainians have again led the way with innovative battlefield solutions to pressing manpower challenges. They are sure to learn, adapt and broaden the application of these uncrewed air-land combat tactics.

But in most military institutions, multiple challenges remain in realising a fully integrated human-robot-AI land force. Ensuring that human-machine teams are mission capable, logistically supportable, survivable in multiple environments and highly lethal (to the enemy) will require continuous technological innovation in autonomous ground navigation, energy conservation, secure networked communications, protection against other UGVs and hardening against electronic warfare.

But not every military has the existential driver to transform that the Ukrainian military does. There will be many who will obstruct or slow down aspects of wider use of ground uncrewed systems. While debate is useful, and we should not rush to failure, we will also need to move quickly in a manner informed by battlefield and experimentation evidence. These changes to the culture of armies will demand excellent institutional leadership.

Notwithstanding this challenge, the pace of change in this field which blends advanced technology, human performance, military operations and human-robotic teaming, is moving very rapidly. It has progressed much more quickly than many of us believed possible even a few short years ago.

The Battle of Lyptsi is likely to be just the leading edge of a much larger wave of military transformation that is about to wash over land forces around the world. Armies are now at the dawn of a new era in ground operations. Those who continue to mark time in absorbing these technologies will be rapidly overwhelmed and will find themselves unable to win on the future battlefield.

7. Ukrainian M1 Abrams Commander Talks Tank's Major Vulnerabilities, Advantages In Combat

What would a US armored division conducting a fully integrated combined arms operation with air superiority do in Ukraine? 

​Excerpts:

The U.S. donated 31 Abrams to Ukraine, which first arrived in September 2023. They were first seen in combat in February and the first images of one that was destroyed appeared online three days later. In August, Australia promised to send 49 Abrams tanks to Ukraine.

Ukraine has lost at least 17 Abrams, according to the Oryx open-source tracking group. Of those, at least eight were destroyed, one damaged, seven damaged and abandoned and one captured. The actual figures are likely higher in reality because Oryx only tabulates losses for which it has visual confirmation.

After the crew abandoned the Abrams, “Russian FPV crews hit the tank with several more FPVs … but the tank was not destroyed and might still be salvageable,” the commander said. “Because of recent advances, Russian forces may capture it.”

The commander and his crew made it back to friendly lines on foot.

“It was close to the Russian positions,” he noted. “We could not evacuate because the FPVs were coming one after another. When I finally could hear no sound, we just jumped out of the tank and ran to a treeline. They were tracking us, so a mortar started working with some more drones, but we crawled away through the treeline. In the end, in a spot still under FPV control, our company commander rushed in and took us away.”

Despite its flaws, imperfect training and combat under conditions never imagined, the Abrams tank is a hit with its crews.

“We … are in love with this tank and are immensely grateful to the United States,” the commander said.

Ukrainian M1 Abrams Commander Talks Tank's Major Vulnerabilities, Advantages In Combat

The M1 commander highlighted glaring issues with the M1 that make it vulnerable on a drone drenched battlefield, while also praising its resilience.

Howard Altman

Posted on Dec 20, 2024

twz.com · by Howard Altman

Last week, several Russian first-person view (FPV) drones struck a U.S.-made M1A1 Abrams tank in the Kursk region, but the crew was able to survive. The vehicle’s commander lauded the American armor for saving their lives, but also highlighted some major vulnerabilities it has on today’s drone-drenched battlefield. In particular, he offered important insights on how Ukraine is adapting its M1s to survive — lessons that could prove very valuable for the U.S. Army in future conflicts.

The drone attack was “the first time that the crew survived multiple hits while inside a disabled Abrams,” the tank commander told Rob Lee (@RALee85), a senior fellow with the Foreign Policy Research Institute, and Michael Kofman (@KofmanMichael), a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment. “Actually, there were 4-6 direct hits. The crew survived, and even without injuries. God bless America.”

A video of that attack, by an FPV drone with a fiber optic cable, was posted on Russian telegram channels. It showed the Abrams rumbling down a snow-dusted roadway and then cut to it being struck by an FPV drone, which disabled the tank. The video then shows another FPV drone strike on the left side side just below the turret. All the strikes came within about two minutes, the commander, who is with the 47th Separate Mechanized Brigade, told Lee and Kofman.

Russian telegram channels posted videos of fiber optic cable FPV strikes on a Ukrainian Abrams tank in Kursk oblast last week. Aside from a concussion, the crew survived without injury and made it back to friendly lines. @KofmanMichael and I spoke to the commander of the tank… pic.twitter.com/piqapqvVMv

— Rob Lee (@RALee85) December 19, 2024

The crew survived thanks to a combination of the Abrams’ design and modifications the Ukrainians made after learning battlefield lessons the hard way, the commander explained.

The Abrams was designed with so-called blowout panels on top of the turret. The panels are fitted over the ammunition storage compartment at the rear of the turret. They are designed to help vent the force of any explosion upward and away from the crew in the event the tank is struck in such a way that causes the shells onboard to detonate.

“Thanks to the fact that the ammo is completely separated from the crew, the crew has a chance to survive (unlike in the T series tanks),” the commander exclaimed. “The Abrams is a great tank.”

A seemingly endless stream of videos have appeared online showing Russian tanks experiencing what has been colloquially referred to as “turret tosses” as the stored munitions inside its hull explode, sending the turrets flying into the air. You can see an example of that in the following video.

One of the most epic turret tosses by a Russian tank, presumably T-90M https://t.co/4OX7d4V9jQ pic.twitter.com/kPeKZFzYNW

— Special Kherson Cat (@bayraktar_1love) November 23, 2024

The tank also “had a unique ‘cope cage‘ (actually, ‘cope netting’) and a lot more ERA than an average Abrams,” the commander explained. “At least one” of the drones “got stuck in the net. Two more missed several minutes before. They apparently hit the engine. They were unable to penetrate either the turret or the hull elsewhere while we were inside.”

“Without the additional ERA and ‘cope netting’ on top of the turret, we would have been smashed and surely dead by now without any chance,” the commander extolled.

While militaries around the globe have begun integrating ‘cope cages‘ and other anti-drone screens on their armor, the U.S. has not followed suit, at least yet.

This tank, which belonged to the Ukrainian 47th Separate Mechanized Brigade, survived FPV drones strikes in large measure because of the netting added to the turret. (Twitter screencap) Twitter screencap

The commander offered several more takeaways about the Abrams.

“The most valuable advantage of the Abrams is that, when having much additional armor and a thorough approach, it saves human lives, even in dire conditions,” he noted.

“If the U.S. provided the tanks with the original armor and the complete [M-19 Abrams Reactive Armor Tiles (ARAT)] kits, this would make us more protected (although the top would still remain unprotected and we would need Kontakt-1, etc.),” he posited, adding some advice for the Pentagon.

“The American tankers should act promptly,” he urged. “Their tanks are too thin and vulnerable given the current threats on the battlefield. Protect your tanks urgently to avoid losses in potential near-future conflicts, taking into account our experience.”

A Russian drone operator prepares an FPV drone with a munition for launching. (Twitter screencap)

The commander also dismissed concerns that the Abrams would be too heavy, even more so with two to three tons of additional weight from the added ERA tiles. In addition, he confirmed that Ukraine did not receive the latest version of the Abrams and they were sent the export version without depleted uranium armor.

Before receiving their tanks, the 47th spent time training how to use them in Germany. The commander said while they were able to fire off a lot of rounds, the U.S. troops conducting that training did not have a full understanding of the challenges Ukraine would face fighting Russia.

“Well, we got a luxurious shooting practice (around 100 rounds fired by each gunner) and some good overall knowledge about the tank,” he explained. “But the American instructors AND military were completely unaware of the modern battlefield threats. And still are unaware (I communicate with some of the American tankers and try to share information with them).”

For example, the commander said his trainers “are shocked that Russians can see us at night with thermal-vision recon drones (we were taught that we would be haunting the Russians who are blind at night), they do not understand at all the threat posed by the FPVs, etc.”

You can see a Ukrainian journalist’s report on that training in the video below.

️Ukrainian journalist Andrii Tsaplienko, in the background of which is the American Abrams M1A1 tank, on which Ukrainian military personnel are training on the territory of the German military base Grafenwer pic.twitter.com/jgpHJJW3lT

— MilitaryNewsUA (@front_ukrainian) July 14, 2023

The U.S. donated 31 Abrams to Ukraine, which first arrived in September 2023. They were first seen in combat in February and the first images of one that was destroyed appeared online three days later. In August, Australia promised to send 49 Abrams tanks to Ukraine.

Ukraine has lost at least 17 Abrams, according to the Oryx open-source tracking group. Of those, at least eight were destroyed, one damaged, seven damaged and abandoned and one captured. The actual figures are likely higher in reality because Oryx only tabulates losses for which it has visual confirmation.

The Ukrainian Abrams tank that was said to have been attacked near Avdiivka as viewed from the top down through a handheld controller for a drone. (Via Twitter) The Ukrainian Abrams tank that was said to have been attacked near Avdiivka as viewed from the top down through a handheld controller for a drone. via X

After the crew abandoned the Abrams, “Russian FPV crews hit the tank with several more FPVs … but the tank was not destroyed and might still be salvageable,” the commander said. “Because of recent advances, Russian forces may capture it.”

The commander and his crew made it back to friendly lines on foot.

“It was close to the Russian positions,” he noted. “We could not evacuate because the FPVs were coming one after another. When I finally could hear no sound, we just jumped out of the tank and ran to a treeline. They were tracking us, so a mortar started working with some more drones, but we crawled away through the treeline. In the end, in a spot still under FPV control, our company commander rushed in and took us away.”

Despite its flaws, imperfect training and combat under conditions never imagined, the Abrams tank is a hit with its crews.

“We … are in love with this tank and are immensely grateful to the United States,” the commander said.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

• Armies
• Land
• M1 Abrams
• Tanks
• U.S. Army
• Ukrainian Army

twz.com · by Howard Altman

8. Does the Fall of Assad Re-Open Turkey’s Kurdish Pandora’s Box?

​Conclusion:

Nevertheless, with no roadmap in sight and the uncertain situation in Syria, the Kurdish issue will remain a central and unresolved challenge influencing Turkey’s domestic politics, regional strategies, and international relations. Whether Pandora’s box reopens, remains sealed, or shatters largely depends on these three elements of the equation aligning or continuing to diverge.

Does the Fall of Assad Re-Open Turkey’s Kurdish Pandora’s Box? - War on the Rocks

Samuele C. A. Abrami and Riccardo Gasco

warontherocks.com · by Samuele C. A. Abrami · December 23, 2024

“Snow has fallen on the mountains you dreamed of.” This Turkish saying describes a situation where something that was long hoped for or dreamed of has finally become reality, but it comes with unexpected challenges, risks, or disappointments.

And this seems to be the situation in front of Turkey after Syrian rebel forces put an end to the 50-year-long Assad regime. On the one hand, what happened earlier this month probably went beyond any of Ankara’s “wildest dreams”: achieving regime change in Damascus, taming Russian and Iranian influence, curbing the “Kurdish threat” at its borders, and allowing for the mass return of Syrian refugees. On the other hand, however, things could go sideways. First, while its support for the Syrian National Army and contacts with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham provide Turkey with leverage in the future power transition in Syria, the challenge is to ensure that the puzzle fits together without drastic setbacks. Second, considering the uncertainty about the incoming Trump administration, yet to be seen is the role of Ankara’s competitors, especially pro-Kurdish groups such as the U.S.-backed People’s Protection Units and the Syrian Democratic Forces.

As a matter of fact, Turkey’s leadership seems to be satisfied with the latest developments. Nonetheless, as its regional equation implies facilitating a smooth sociopolitical transition in Damascus but also the fight against the “Kurdish terrorist corridor,” it is highly likely that this evolutionary phase will have significant implications for Turkey’s own Kurdish equation. Still to clarify is the extent to which the Syrian transition government led by Mohammed al Sharraa and Turkey’s objectives on the issue overlap. As the Turkish Foreign Ministry lately declared, “If they [the Syrian transition cabinet] address this issue properly, there would be no reason for us to intervene.” Yet, while this seems to confirm their embrace of a pluralistic vision for a “new” Syria, clashes might emerge on their respective position about the future of pro-Kurdish groups in the northeast.

Will the fall of Bashar al Assad re-open the Kurdish Pandora’s box? What is the interconnection between Turkish domestic and foreign policies on this matter? Ankara faces a dual path: seeking normalization to mitigate regional instability or risking escalation in Syria, which could reignite the securitized approach it has long applied to the Kurdish issue. With no clear roadmap and Syria’s situation in flux, the Kurdish issue looms large and is likely to remain an unresolved equation at the heart of Turkey’s domestic and regional math.

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The Terms of Turkey’s Kurdish Equation

In Turkey, the Kurdish question historically resembles a Pandora’s box that can be opened, broken, or hidden in different periods by several actors and for multiple reasons. Indeed, Turkish citizens and observers of Turkish politics are accustomed to the cyclical phases of tension and rapprochement in the government’s relationship with the Kurds. Still, in October many were surprised when the Turkish government made a new call for normalization to various segments of the Kurdish leadership. It was surprising because it came from Devlet Bahçeli, the leader of the ultranationalist Nationalist Movement Party. It was even more astonishing because it was directly addressed to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party — considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States, and many Western countries — and its leader, Abdullah Öcalan, who has been imprisoned by Turkey since 1999. Was it a genuine move to reverse the negative trend since the break of the peace process in 2015? Or is it just another strategy dictated by the political calculations of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party?

Meanwhile, as a twist of fate, some cells affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party conducted a terrorist attack in Ankara that same month, to which the government responded not only with an increase in military actions but also with a wave of re-securitization against pro-Kurdish and opposition political figures in Turkey. Is this also related to the broader ongoing international and regional instability? And, considering the uncertainties around the Syrian conundrum and a new Trump administration, what does the future hold for the Kurdish issue inside and outside Turkey?

Just Another Attempt at a Long Series?

“A Turk who does not like Kurds is not a Turk. A Kurd who does not like Turks is not a Kurd.” So said the leader of Turkey’s right-wing Nationalist Movement Party. This was an unlikely source as Bahçeli is well known for his harsh anti-Kurdish stance. A few days later, such appeasing words found an echo in a similar conciliatory tone in Erdoğan’s public statements, yet with less vigor and more caution in differentiating between “Kurdish brothers” and “those terrorists in Syria and Iraq.”

As we have argued elsewhere, this seems to confirm that the relationship between the Turkish state and Kurdish political and military representatives is characterized by an intertwining between the external and internal dimensions. On the one hand, Erdoğan and his party have a two-decades-long history of ebbs and flows with the Kurdish question. While up to the early 2010s, his governments endeavored to follow a path of accommodation and dialogue, the last 10 years have been witness to a return to a re-securitization within and outside Turkey’s borders. On the other hand, Kurdish parties and non-state actors like the Kurdistan Workers Party — a left-wing militant group founded in the 1980s — have undergone numerous alterations but have proved resilient.

This attempt at a resolution is just the latest of a long series of attempts to cope with a structural open question for the Turkish state. As early as 2009, then-Prime Minister Erdoğan proposed an initiative known as the “Kurdish Opening.” Despite the ups and downs in this complicated process, the government and intelligence services made similar attempts until 2015, a year that dramatically ended the peace overture. The collapse of dialogue prompted the restart of “trench wars” in Turkey’s southeastern regions, further exacerbated by the spillover effects of the Syrian civil war.

Almost a decade later, his ruling coalition is now weakened by an ongoing economic crisis and a decline in votes. Therefore, at first glance, broadening the voter base through reconciliation with particular segments of the Kurdish communities could arguably represent a political strategy for Erdoğan’s immediate and long-term political objectives. This is plausible, considering he is a pragmatic leader who can turn the country’s volatile context and sociopolitical polarization in his favor. His party needs additional support to secure a parliamentary majority to amend the constitution, which currently limits the presidential mandate to two terms, allowing him to run in the 2028 presidential elections.

Nevertheless, reaching and engaging the various components of Kurdish society remains a formidable challenge. One should recall that the Kurdish electorate and political factions are far from monolithic. On one side are those who identify themselves with the principles of the People’s Equality and Democracy Party, where there are still figures following the leadership of Öcalan and those trying to gain broader leftist-leaning appeal, even among non-Kurdish voters. On the other side are more traditionalist and conservative groups that have historically supported Erdoğan’s party and, as some sources told us, now “appear to be the most surprised by government’s search for dialogue.” In this sense, Erdoğan sees an opportunity to exploit these internal divisions within the Kurdish electorate, seeking to win over more moderate and conservative segments without alienating the government’s nationalist supporters.

The Kurdish Question as the Opposition’s Kryptonite

The Erdoğan-Bahçeli duo’s “divide-and-rule strategy” not only strengthens their domestic position but also serves to marginalize the Republican People’s Party, the main opposition party. Indeed, forcing it to take potentially divisive stances on Kurdish issues is likely to foment dissent between its liberal and more nationalist factions. This also represents a way to discredit the opposition whenever its leaders open up to Kurdish counterparts by accusing them of talking with “terrorists.” As such, Bahçeli’s recent statements suggesting reconciliation with Öcalan seem part of this broader political calculation. Yet, as close observers noted, this move is likely coordinated with Erdoğan, aiming to present Erdoğan’s administration as open to dialogue while maintaining a pragmatic and tactical distance. In this way, Erdoğan retains the flexibility to step back should public opinion turn against the idea, avoiding the political fallout from previous failed Kurdish outreach attempts and leaving open the possibility of using the state’s “heavy hand.”

This is what happened after the events in Ankara in October 2024, when the Kurdistan Workers Party launched a terrorist attack on TUSAŞ, one of Turkey’s leading aerospace companies. Domestically, the government used the event as a pretext to take severe measures against Kurdish-affiliated political figures and municipalities. Recent actions include the dismissal of the Republican People Party’s mayor of Kurdish origins in Istanbul’s Esenyurt district for alleged terrorist links, as well as the imposition of trustees and investigations against 37 pro-Kurdish party mayors. Such measures reflect a longstanding practice in southeastern Turkey, where the government has frequently replaced elected officials with appointed trustees in Kurdish-majority areas. Yet, this comes with a political cost. This practice is becoming increasingly unacceptable also among some ruling members of parliament. They view it as one of the key reasons behind the party’s consistent loss of support in predominantly Kurdish-populated areas over the years. At the same time, this might also help the incumbent rulers to satisfy the demands of those conservative Kurds who do not feel represented by the People’s Equality and Democracy Party’s leftist and progressive positions.

An Olive Branch Is Not For Everyone

Offering an “olive branch” to Öcalan has not precluded Ankara from intensifying its military operations against pro-Kurdish militias in Iraq and Syria. Indeed, the Kurdistan Workers Party’s activities extend across borders, where the actions of its affiliated groups impact both Turkey’s domestic politics and relations with neighboring states. Bahçeli himself has declared that “Turkey does not have a Kurdish problem, nor will there ever be. The existing problem is the problem of separatist terrorism, and this betrayal will definitely be rooted out.” That is why some argue that this latest peace proposal by the Turkish government is just a way to disentangle the different components of the Kurdish equation.

First, especially within the context of Israel’s war on Hamas, the recent toppling of Assad, and the ongoing instability in the Middle East, Turkey is playing a delicate match. On the one hand, Erdoğan’s government is leveraging the situation to reinforce its position towards its domestic and regional audience. On the other, securing the country from potential spillover effects remains a security priority.

Overall, Erdoğan is aware that these dynamics could increase the Kurds’ strategic value if other actors exploit Kurdish factions to advance their agendas. Israel’s increased military activism is part of a broader strategy to dismantle Iran’s “axis of resistance.” A senior member of the Kurdistan Workers Party declared on Nov. 14 that, while condemning Israel’s policies, the establishment of relations is not excluded. Thus, Turkey fears that the group could be similarly weaponized by rival powers, adding urgency to Ankara’s efforts to neutralize it domestically and regionally.

Second, Erdoğan likely interprets the current moment as an opportunity to address Turkey’s Kurdish issue by securing broader regional support. In Iraq, Ankara has sought to bolster counter-terrorism cooperation by persuading Baghdad to officially label the Kurdistan Workers Party as a terrorist organization. However, the anticipated collaboration has not yet materialized. Recent developments suggest that Iraq plans to organize a security conference involving Turkey, Iran, and Syria to address the issue. This could also rely on the support of Kurdistan Region President Nerchirvan Barzani, who recently noted that this would mark the beginning of a new promising process. Nonetheless, much will now depend on the transition administration in Syria.

Lastly, the presence of nearly four million Syrian refugees in Turkey has also turned into a political liability for Erdogan’s government. This is even more true in light of the current developments in Syria. The takeover by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham positions Ankara as the primary interlocutor with the new administration. One of Turkey’s stated objectives is to put an end to Kurdish terrorism originating from Syria, specifically from the People’s Defense Units. Surely, Ankara might want to capitalize on this eventual favorable sliding-door scenario. Syria has long been a pivotal factor in shaping Turkey’s domestic politics, and the current situation presents a golden opportunity for Ankara.

The Trump Factor

Much also hinges on developments at the international level. While major players like the United States and Russia might have diverted their attention to other more urgent scenarios, their moves and influence still maintain the power to restrict or enlarge other regional players’ margin of maneuver. Above all, Washington’s longstanding support for the Syrian Democratic Forces and the People’s Protection Units has heavily strained its relations with Ankara. Hence, a key consideration for Turkey is the return of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency. Trump’s previous administration took steps to withdraw American forces from Syria, providing Turkey with more margin of maneuver for military interventions.

That is why many in Ankara viewed Trump’s re-election for a second term in the White House positively, with Erdoğan referring to him as a friend in his congratulatory message. However, this cautiously optimistic atmosphere waned with the “not super Turkey-friendly” first appointments the upcoming Trump administration made. Marco Rubio, appointed secretary of state, and Mike Waltz, named as national security advisor, are two figures who could further complicate relations between Ankara and Washington. The former is known for his positions close to the Gülenists, followers of Fethullah Gülen, who recently passed away but is considered the mastermind behind the 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. The latter is recognized for his general anti-Turkey stance and strong support for the Kurdish cause and Kurdish groups in the Middle East.

Peace or Endless Waves of Securitization?

Since the breakdown of the peace process in 2015, the Kurdish question has experienced waves of securitization. The recent terrorist attack in Ankara underscores the volatility of the issue, which can be easily and quickly transformed from a political question to a matter of national security and foreign policy. In the near term, the oscillation between politicizing and securitizing the Kurdish issue is likely to continue, deepening polarization within Turkish society and heightening the risk of security escalations in sensitive regions, as Syria shows.

Domestically, there are the incumbent government’s political calculations and dividends. Recent developments have revealed that certain factions within the Kurdistan Workers Party have no intention of accepting a deal proposed by Erdoğan, whom they view as an autocrat incapable of making the necessary concessions. This depends on whether the upcoming talks between the pro-Kurdish party’s chairpersons and Öcalan will cease the guerrillas’ modus operandi in favor of a political solution. Yet, should this not work out, these contrasts might result in the emergence of new and radical figures in the Kurdistan Workers Party, further complicating the prospects for a viable resolution. Finally, solving the equation is also a matter of alignment and cooperation between Kurdish and other opposition leaders. A critical factor could be the Republican People’s Party’s willingness to move away from nationalist rhetoric and foster collaboration with the pro-Kurdish party as tried since the 2019 municipal elections.

At the domestic-regional nexus, the alleged divergent views between the Iraqi and Syrian divisions of the Kurdistan Workers Party also underscore how Öcalan likely no longer possesses the full ability to influence the entirety of the movement. While the founder has called on the movement’s members to lay down their weapons, some stick with the original violent tactics. On the regional front, much will depend on developments in Syria, especially the progress of the transitional government and the role that Ankara could play. Furthermore, it will take several months to discern how the United States intends to manage its stance on the matter and its broader Middle Eastern policies. This might result in new green lights from Trump for Turkish military operations, as in 2019, or a more proactive stance in which Washington could promote this renovated peace process to avoid any further escalation during the power transition in Syria. For a start, the United States could try to press the Syrian Democratic Forces to clearly detach from the Kurdistan Workers Party’s violent positions and overtly stand for Syria’s territorial integrity. In this regard, it is unpredictable whether the latest alleged preoccupation in Washington about limiting the scope of Kurdish autonomy would also address some of Turkey’s concerns. However, it will be challenging to appease Turkey’s position on the security side of the equation, as demonstrated by the recent military build-up across the areas dominated by Kurdish groups. First, Ankara views the party founded by Öcalan and its Syrian offshoot as part of the same movement, and the country’s nationalistic milieu makes it unthinkable for Turkish leaders to accept any sort of empowerment of Kurdish zones inside Syria. Second, it is worth noting that any increase in the Turkish army’s military operations against Kurdish militias in Iraq and Syria triggers a rally-around-the-flag effect within Turkish society that helps the government draw bipartisan support against an evergreen matter of “national survival.”

Nevertheless, with no roadmap in sight and the uncertain situation in Syria, the Kurdish issue will remain a central and unresolved challenge influencing Turkey’s domestic politics, regional strategies, and international relations. Whether Pandora’s box reopens, remains sealed, or shatters largely depends on these three elements of the equation aligning or continuing to diverge.

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Samuele C. A. Abrami is a Mercator-Istanbul Policy Center fellow. He is about to obtain his Ph.D. from the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, where he is also a lecturer for the Masters in Middle Eastern Studies. Besides Turkish foreign policy, his research focuses on the E.U. foreign policy, Turkish politics, the Kurdish issue, and climate change in the Middle East and North Africa. A member of the Turkey Europe Future Forum, Samuele was also a visiting fellow at Sabancı University and the Stockholm Institute for Turkish Studies.

Riccardo Gasco is a Ph.D. candidate at Bologna University and Foreign Policy Program coordinator at IstanPol Institute in Istanbul, as well as a visiting research fellow at the Istanbul Policy Center. He holds a degree in international relations from the University of Genoa and the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. His research focuses on Turkey’s foreign policy between NATO and Russia. He has published on Turkish foreign policy, domestic politics, the Kurdish issue, Turkish-E.U. relations, the Middle East, and trans-Atlantic relations.

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Samuele C. A. Abrami · December 23, 2024

9. Philippine Armed Forces

​An interesting OpEd in the Manila times praising the Philippine military and security forces and first responders.

Military and uniformed personnel, or MUP, are mission-oriented. They are trained and drilled on objective ends. There are officers and the rank and file and there are elite forces. These elite forces are the Special Operations Command (Socom), the primary unit responsible for conducting special operations in the Philippines. This includes counterterrorism, direct action missions, and unconventional warfare. Socom is composed of various specialized units, including the Philippine Army Special Forces (Green Berets), Philippine Navy Special Operations Group (NavSog) and Philippine Air Force Special Operations Wing (PAF-SOW).

We have counter-terrorism units to address the growing threat of terrorism in the region. These units are trained to respond quickly to terrorist incidents and conduct operations to neutralize threats. They often collaborate with international partners to enhance their capabilities. The Special Action Force (SAF) is an elite unit within the PNP that specializes in high-risk operations, including hostage rescue, counterterrorism, and anti-drug operations. They are known for their rigorous training and are often deployed in critical situations where law enforcement requires specialized skills. There is the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) Special Rescue Unit, while primarily focused on firefighting and rescue operations, the BFP also has specialized units trained for emergency response in disaster situations. These personnel are crucial during natural disasters, providing rescue and recovery services. And the Joint Task Forces combine personnel from different branches (Army, Navy, Air Force) to address specific threats or conduct operations in particular areas. These task forces are designed to leverage the strengths of each branch for more effective operations.

Fading away

ZILCH

https://www.manilatimes.net/2024/12/24/opinion/columns/fading-away/2026706

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IT's the eve of Christmas 2024, and we are preparing for the traditional get-together on the eve with family. The following day, we open our gifts and celebrate the birth of the Child Jesus. There are so many things to be thankful for and share, but this one is personal: I thank the uniformed personnel for all the things they have done through the political mess we are in right now. In mind are the junior officers who remain loyal and protect the State, for as someone stressed, "We are part of the State."

Military and uniformed personnel, or MUP, are mission-oriented. They are trained and drilled on objective ends. There are officers and the rank and file and there are elite forces. These elite forces are the Special Operations Command (Socom), the primary unit responsible for conducting special operations in the Philippines. This includes counterterrorism, direct action missions, and unconventional warfare. Socom is composed of various specialized units, including the Philippine Army Special Forces (Green Berets), Philippine Navy Special Operations Group (NavSog) and Philippine Air Force Special Operations Wing (PAF-SOW).

We have counter-terrorism units to address the growing threat of terrorism in the region. These units are trained to respond quickly to terrorist incidents and conduct operations to neutralize threats. They often collaborate with international partners to enhance their capabilities. The Special Action Force (SAF) is an elite unit within the PNP that specializes in high-risk operations, including hostage rescue, counterterrorism, and anti-drug operations. They are known for their rigorous training and are often deployed in critical situations where law enforcement requires specialized skills. There is the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) Special Rescue Unit, while primarily focused on firefighting and rescue operations, the BFP also has specialized units trained for emergency response in disaster situations. These personnel are crucial during natural disasters, providing rescue and recovery services. And the Joint Task Forces combine personnel from different branches (Army, Navy, Air Force) to address specific threats or conduct operations in particular areas. These task forces are designed to leverage the strengths of each branch for more effective operations.

Uniformed personnel primarily include members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), the Philippine National Police (PNP), and other agencies involved in national defense and law enforcement. They are tasked with maintaining peace, order, and security within the country. They serve a variety of critical roles that are essential for maintaining national security, public safety, and order. The primary functions they fulfill are national defense (members of the AFP are primarily responsible for defending the country against external threats); law enforcement (PNP) is tasked with maintaining peace and order within the country); disaster response and management (often at the forefront of disaster response efforts, particularly during natural calamities such as typhoons, earthquakes, and floods); internal security operations (engage in internal security operations to combat insurgency and terrorism); community engagement (participate in community outreach programs aimed at fostering trust and cooperation between the military/police and the civilian population); and support for civil authorities (during times of national emergencies or civil unrest, uniformed personnel may be called upon to support civil authorities in maintaining order).

Challenges are aplenty. From promotions to pension systems, redress of grievances (limited to two levels up), health and safety prioritization, streamlining benefits processing and legislative support both for the institution and the personnel.

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Of late, the enemies of the state (CPP-NPA-NDF) led the offensive in the House. Positioned by the House speaker as a "truth commission," the enemies of the state lorded it over the quad com and the use of confidential and intelligence funds. The belated reactions of the Secretary of National Defense and the national security adviser on the enemies of the state were shocking since they supported the amnesty program of the Marcos administration from the beginning.

The ruling class currently are Classes 1990 and 1991. Next would be Classes 1992 and 1993. The force of 120,000 are trained to be professional, competent and have integrity as a core principle in all their lives. The AFP has an estimated 150,000 active personnel and 1,500,000 ready reserve personnel in 2024.

All they ask is for the government to take care of their respective families and kids and "let us die in our country," for it is a career with one foot already on the grave. They love the system, but they hate the insults often thrown by some politicians, such as the increase of P200 in their subsistence allowance shown to the whole world via a video of Speaker Romualdez telling the AFP chief of the increase and the photo ops among officers. Soldiers don't complain even if, on the 32nd day, they are already hungry. The increase was not even announced by the commander in chief.

Then there is the AFP modernization, which has been played so many times, resulting in a military that needs to pole-vault to be at par with our neighbors. Under the proposed budget for 2025, Congress slashed the modernization budget from P50 billion to P15 billion in exchange for an increase in subsistence allowance. Is this the right policy? In the military, though, they often say, "Sometimes doing the right thing is not right." And I often wonder if this is due to the so-called doctrine of the chain of command.

And the fading away is happening fast to junior officers who have dedicated 27-30 years to reach the star rank only to be left to rot because there is no movement. They just go home every quarter for seven days or a total of 28 days for a year to decompress and be with family, then back to duty, never asking about promotions when there are still vacant positions. Disgruntled? Many are, most especially when the leader just waves at them when he visits and never asks how they are. Or they are treated disrespectfully by partisan politicians such as what happened to PNP Col. Hector Grijaldo (whom the chief PNP seems unable to assist) and former PDEA chief Wilkins Villanueva, among others.

If there are promotions, it is often not based on merit. Take the case of the so-called "coup soldiers" who had to queue for promotions only to leapfrog by several notches. There were also instances when, during donning of ranks, some decided to skip things in protest by having a drinking spree the day before the event so that they could signify their protest. There are so many stories of promotions that lead to fading away because they cannot question decisions made by higher-ups, most especially when other civilians interfere.

"The soldier's heart, the soldier's spirit, the soldier's soul, are everything." I hope political leaders understand them more because they often say, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." Maraming salamat sa inyo. Maligayang Pasko sa lahat ng Filipino!

10. Russia, Iran, and North Korea Unite Prompting U.S. Special Forces Prepare for Next-Gen Challenges

​ASD Maier's one hour CNAS conference is getting a lot of press.

Russia, Iran, and North Korea Unite Prompting U.S. Special Forces Prepare for Next-Gen Challenges

republicworld.com · December 23, 2024

Published 15:45 IST, December 23rd 2024

This realignment of focus marks a critical evolution in U.S. defence policy, positioning SOF as a cornerstone of conflict prevention and global security.

• Defence
• 3 min read

Reported by: Yuvraj Tyagi

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This shift underscores the increasing complexity of global threats that demand innovative strategies from the SOF community. | Image: US Indo-Pacific Command

Washington D.C. — The Pentagon is emphasizig the crucial role of Special Operations Forces (SOF) in preventing conflicts. The recent development comes as adversaries of the United States strengthen their alliances and influence operations across the globe. This shift underscores the increasing complexity of global threats that demand innovative strategies from the SOF community.

At a recent event hosted by the Center for a New American Security, Christopher Maier, the outgoing assistant secretary for Special Operations-Low-Intensity Conflict, highlighted the evolving role of SOF in the competition and crisis phases that precede armed conflict.

“Progress in recent years has been expanding that aperture to look at competition and crisis as warfighting challenges,” Maier stated. He emphasized the necessity of SOF operations in unconventional contexts, breaking away from traditional assumptions that view war solely through direct combat.

Adversarial Alliances Intensify

The U.S. faces increasingly complex threats as adversarial nations forge alliances across multiple fronts. Army Gen. Bryan Fenton, head of Special Operations Command, described a "convergence" of adversaries during the Reagan National Defense Forum earlier this month.

The alignment of forces includes examples such as North Korean troops fighting alongside Russia in Ukraine, Iranian personnel training Russian forces, and China's indirect contributions to Moscow’s war efforts.

Russian Special Forces during a HALO training mission.

“This is not just Russia fighting Ukraine,” Fenton said. “It’s Russia, backed by Iranian drones, North Korean personnel, and indirect Chinese contributions.”

The convergence extends beyond state actors. Long-standing partnerships between Iran and groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis demonstrate how nation-states collaborate with non-state entities to advance geopolitical objectives. These partnerships threaten U.S. interests globally, particularly in regions like the Middle East and Europe.

Strengthening Deterrence and Preparedness

Recognizing the expanding threat landscape, SOF units are integrating innovative deterrence strategies. Exercises like the West Virginia Army National Guard’s “Ridge Runner” simulate scenarios reflective of current conflicts, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. These drills, featuring personnel from multiple branches of the U.S. military, showcase how SOF troops can support local forces while preparing for irregular warfare.

Psychological operations, civil affairs, and tactical deployments are now critical components of SOF operations, shifting focus from counterterrorism to broader geopolitical competition.

Tailored Campaigning: A Strategic Imperative

Deterrence remains at the forefront of U.S. defence strategy. According to Maier, the SOF community’s role in "campaigning" is becoming increasingly important. Campaigning involves integrating military and civilian resources to preempt conflicts and stabilize regions.

Troops from US Northern Command (Left) and troops from US Indo-Pacific Command (Right). | Credit- US Army

The Pentagon’s shift, outlined in a 2023 report by the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), calls for region-specific strategies to counter the unique challenges posed by nations like Russia, China, and Iran. This approach links SOF capabilities with broader military and governmental efforts, ensuring a unified response to adversarial activities.

The Decisive Decade

The U.S. faces a pivotal moment in global security, with adversaries leveraging unconventional means to challenge its influence. SOF troops, equipped with versatile capabilities and a new operational mandate, are central to countering these threats. As partnerships among adversaries grow stronger, the convergence of challenges necessitates a convergence of U.S. strengths to maintain global stability.

Key Takeaways

• Adversaries like Russia, China, and Iran are intensifying partnerships with state and non-state actors.
• SOF operations now emphasize deterrence and crisis management in addition to direct combat.
• Tailored campaigning strategies align military resources with regional geopolitical needs, ensuring preparedness for evolving threats.

This realignment of focus marks a critical evolution in U.S. defence policy, positioning SOF as a cornerstone of conflict prevention and global security.

Updated 15:45 IST, December 23rd 2024

republicworld.com · December 23, 2024

11. Elbridge Colby: the brain behind Trump's foreign policy

​Oh and "Korea passing" will come to pass. While the author focuses on Europe and Ukraine and mentions Japan and Taiwan, he does not even mention korea.

Elbridge Colby: the brain behind Trump's foreign policy

unherd.com · by Tom Rogan

December 23, 2024 - 11:00am

As President-elect Donald Trump continues to nominate candidates to serve in his next administration, one name could indicate the direction of America’s foreign policy during his second presidency. Elbridge Colby, who wrote the National Defense Strategy in 2018, has now been picked to be the next Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, vowing to “focus our defense policy on restoring peace through strength and always putting America first”.

A Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense in Trump’s first term, Colby is popular with conservative realists for his scepticism of foreign military entanglements. Conversely, others on the Right fear that Colby is too dovish towards Iran. Nonetheless, he is undoubtedly accomplished, not to mention aligned with Trump’s foreign policy instincts. The Undersecretary of Defense for Policy is responsible for developing Pentagon strategy, and Colby’s writing and public statements provide an insight as to where he will focus his energies: namely, China.

Colby believes that the military threat posed by Beijing is far more potent and concerning than is generally understood in Washington. In turn, he argues that US military resources need to be redeployed from Europe and the Middle East to the Pacific in order to better deter China. American military resources, especially naval resources, are currently spread too thin; amid an inadequate defence industrial base which produces warships far too slowly and expensively, this overstretch is increasing maintenance delays and crew exhaustion. At the same time, the People’s Liberation Army is ramping up its production of highly capable missiles and warships, demonstrating the likelihood that the US military would lose a war over Taiwan.

In tandem with Trump’s push for European allies to spend more on defence, an argument that Colby has made repeatedly, we should therefore expect fewer high-end naval and air force deployments on the continent. This should not be a great concern for European governments, which have traditionally preferred the Americans to carry the expensive weight of deterrence activities related to Russia. Because of Moscow’s increasingly sophisticated nuclear ballistic missile submarine forces, however, the US Navy will maintain submarine deployments in European waters under Trump. If Europe is to reach one conclusion from Colby’s appointment, it is that its leaders should invest significantly and immediately in refuelling and transport aircraft, and boost support for Ukraine.

While some claim that giving Colby a top Defense brief will lead to an abandonment of US support for Ukraine, this concern is arguably overstated. Though he has lobbied for a more cautious provision of US military aid to Ukraine, the incoming administration is likely to recognise that this aid is its primary lever of influence towards Russian concessions in future peace negotiations. Still, Colby’s appointment does emphasise that Trump wants to put intellectual weight behind his argument that Europe must do much more for its own security. The same principle applies to other allies such as Taiwan and Japan, which Colby has argued must also significantly increase defence spending.

Though he is outspoken on social media, US allies will find a good partner in Colby. I know from personal experience that he is willing to engage in serious and respectful debate. He has strong views but also a sustaining interest in productive dialogue. He will further a Trump defence policy that seeks to avoid conflict wherever possible, while pursuing urgent preparations for war of a kind not seen since 1945.

Tom Rogan is a national security writer at the Washington Examiner

12. Paper Urges Leaders to Embrace Nontraditional Commands

​Read the paper The Leadership Route Less Taken: Taking Charge in the Army’s “Other” Commands here: https://www.ausa.org/publications/harding-paper/leadership-route-less-taken

Paper Urges Leaders to Embrace Nontraditional Commands

ausa.org · December 23, 2024

Photo by: Courtesy

Mon, 12/23/2024 - 08:36

Army leaders selected for command positions can set themselves up for success both prior to and while commanding, regardless of the type of unit they’re tapped to lead, according to a new paper published by the Association of the U.S. Army.

“All officers have an unspoken level of nervousness and apprehension going into their command positions—and fears and uncertainty are likely heightened when officers are going into nontraditional command roles,” write authors Capts. Andrew Lightsey and Tanner Cook, Col. Xavier Colón and Lt. Col. Chaveso Cook. “There is a lot of written guidance on basic branch and operational commands, but there is not much to be found on ‘alternative’ leadership positions.”

In “The Leadership Route Less Taken: Taking Charge in the Army’s ‘Other’ Commands,” the authors offer advice for commanders as they prepare to take command and during their tenure.

Lightsey is a public affairs officer with the 101st Airborne Division, while Cook commands the Boise Army Recruiting Company. Colón is a division chief on the Joint Staff’s deputy directorate for special operations and counterterrorism, and Cook is a division chief on the Joint Staff’s deputy directorate for global operations.

Their paper is part of AUSA’s new Harding Papers series, which was launched in conjunction with the Army’s Harding Project, which aims to revitalize scholarship and writing across the force.

Prior to command, incoming leaders should create a vision and purpose statements that can “reach and resonate with the most junior soldiers and civilians in the organization,” the authors write.

“When the Army talks about purpose and legacy, it talks about us ‘being a part of something bigger’; although your purpose and vision should be tailored to the organization, do not discount the need to fit into the bigger Army picture—even when your command is nontraditional,” the authors write.

Commanders “must be prepared to ‘loosen the reigns’ as quickly as [they] tighten them” and “be comfortable with delegating tasks, and trust that they will be completed to standard,” according to the authors.

Regardless of the type of unit, “leading America’s sons and daughters in our armed forces is an unparalleled privilege,” the authors write.

“While the role of the commander in nontraditional units certainly comes with distinct challenges and issues, as does any command, each leader must remember no matter the circumstances, a command is a command,” the authors write. “It is not a privilege or a responsibility to be taken lightly—and it is certainly neither a guarantee nor a right for any commander.”

Read the paper here.

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ausa.org · December 23, 2024

13. The Rise and Fall of Economic Statecraft

​Excerpts:

The one area in which Trump shows unwavering determination is his enmity toward technical expertise. His promised efforts to immediately fire “corrupt actors” in the national security and intelligence apparatus will lead to years of lawsuits. Yet even if they do not fully succeed, they will hinder the ability of the economic security state to get things done. Economic security officials with decades of experience will question whether they want to stay in an unpredictable workplace.

Indeed, everyone—businesses, allied governments, and adversaries—will be trying to figure out what is happening within a chaotic administration, and, if possible, to shape it. Allies will strive to protect themselves from an unpredictable great power that is no longer as capable of exercising control as it believes. Foreign and domestic businesses and crypto capitalists will rewire the infrastructure of the world economy to make more money, just as their forebears did in the early days of the U.S. empire, when the state was underdeveloped. Some may capture parts of the Trump administration, turning U.S. power to their own advantage. Adversaries will look to capitalize on America’s weaknesses, leading to even greater disorganization.

Once, and not too long ago, it was possible for U.S. elites to believe that technocrats could order the world in their interests, making it secure and predictable for them. They held out hope that Trump’s first term was a temporary aberration. Now, it is clear that it was no such thing. The sun is setting on the sanctions technocrats, and indeed on traditional technocracy more generally. American economic power is sure to suffer for it.

The Rise and Fall of Economic Statecraft

Foreign Affairs · by More by Henry Farrell · December 23, 2024

Review Essay

Overreach and Incoherence Hobble America’s Most Powerful Weapon

Henry Farrell

January/February 2025 Published on December 23, 2024

The New York Stock Exchange in New York City, November 2024 Stephani Spindel / Reuters

Henry Farrell is Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute Professor of International Affairs at Johns Hopkins University.

In This Review

• Dollars and Dominion: U.S. Bankers and the Making of a Superpower
• By Mary Bridges
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• Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare
• By Edward Fishman
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When Donald Trump returns to the White House in late January, he’ll hold the levers of U.S. economic power. The ubiquity of the dollar as a currency of exchange, coupled with the centrality of U.S. financial institutions and networks, gives Washington an unparalleled ability to make it hard for adversaries to do business. Since 9/11, the United States has wielded financial sanctions at an increasing scale and scope, targeting individuals, governments, and nonstate actors. It has even turned export controls for technologies into a makeshift alternative for sanctions. The future of these tools—some of the most consequential the United States possesses—now resides with a mercurial president.

On the campaign trail, Trump insisted that sanctions were a poor tool compared with tariffs: he vowed to use them “as little as possible” for fear that they would kill the dollar as a world currency—an outcome as bad as losing a war, he claimed. That professed skepticism clashed with his record in office. In his first term, he was happy to slap sanctions on North Korea and deploy them in an effort to exert “maximum pressure” on Iran. Trump’s flip-flopping on sanctions is likely to spark disagreements in his next term. Many of the figures he is bringing into his administration, such as Senator Marco Rubio, the nominee for secretary of state, are proponents of sanctions. They will certainly want to train this major weapon of U.S. economic statecraft on their enemies. Others may be nervous about overusing sanctions, as Steven Mnuchin, the treasury secretary in Trump’s first administration, was. Some may even be actively hostile to the power of the U.S. dollar.

Discord may reign. Washington’s ability to surveil vast troves of financial data and keep money and technology out of the hands of its rivals could be hamstrung by infighting and by Trump’s tendency to change his mind on a whim. U.S. economic security policy is primed to become a battleground in which China hawks, tariff warriors, Wall Streeters, and Bitcoin bros compete to sway a president who comes up with policy based on the advice of whoever he last talked to.

The likely consequences of that discord are made clear by two new books that tell the story of how Washington came to master the art of economic coercion, and consider how that mastery might fare in the future. In Dollars and Dominion, Mary Bridges, a business journalist turned historian, lays out the century-old beginnings of the United States’ financial empire. In Chokepoints, Edward Fishman, who worked at the Treasury and State Departments, celebrates the “sanctions technocrats” who have built up this mastery over the last two decades. Given that Trump regards technocratic expertise as the fetters of the “deep state,” Bridges’s account may prove more relevant in the near future, as Trump returns to an earlier and more primitive approach to American economic power.

Today, as in the early twentieth century, that power stems from a hodgepodge of sources. Over the past two decades, the United States has built economic enforcement muscle at the expense of figuring out how best to use it. The different parts of what might be called “the economic security state,” such as the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security, sometimes struggle to coordinate their work and have a shockingly hard time gathering information or crafting long-term strategy. There is still no blueprint for how all the components ought to fit together.

Trump’s return will only make these problems worse. The economic security state needs more coherence and planning, not less. Sanctions and export controls are some of the most powerful weapons in the U.S. arsenal, but they are administered by a bureaucratic machine held together by spit and duct tape. There is no equivalent of the Pentagon—a headquarters that brings the efforts of the U.S. government under one roof—for economic security.

If Trump follows through on his promised sidelining of civil servants, there will be nothing to restrain his appetite for chaos. In all likelihood, the new administration will lurch unpredictably between wildly incompatible policies: replacing sanctions and export controls with tariffs, deploying sanctions at scale (even possibly against allies), and protecting financial institutions and cryptocurrencies from U.S. regulatory power. That will be a mess in the short run and will weaken U.S. power in the long run, as other countries insulate themselves from the chaos by avoiding the American economic system as much as they can.

GROWING PAINS

Since 9/11, Democratic and Republican administrations have capitalized on the ubiquity of the U.S. dollar to turn financial sanctions into an all-purpose weapon. International banks need access to the dollar clearing system, which is controlled by U.S. regulators, to transfer funds to one another. That obliges banks, even those based overseas, to comply with U.S. financial sanctions and reporting requirements.

The results are powerful. When the Trump administration sanctioned Carrie Lam, the pro-Beijing chief executive of Hong Kong, for human rights violations in 2020, even Chinese banks refused to do business with her. She had to keep piles of cash around her mansion to pay her bills. When, in 2024, the Biden administration sanctioned extremist Israeli settlers for attacking or dispossessing Palestinians, Israeli banks had no choice but to cut them off, to the fury and consternation of Israel’s far-right finance minister. The force of U.S. sanctions reaches deep into the internal financial arrangements of allies and adversaries alike.

Washington has cobbled together other means of economic coercion, too. In Trump’s first term, officials expanded the United States’ reach into global supply chains by turning export controls, measures that were originally designed to keep U.S. technologies out of the hands of enemy militaries, into ersatz sanctions—another way to hurt an adversary’s economy. U.S. President Joe Biden used the same mechanism to restrict the entire Chinese and Russian economies from accessing certain semiconductors.

U.S. economic tools have lost their bite.

Export controls have been less effective than U.S. officials had hoped because supply chains are murky and therefore hard to control. Nonetheless, they and other innovations have fostered a growing, albeit disorganized, economic security state within the U.S. federal government. By managing and administering sanctions, export controls, and investment screening, Washington can often prevent money and certain technology from falling into the hands of its rivals. Other parts of the U.S. regulatory state help, too, even when they don’t have formal ties to national security. For example, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s efforts to regulate cryptocurrencies helped the Treasury and Justice Departments bring an anarchic financial realm into compliance with U.S. law. As a result, terrorists and rogue states now have a harder time circumventing conventional financial controls.

But the rapid growth of the U.S. economic security state has come at the cost of coherence. U.S. officials have few guidelines on when to employ particular economic weapons and few ways to ensure that they don’t interfere with each other. Sanctions, export controls, and other economic tools have lost some of their bite because they have been used to do ever more things. Now is an especially bad time for their degradation. The United States has embarked on a great reorientation of its relationship to the global economy. Washington once promoted economic interdependence but now openly weaponizes it. Domestic and international regulations are increasingly intertwined and essential to national security. If the United States cannot shape markets at home, it will be in no position to do so abroad. There are even bigger worries. In a world of rapid technological change, the United States cannot take its economic dominance for granted or rest on its primacy. Its advantages in the field of artificial intelligence may not compensate for losing the race for the clean energy technologies that AI server centers and everyday electronics will come to depend on.

Tackling these problems will require an enormous increase in state capacity. The United States needs to become more adaptive by getting much better at gathering information, taking big policy risks, and adjusting policy depending on which bets pay off—a tall order for any administration. It will be spectacularly challenging for Trump, given his difficulty with sticking to any long-term objectives and his hostility to experts and the so-called deep state.

POWER OF THE PAPER PUSHERS

Fishman’s thoroughgoing book is all about expertise, lionizing the bureaucratic virtues that the new administration detests. It is a 500-page tribute to the sanctions technocrats, the oft-disregarded officials who built up Washington’s coercive might. After 9/11, the United States discovered that economic globalization had created security vulnerabilities. Terrorists and other malign actors could organize on the Internet and send and receive money across borders without being tracked.

Over the next two decades, successive Republican and Democratic administrations reasserted influence over the world by controlling choke points in the networks that make up the global financial system. For example, through the SWIFT network, a communications platform for banks, U.S. officials can see who is sending money to whom. The first Trump administration expanded the reach of export controls by applying the foreign direct product rule, under which the U.S. government can stop the sale not only of U.S. products but also of many products made with U.S. equipment, technology, and know-how, including sophisticated semiconductors. That rule was first used to target Huawei, a Chinese telecommunications firm, and then to regulate the sale of a wide variety of goods to Russia. Eventually, it was used to block the export of certain high-end semiconductors to China.

Fishman adds previously unknown details to this story, ranging from the trivial (how an EU official stuffed his office with toy airplanes and trains) to the substantial (how Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen was persuaded to embrace measures preventing Russia’s central bank from accessing its foreign reserves). He has a knack for talking to the sometimes obscure people responsible for “writing the memo,” a practice he shares with one of his bureaucratic heroes.

Chokepoints claims that the wisdom and foresight of these sanctions technocrats created the “blueprints” for a new kind of world order led by the United States and its allies. Fishman writes that the first Trump administration provides both a “cautionary tale” of how unilateralism can go too far and an example of how to take the threat of China seriously. He finds that U.S. financial and technological primacy enabled “little-known American and European bureaucrats” to restructure “relationships between world powers.” The challenge for the United States and its allies is to manage these choke points wisely, using economic warfare to maintain this order and avoid shooting wars as long as possible.

Already, Chokepoints reads less like a prescription for the future than a celebration of the past. The first Trump administration turned out to be not a cautionary tale but a prototype for the world to come. There won’t be a new technocratic order. Instead of operating in a predictable cosmos, global politics will be reshaped by the internal chaos of a new Trump administration, which will feed the chaos of the world outside, as businesses and governments alike try to respond to an unpredictable superpower.

MAN PLANS, GOD LAUGHS

If Fishman praises the technocrats of empire, Bridges explains the limits of their vision. Her indispensable account of the prehistory of the U.S. economic security state argues that elite strategies of domination are only half the story, if that. As she points out, global systems of power have “rarely conformed to the blueprints of distant designers.” It is impossible to understand unwieldy economic systems by focusing on the officials who planned them. Rather, one must also pay attention to the strategies of the businesses and foreigners subject to the plans.

Bridges sketches the haphazard process through which U.S. dollar dominance came into being. In the early twentieth century, the United States worried about its companies using the existing financial system, which was dominated by the United Kingdom. Politicians and businesses feared that foreign banks would share sensitive information with their competitors, a concern that led to the creation of the United States’ first broadly multinational bank, the International Banking Corporation.

The effort to stand up the International Banking Corporation was born less out of a coherent strategy than an ad hoc construction, she finds. Business leaders and bankers assembled a loose infrastructure to allow U.S. colonies and dependencies to use the U.S. dollar, rather than the British pound, in their transactions. The International Banking Corporation itself was funded by private firms that had an interest in U.S. dominance. It was bumbling, chaotic, and self-centered; more interested in helping itself than in helping Uncle Sam. Through chance as much as intent, this “group of bewildered U.S. bankers,” as Bridges puts it, helped cement U.S. global financial power, turning obscure financial instruments into an infrastructure for dollar exchange.

A cryptocurrency exchange in Hong Kong, December 2024 Tyrone Siu / Reuters

In Bridges’s view, the current age is also one of flux, with one empire dwindling and another looking to expand. Just as the United States resented the United Kingdom’s grasp on global finance in the early twentieth century, China resents U.S. power today and is trying to build its own alternative systems. The very nature of finance is shifting, as new technologies such as cryptocurrencies and central bank digital currencies emerge. It is possible that the United States may lose its technological primacy, perhaps through losing the clean energy race. Chinese leader Xi Jinping is doubling down on physical technologies such as advanced batteries, betting that the ability to create abundant and secure energy is right around the corner.

Xi’s approach may win the support of foreign governments. Whereas the United States uses choke points to slow the progress of its adversaries, China is advancing in clean energy technologies that it can sell cheaply to other countries. Yet China’s attempt to reorient the world economy around itself is sometimes as bumbling as the United States’ was a century ago. China’s Belt and Road Initiative is less an organized plan for world domination than a machine for shoveling contracts to well-connected construction companies. If this helps build a world economy with Chinese characteristics, it will be half by accident.

Bridges’s book reveals a chaotic and unpredictable world, in which other countries and seemingly minor players can undermine the grand designs of imperial planners. U.S. economic coercion rests not only on the primacy of the dollar or control over semiconductors but also on a vast interconnected system of banking, business, and law, one that is becoming ever more complex. The tools preferred by the sanctions technocrats are becoming less useful as businesses and adversaries find ways to circumvent U.S.-controlled choke points and adversaries, such as China, build their own. Oligarchs, arms dealers, and terrorists evade sanctions through cryptocurrencies. In 2023, almost as much money flowed through Tether, a cryptocurrency stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar, as did through Visa cards, powering a shadow economy that is mostly outside the reach of the U.S. government.

Washington is starting to feel its power falter. Export controls, even when supercharged by the foreign direct product rule, are far less straightforward to apply than the Biden administration hoped. There is no equivalent to SWIFT that can provide U.S. officials with data on supply chains, and U.S. semiconductor businesses have been willing to walk right up to the edge of what is allowable to maintain access to the Chinese market. Toward the end of Biden’s term, U.S. officials began reverting to financial sanctions as they discovered how hard it was to enforce export controls on products with complex supply chains. Such problems would be tough enough to handle if the sanctions technocrats were still in charge. But if there is one person who has no technocratic inclination at all, it is Trump.

THE COMING CHAOS

The first Trump administration’s economic security policy was a crazy ride, in which people who were connected to finance and Wall Street, such as Mnuchin, battled with China hawks, such as National Security Adviser John Bolton, and tariff enthusiasts, such as U.S. Trade Representative Robert Light­hizer. Things happened—or didn’t happen—depending on who had the ear of the president at any moment and who had mastered the dark arts of bureaucratic warfare.

But in this sea of chaos, some islands of stability remained. Deeper layers of government worked much as they had in previous Republican administrations. Midlevel economic security officials did their jobs as best as they could. They lived in fear that an out-of-the-blue presidential tweet might completely remake the policies they were supposed to administer, but many areas of policy were too boring and technical for Trump to care about.

The second Trump administration will be different. There are new factions in the game, and the chaos may penetrate even those levels of government that escaped Trump’s first term relatively unscathed. The crypto venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who backed Trump now want to collect their reward. Some of them have startling political beliefs. Balaji Srinivasan, for example, who was floated as a potential head of Trump’s Food and Drug Administration, is the author of a self-published book attacking the supposed nexus of U.S. dollar power and New York Times “wokeism,” which he sees as the products of a decadent intellectual elite. Srinivasan wants the U.S.-led world order—which he sees as “declining”—to be swept away by a “Pax Bitcoinica.”

Less philosophical crypto enthusiasts just want to block government regulations that would stop them from making money. Both the true believers and the opportunists were outraged when Biden’s Treasury officials used sanctions to isolate a cryptocurrency mixer service—an entity that makes it harder to tell whose money goes where—for laundering billions of dollars for North Korea and other malefactors. Now, conservative judges have blocked these sanctions, and Trump plans to appoint crypto-friendly officials who will surely try to deregulate cryptocurrency finance. Should they succeed, the United States’ economic security will be degraded as it becomes easier for people to skirt the dollar.

The crypto venture capitalists who backed Trump now want to collect their reward.

The internal battles will not be limited to financial deregulation. Traditional national security hawks will want to double down on sanctions and export controls, without any clear sense of where to stop. Fans of tariffs—a group that currently includes Trump—will apply them to remedy economic insecurity and all else that ails the United States. They will eventually discover the limits and costs of tariffs, but probably not soon enough. Well-connected firms will call for more traditional, business-friendly measures, combined with sweetheart deals and carve-outs for themselves and their friends. Fraught alliances, palace politics, knifings in the dark, and Trump’s whims will send economic security policy reeling.

The one area in which Trump shows unwavering determination is his enmity toward technical expertise. His promised efforts to immediately fire “corrupt actors” in the national security and intelligence apparatus will lead to years of lawsuits. Yet even if they do not fully succeed, they will hinder the ability of the economic security state to get things done. Economic security officials with decades of experience will question whether they want to stay in an unpredictable workplace.

Indeed, everyone—businesses, allied governments, and adversaries—will be trying to figure out what is happening within a chaotic administration, and, if possible, to shape it. Allies will strive to protect themselves from an unpredictable great power that is no longer as capable of exercising control as it believes. Foreign and domestic businesses and crypto capitalists will rewire the infrastructure of the world economy to make more money, just as their forebears did in the early days of the U.S. empire, when the state was underdeveloped. Some may capture parts of the Trump administration, turning U.S. power to their own advantage. Adversaries will look to capitalize on America’s weaknesses, leading to even greater disorganization.

Once, and not too long ago, it was possible for U.S. elites to believe that technocrats could order the world in their interests, making it secure and predictable for them. They held out hope that Trump’s first term was a temporary aberration. Now, it is clear that it was no such thing. The sun is setting on the sanctions technocrats, and indeed on traditional technocracy more generally. American economic power is sure to suffer for it.

Henry Farrell is Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute Professor of International Affairs at Johns Hopkins University.

Foreign Affairs · by More by Henry Farrell · December 23, 2024

14. How Iran Lost Syria

​Excerpts:

The fall of Assad and the erosion of Iran’s foothold in Syria present a rare opportunity for renewal but also immense challenges, the resolution of which will require active U.S. engagement. First, sustained U.S. support for the Syrian Kurds is crucial. The Kurdish-led SDF has been a key ally in the fight against the Islamic State, the jihadi terrorist group also known as ISIS, and a stabilizing force in northeastern Syria. But recent clashes with Turkish-backed rebel groups have forced the SDF to suspend its operations against ISIS. Continued U.S. support, including financial, political, and diplomatic assistance, will strengthen the Kurds against such threats while deterring Iran from exploiting emerging power vacuums.

Washington must simultaneously encourage Israel to restrain and de-escalate its operations in southwestern Syria. Following Assad’s fall, Israel has expanded its presence beyond the Golan Heights, occupying areas deeper inside Syria and justifying the move by citing security concerns. But any prolonged Israeli occupation risks alienating Syrians and providing Iran with a pretext to reactivate its anti-Israel agenda in Syria.

The United States must also collaborate with allies in the Middle East and Europe to promote an inclusive political dialogue among all Syrian factions. The power vacuum left by Assad’s departure risks intensifying competition among various factions and among country’s many ethnic and religious minorities. Supporting comprehensive dialogue would help establish a representative government that preserves Syria’s territorial integrity and protects minority rights, while reducing the likelihood that Iran or other external actors exploit minority groups to gain influence.

Yet equally critical to ensuring security in Syria will be diplomatic efforts to prevent further destabilization in Iran. Tehran’s growing sense of insecurity following Assad’s fall may drive the country’s leadership to escalate activities that destabilize the region, such as efforts to further strengthen allied militias in Iraq and Yemen or inciting sectarian tensions in Syria. The United States should, in fact, offer Iran a seat at the table during regional talks over Syria’s future, addressing Tehran’s security concerns while calling on its leadership to de-escalate on other fronts. This strategy could curtail Iran’s disruptive influence in Syria and the greater Middle East—and possibly even open the door to more comprehensive diplomatic talks between Washington and Tehran.

How Iran Lost Syria

Foreign Affairs · by More by Hamidreza Azizi · December 23, 2024

And Why a Stable Post-Assad Future Will Require Tehran’s Involvement

Hamidreza Azizi

December 23, 2024

Tearing down pictures of Bashar al-Assad and his allies in rural Aleppo, Syria, December 2024 Umit Bektas / Reuters

Hamidreza Azizi is a Visiting Fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs and a Nonresident Fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs.

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Thirteen years after the start of the Syrian uprising, the swift and dramatic fall of Bashar al-Assad shattered the perception of a stable, albeit repressive, status quo. For much of the past decade, Assad’s regime, bolstered by unwavering support from Iran and Russia, brutally suppressed dissent. What began as an uprising in 2011 evolved into a devastating civil war that eventually settled into an uneasy stalemate. Despite persistent challenges, Assad’s grip on power appeared secure. Yet his regime collapsed within days of the start of a coordinated rebel offensive.

Among other casualties was Iran’s influence in Syria, painstakingly cultivated through years of costly intervention and unwavering support. Tehran was Assad’s most steadfast ally throughout the conflict. Over the years, Iran invested immense resources and military aid to ensure his survival. Yet as the Syrian military rapidly disintegrated, Iran was notably absent. In the aftermath, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, condemned Assad’s fall as a foreign-orchestrated conspiracy, a framing that reflects Tehran’s efforts to preserve its image as a resilient regional power. Within Iran, however, officials and observers appear divided. The rapid pace of events and the depletion of Tehran’s military and political resources over the past year, amid escalating direct and indirect military confrontations with Israel, have left the leadership struggling to formulate a coherent response.

Iran’s strategic setback presents the United States with a unique opportunity to curb the potential for renewed conflict and to lay the groundwork for lasting stability in Syria. By continuing to support Syrian Kurdish forces, promoting dialogue among key Syrian stakeholders, and encouraging Israeli restraint in Syria, Washington can help shape the post-Assad reality into one of long-term peace and security. But stabilizing the region will also likely require Iran’s involvement in talks over Syria’s future. If Washington and Tehran fail to engage with each other, Syria will continue to suffer.

EXPOSED EXHAUSTION

Iran’s extensive involvement in Syria’s civil war was instrumental in sustaining the Assad regime. Since 2011, Tehran has spent somewhere between $30 billion and $50 billion on military aid, oil transfers, and logistical support to Syria. The Quds Force, the elite wing of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, coordinated operations early on by training local militias to reinforce the Syrian army and by mobilizing a wide array of foreign Shiite fighters, including members of the Lebanese organization Hezbollah, Iraqi militias, and Afghan and Pakistani groups.

After large-scale fighting subsided in 2018, Tehran began to focus on consolidating its influence in Syria’s south and southeast, securing control over territory and integrating the militias into the Syrian armed forces. But these efforts proved insufficient to prevent Assad’s rapid collapse in early December. Iran appears to have been misled by the façade of a capable and stable government in Damascus, even though Tehran itself had helped Assad craft this illusion. The Iranian government remained unprepared for the Syrian army’s swift collapse, as defensive lines crumbled and soldiers proved unready or unable to fight. In just a few days, rebels seized Syria’s second-largest city, Aleppo, and advanced southward, leaving Iran with no time to respond effectively. As IRGC Chief Commander Hossein Salami admitted, Iran “couldn’t fight on behalf of the Syrian army . . . when they were sitting idly by and watching.”

The weakening of Hezbollah further compounded Iran’s challenges. Hezbollah was central to Iran’s strategy in Syria, with thousands of its fighters deployed to support Assad’s regime over the last decade. After the death of the Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, in 2020, Hezbollah became the primary coordinator of Iranian-backed militias in Syria. But Israeli strikes against Hezbollah personnel and infrastructure over the last year wiped out leadership and prevented the group from offering Assad any further military or logistical support.

Israel also intensified its targeting of Iranian assets in Syria. Initially aimed at disrupting Iranian arms transfers to Hezbollah via Syria, this strategy became part of Israel’s broader confrontation with Hezbollah and the Iranian-backed “axis of resistance,” escalating into a de facto land and air blockade by late 2023 that effectively cut off Iranian troop and logistics movements into Syria, particularly through Iraq. Even Khamenei admitted in a speech in early December that Iran had been unable to provide Assad with support because every access point was effectively closed off.

Meanwhile, by the time the rebel offensive in Syria began, in late November, the Iraqi Shiite militias that had played a major role in the early stages of the Syrian civil war had become unwilling to reenter the fray, preoccupied with domestic priorities and wary of escalating costs of external intervention. This lack of reliable allied support left Iran constrained in its ability to respond effectively.

Domestic factors also influenced Tehran’s decisions not to engage. Two rounds of tit-for-tat with Israel, particularly a series of Israeli strikes on Iranian military sites and air defenses last October, had exposed the Islamic Republic’s vulnerabilities. And Iran’s economy is far less robust today than when Tehran first intervened in Syria in 2011, limiting its capacity to sustain another costly external engagement. Facing the likelihood of further escalation, Tehran prioritized fortifying its defenses over diverting resources to foreign conflicts.

A FRACTURING AXIS

The fall of Assad not only demonstrates Iran’s weaknesses but also poses significant new challenges for Tehran, threatening both its regional influence and the regime’s stability. Foremost among these is the difficulty of revitalizing Hezbollah’s operational capabilities. Syria long served as a vital logistical hub in the “land corridor” that linked Iran to the Mediterranean Sea and enabled the transfer of advanced weaponry and logistics to Hezbollah. With Assad’s collapse, this supply line has been severed, isolating Hezbollah and disrupting the axis of resistance’s geographical connectivity. Already weakened by a 14-month war with Israel, Hezbollah will now face the daunting task of recovering with far less direct logistical support from Iran.

Assad’s fall has also highlighted ideological and sectarian divisions among Iran’s allies that may further fracture the axis’s cohesion. Iran, Hezbollah, Iraqi militias, and the Houthis all viewed the event as a major setback. But Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Sunni groups that Iran supports, congratulated the Syrian rebels of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a Sunni Islamist group, on their victory over Assad.

As far as the axis is concerned, losing Syria may also undermine Iran’s credibility with its regional partners in Iraq and Yemen. Iran’s failure to intervene decisively in Assad’s defense will likely raise doubts about its commitment and capacity. Former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who maintained close ties to Iran, expressed his surprise over Tehran’s inaction in Syria during a television interview just after Assad’s fall. “I was surprised by . . . the position of those states that were on Syria’s side . . . Russia and Iran,” Maliki said. “How did they change [their position]? What are the consequences of this change?” Going forward, groups that have depended on Tehran’s support might now question its reliability

The loss of its ally in Syria will also disadvantage Iran in its rivalry with Turkey. Ankara’s strong support for Syrian rebels has disrupted the regional balance of power. Under Assad, Iran’s extensive presence in Syria allowed Tehran to counterbalance Turkey’s regional ambitions. But since Assad’s fall, Ankara—now the main patron of Syrian rebels, particularly HTS—has replaced Tehran and Moscow as the dominant external power in Syria, expanding the breadth of Turkey’s influence while limiting Iran’s. There are growing concerns in Iran that Turkey, emboldened by Tehran’s weakened position, could now seek to increase its influence, at Iran’s expense, in Iraq, Lebanon, and the South Caucasus. In Iraq and Lebanon, Turkey might bolster its support for Sunni factions against pro-Iranian Shiite groups. In the South Caucasus, Turkey’s push for the creation of the so-called Zangezur corridor—a strategic transit route linking Turkey to Azerbaijan via Armenian territory—threatens to cut Iran’s land access to Armenia, a strategic partner crucial for maintaining Tehran’s regional foothold and trade routes in the Caucasus, isolating it economically and geopolitically.

Finally, Assad’s fall has fueled domestic discontent among loyalists to the regime in Tehran, with some calling the loss a strategic blunder and openly criticizing the government on state television. For a regime heavily reliant on fervent supporters, such dissent poses a serious challenge. Moreover, there are fears that Sunni extremist groups in Iran’s restive southern regions, such as those populated by Arab and Baluchi groups, may be emboldened by the victory of like-minded groups in Syria, risking further unrest at a time when the government is increasingly vulnerable.

ONTO THE NEXT

Despite the many challenges facing Tehran, Iran is adapting its strategy to preserve influence in Syria and the Levant by making tactical adjustments. Iran has shown interest in engaging with Syrian Kurdish groups that, despite not challenging Assad directly, were among the key actors during the war, especially in the fight against Sunni extremist groups, and which retain control over large parts of northeastern Syria. In the lead-up to Assad’s ouster, Iranian-backed forces withdrew from key positions in eastern Syria, especially in the Deir ez‑Zor province near the Iraqi border, transferring control to the Syrian Democratic Forces, whose personnel and command structure are primarily Kurdish. This move signaled Iran’s effort to position itself as a potential partner to the Syrian Kurds, especially given Kurdish concerns that U.S. support for the SDF might diminish once Donald Trump returns to the White House. (Many expect Trump to reduce American involvement in Syria and to seek stronger ties with Turkey, which considers the SDF a terrorist group.)

Iran may also explore the possibility of engaging with HTS, leveraging the anti-Israeli and pro-Palestinian sentiments within the rebels’ ranks. Although the HTS leadership has expressed its unwillingness to start a conflict with Israel, ongoing Israeli strikes and territorial advances in Syria could encourage a change of heart. Tehran might offer support to HTS in exchange for strategic concessions, such as renewed access to Hezbollah forces in Lebanon.

Alternatively, Iran could pivot to forging new ties with Shiite and Alawite minorities in western Syria who fear discrimination and repression by Sunni extremists. By aligning with these groups, Iran could build a network of loyalist forces and proxies to sustain its influence in Syria even in the absence of a pliant ruling regime. Iran might even reorganize the hundreds of Assad regime soldiers that fled to Iraq into a counterrevolutionary force, potentially enabling it to regain a foothold in Syria.

FILLING THE VACUUM

The fall of Assad and the erosion of Iran’s foothold in Syria present a rare opportunity for renewal but also immense challenges, the resolution of which will require active U.S. engagement. First, sustained U.S. support for the Syrian Kurds is crucial. The Kurdish-led SDF has been a key ally in the fight against the Islamic State, the jihadi terrorist group also known as ISIS, and a stabilizing force in northeastern Syria. But recent clashes with Turkish-backed rebel groups have forced the SDF to suspend its operations against ISIS. Continued U.S. support, including financial, political, and diplomatic assistance, will strengthen the Kurds against such threats while deterring Iran from exploiting emerging power vacuums.

Washington must simultaneously encourage Israel to restrain and de-escalate its operations in southwestern Syria. Following Assad’s fall, Israel has expanded its presence beyond the Golan Heights, occupying areas deeper inside Syria and justifying the move by citing security concerns. But any prolonged Israeli occupation risks alienating Syrians and providing Iran with a pretext to reactivate its anti-Israel agenda in Syria.

The United States must also collaborate with allies in the Middle East and Europe to promote an inclusive political dialogue among all Syrian factions. The power vacuum left by Assad’s departure risks intensifying competition among various factions and among country’s many ethnic and religious minorities. Supporting comprehensive dialogue would help establish a representative government that preserves Syria’s territorial integrity and protects minority rights, while reducing the likelihood that Iran or other external actors exploit minority groups to gain influence.

Yet equally critical to ensuring security in Syria will be diplomatic efforts to prevent further destabilization in Iran. Tehran’s growing sense of insecurity following Assad’s fall may drive the country’s leadership to escalate activities that destabilize the region, such as efforts to further strengthen allied militias in Iraq and Yemen or inciting sectarian tensions in Syria. The United States should, in fact, offer Iran a seat at the table during regional talks over Syria’s future, addressing Tehran’s security concerns while calling on its leadership to de-escalate on other fronts. This strategy could curtail Iran’s disruptive influence in Syria and the greater Middle East—and possibly even open the door to more comprehensive diplomatic talks between Washington and Tehran.

Hamidreza Azizi is a Visiting Fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs and a Nonresident Fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs.

Foreign Affairs · by More by Hamidreza Azizi · December 23, 2024

​15. Army faces balancing act in quest to raise fitness test rigor for combat jobs, study finds

Army faces balancing act in quest to raise fitness test rigor for combat jobs, study finds

Stars and Stripes · by John Vandiver · December 23, 2024

Soldiers do deadlifts during an Army Combat Fitness Test on Dec. 12, 2024, in Sembach, Germany. The Army can safely raise minimum fitness standards for close combat jobs, but setting the bar too high would test the service's acceptance of lower pass rates, according to a new study. (Yesenia Cadavid/U.S. Army)

The Army can raise the bar on minimum fitness standards for close-combat jobs and also must establish clear consequences for soldiers who fall short, according to the recommendations from a new study on the implications of demanding more from front-line troops.

The Rand Corp. study, released Friday, found that higher standards for select military specialties, such as infantry and combat engineers, can be implemented as a means to ensure better fitness for those in more physically demanding positions.

But the Army’s ability to achieve desired fitness test pass rates for those jobs hinges on how high it sets a new minimum standard, the service-commissioned report said.

Between May and August, the Army tested higher potential standards among a sample of more than 44,000 soldiers in close-combat jobs. Rand’s analysis of the results showcased potential trade-offs associated with alternative approaches.

For example, raising the overall Army Combat Fitness Test minimum from its current 360-point total up to 450 points and a minimum deadlift requirement of 150 pounds — levels the Army wanted for the trial — may be too high if the aim is to achieve a 95% overall pass rate and a 90% pass rate for select subgroups, Rand said.

Under that standard, active-duty soldiers in the regular Army scored a 91.4% pass rate, while several subgroups had rates below 90%.

Pass rates for soldiers in the National Guard and reserves were “significantly lower” under this standard, coming in at under 75%, Rand said.

Soldiers participate in the Army Combat Fitness Test at the 7th Army Training Command's Grafenwoehr Training Area, Germany, Oct. 8, 2024. The Army can safely raise minimum fitness standards for close combat jobs, but there are consequences in setting the bar too high, according to a Rand Corp. study released Dec. 20. (Christian Carrillo/U.S. Army)

The study was prompted by a bill Congress passed last year requiring the Army to elevate fitness standards for infantry, combat engineering, armor and cavalry, artillery forward observers, engineer and artillery officers and all Special Forces soldiers.

The congressional mandate was aimed at addressing concerns related to the fitness test’s shift from being age- and gender-neutral, as it was originally proposed several years ago, to one that now has tailored standards.

To address those concerns, Congress called for higher minimum fitness standards for soldiers in front-line jobs. However, the legislation didn’t specify how far beyond the current minimum test score of 360 points the new standard should go.

Rand noted that younger, female soldiers had lower pass rates when the test’s deadlift standard was increased from a minimum of 120 pounds to 150 pounds.

The Army Combat Fitness Test is made up of six events: deadlift, standing power throw, hand release pushup, sprint-drag-carry, planks and the 2-mile run.

An overall minimum standard of 420 points would be enough to ensure the general fitness of soldiers for combat jobs, while setting the level at 450 points would require enhanced fitness, the report said.

As the Army sorts out how to implement higher standards for combat jobs and how high it should go, it should set up “glide paths” that allow soldiers sufficient time to train and improve, Rand said.

It also must make sure that sufficient training resources are delivered down to lower unit levels, such as squads and companies.

Meanwhile, the Army will need to establish “a clear and consistent message” that “includes transparent policies for failure to meet close combat ACFT standards,” Rand said.

Stars and Stripes · by John Vandiver · December 23, 2024

16. Outlook Dims for British-American Relations as an Aide to Trump Calls the New Ambassador to Washington a ‘Moron’

​Uh Oh.  

Outlook Dims for British-American Relations as an Aide to Trump Calls the New Ambassador to Washington a ‘Moron’

‘Reckless and a danger to the world,’ is how Peter Mandelson once described the man about to become the 47th president.

DONALD KIRK

Dec. 23, 2024 03:46 AM ET

nysun.com

LONDON – The outlook for American-British relations looks bleak, at least to judge from the choice of Britain’s next ambassador to Washington. A figure in the Labour government of prime minister Tony Blair more than 20 years ago, Lord Peter Mandelson, has left no doubt what he thinks of President Trump.

“Reckless and a danger to the world,” is how Mr. Mandelson described Trump to an Italian journalist during the president-elect’s first term. Mr. Mandelson will surely shy away from such language when he gets to Washington, but it’s not likely his harsh words in the past will be quickly forgotten.

“An absolute moron,” one of Trump’s closest aides, Chris LaCivita, posted on X. He contrasts Mr. Mandelson to the outgoing British ambassador in Washington, Karen Pierce, whom he called a “professional universally respected ambo.”

More specifically, Mr. Mandelson, as European commissioner for trade in 2018, warned in a British newspaper it was “necessary to recognize Mr. Trump’s behavior for what it is: he is a bully, and the U.S. will gain in trade only when others are losing.”

Trump’s “idea of a progressive trade policy,” he wrote, “is one that forces everyone else to give the U.S. more favorable treatment rather than a trading system from which everyone gains.” Trump has often called for an aggressive policy on trade, including elevated tariffs, but Mr. Mandelson’s overall tone has upset Trump and his aides.

“Trump aide’s Mandelson jibe was clearly designed to stir things up — but why?” asked the British television network Sky News. Mr. LaCivita’s remark was “awkward for Downing Street to say the least,” the network added.

By appointing Mr. Mandelson to such a visible, critical post, however, the prime minister, Keir Starmer, may be sending a signal to Washington — that Britain intends to get tough with President Trump on issues ranging from trade and tariffs to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the war in Ukraine.

Between the lines of honeyed words in a statement from Mr. Starmer announcing the appointment, it seemed clear that Mr. Mandelson will do more in Washington than engage in diplomatic pleasantries. “Peter will bring unrivalled experience to the role and take our partnership from strength to strength,” Mr. Starmer’s office quoted him as saying.

Mr. Mandelson was slightly more forthcoming, according to the announcement, when he acknowledged, “We face challenges in Britain, but also big opportunities and it will be a privilege to work with the government to land those opportunities.”

Exactly what he had in mind was left unclear, but there’s no doubt Britain and America aren’t getting along quite so famously as, say, President Reagan and Prime Minister Thatcher.

nysun.com

17. Ukraine’s Elite Special Ops: Top Missions of 2024 – From Black Sea to Kursk

Ukraine’s Elite Special Ops: Top Missions of 2024 – From Black Sea to Kursk

Ukraine’s Special Ops team took on daring missions in 2024, from blowing up Black Sea platfor

by Julia Struck | December 23, 2024, 7:34 am

kyivpost.com · by Julia Struck · December 23, 2024

The Special Operations Forces (SSO) of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) are elite troops specializing in high-complexity missions on land, water, and occupied territories. Their roles include sabotage, aerial reconnaissance, and psychological operations.

Due to their classified nature, details of SSO missions and personnel remain undisclosed. Entry into the SSO is highly selective, with only 10 percent of candidates passing the rigorous training process.

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Kyiv Post regularly covers the SSO’s activities during Russia’s war in Ukraine, so we have compiled for you a rundown of their most impressive missions of 2024.

Operation “Citadel” – destruction of Russian-occupied Black Sea platform

In early February, the SSO released footage of their rapid “Citadel” mission, during which troops destroyed a Russian-occupied drilling platform in the Black Sea.

Intelligence revealed that Russia was using the platform to coordinate Shahed kamikaze drone strikes on Ukraine’s southern infrastructure. The platform was also equipped with a Neva-B radar, designed to monitor large open areas, including the northwestern Black Sea.

“With the help of this radar, the Russians controlled the situation in the northwestern part of the Black Sea,” the SSO reported.

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The SSO mission, executed by Ukraine’s 73rd SSO Maritime Center, involved careful planning due to constant Russian Navy and Air Force patrols. Under the cover of darkness, SSO boats approached the platform, cleared enemy facilities, and planted explosives. The team then withdrew to a safe distance and detonated the structure.

“As a result, the enemy’s important equipment was captured, and the mast with the antenna was blown up,” the report said.

The 73rd Maritime Center, Ukraine’s elite naval special forces unit, often compared to the US Navy SEALs, specializes in combat diving and maritime operations. The unit has reportedly trained with NATO counterparts from the US, Poland, and Lithuania, earning its reputation as a top-tier special operations force.

Operation “Hoverla” – seizure of a Russian stronghold

Early February was marked by two lightning-flash special operations. The second of these, codenamed “Hoverla,” involved successfully seizing a Russian stronghold from a dominant position of height.

While the location remains undisclosed, the SSO emphasized that the operation significantly improved the operational and tactical situation for the AFU.

“The units of the Defense Forces had not succeeded in taking [the position] under control for several months,” the SSO reported.

Carefully planned and coordinated with conventional Defense Force units, the operation included fire support, radio-electronic warfare, and drones. Footage showed the assault team advancing on the stronghold, engaging in combat, and successfully capturing the position. Two Russian paratroopers were taken prisoner. Following the SSO’s success, other Defense Force units secured the area.

In mid-March, the SSO released a video showcasing the operation, as revealed by the battle group’s operators.

“The enemy defended these positions for a long time, controlling a large area and obstructing the actions of Ukrainian units,” the video caption read.

The SSO also revealed that they had conducted similar successful operations previously.

Relentless pursuit of Russian Buk missile systems

The Buk medium-range anti-aircraft missile system is designed for point defense, attempting to neutralize a variety of aerial threats, including strategic and tactical aircraft, cruise missiles, and helicopters. Estimates suggest that the cost of the latest version of this air defense system, the Buk-M1-2, is approximately $100 million.

Ukrainian Special Ops have consistently reported successful operations against Russian Buk air defense systems, using a variety of tactics and attack systems.

January: In the Donetsk sector, SSO drone operators provided coordinates to Ukrainian artillery, resulting in the destruction of one Buk system and disabling two others beyond repair.

March: The SSO destroyed a Russian Buk-M1 in the early part of the month, followed by another Buk system in the Zaporizhzhia sector later in the month. SSO operators coordinated HIMARS fire for the latter strike.

April 25: Ukrainian artillery, guided by SSO coordinates, destroyed a Buk-M1 that was preparing to launch missiles in the Donetsk sector.

April 30: In the Sumy sector, SSO operators struck a Buk at a launch position using attack drones. A second Buk system that arrived to evacuate the damaged launcher was also destroyed in the same operation.

May: The SSO reported destroying a Buk launcher carrying six missiles on May 2. By the end of the month, the 3rd Separate Regiment of the SSO confirmed that Ukrainian forces had destroyed four Buk systems – half a battalion. One of these was targeted with an advanced attack drone, one of the latest additions to the SSO arsenal.

A standard Buk battalion typically includes a command vehicle, target acquisition radar, six transporter erector launcher and radar vehicles, and three transporter erector launchers.

November: The SSO, in collaboration with other Ukrainian Defense Forces units, destroyed a radar station of a Russian Buk-M3 system in occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

A Ukrainian military officer, speaking anonymously to Kyiv Post, highlighted the growing use of diverse attack systems, including aircraft-type Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), in targeting Russian Buk systems.

First ever strike on Russia’s advanced R-416GM digital radio relay station

In June, Ukraine’s Special Ops reported a historic milestone: the successful targeting of a Russian digital radio relay station, the R-416GM, marking the first time such a station has been hit during the war.

According to the report, SSO drone operators identified the R-416GM and inflicted fire damage on the station using “one of the latest developments” in their arsenal. The strike disrupted communication between the Russian command post and its military units.

The R-416GM, developed by the Russian Radio Equipment Plant in St. Petersburg, was first showcased at a Russian defense exhibition in 2017 and adopted by the Russian military in 2018. According to open sources, the cost of the station is $25 million.

This mobile station is designed to enhance the capabilities of radio relay units in field conditions, improving object visibility and command efficiency for military formations.

“This marks a significant achievement, as the Ukrainian military has never targeted this system before,” the SSO reported.

Inferno at a Russian oil depot in Orel

The SSO launched a drone strike on one of Russia’s largest petroleum terminals near Orel on Dec. 14. The target, a linear production-dispatching station in the village of Stalnoy Kon’, was successfully hit, causing a significant fire, according to a Special Ops report.

The station is reportedly part of Russia’s military-industrial complex, supplying fuel to the Russian army. The Orel region also serves as a base for launching drones used in attacks against Ukraine.

Russian Telegram channels confirmed the strike, with locals reporting the sound of drones, followed by an explosion and a large fire. Andrey Klychkov, governor of the Orel region, acknowledged the fire but claimed there were no casualties. He also reported that 11 drones had been shot down over the region.

Special Ops in Kursk: a silent offensive that shook the enemy

When Ukraine launched its operation in the Kursk region, the SSO immediately reported their active involvement. In fact, their daring missions behind enemy lines could fill volumes, and one day, books will be undoubtedly be written about their exploits.

Since Aug. 6, when Ukrainian forces crossed the border into the Kursk region, the SSO has consistently carried out ambushes and lightning raids on Russian troop positions. These operations have resulted in the elimination of over a dozen Russian soldiers, the capture of dozens more, and the rescue of encircled Ukrainian Defense Forces personnel.

Photo caption: Silent Kursk Night. SSO at work

Photo caption: Prisoners in Kursk region, captured by SSO operators

In addition to their ambushes, SSO fighters captured and eliminated Russian military equipment, destroying military assets, including pontoon crossings and electronic warfare systems.

As Moscow launched counteroffensive operations, the SSO shifted to repelling assaults. By late December, Russia had deployed North Korean soldiers to support its efforts, but these reinforcements soon became targets of the SSO’s precision strikes.

On Dec. 17, SSO drone operators successfully targeted nearly 100 North Korean soldiers in the Kursk region. They reported 50 soldiers killed and 47 wounded in just three days. During this time, they also destroyed two armored vehicles, two trucks, and one Russian all-terrain vehicle.

A video released by the SSO showed kamikaze drones from the 8th Special Operations Forces Regiment targeting DPRK soldiers, followed by a series of explosions confirming casualties among the North Koreans.

On Dec. 19, the 73rd Marine Center of the SSO thwarted a North Korean assault on a Ukrainian position in the Kursk region. SSO operators used an MK-19 automatic grenade launcher and conducted a series of drone strikes, killing 12 North Korean soldiers and wounding 20 more during the failed assault.

Through precision strikes and coordinated tactics, Ukraine’s SSO continues to demonstrate its ability to adapt and excel, even in the most challenging circumstances.

kyivpost.com · by Julia Struck · December 23, 2024

18. 2024: 10 Events That Changed The World

​And all of these have implications for 2025.

2024: 10 Events That Changed The World

A year filled with headlines that few could have imagined, one year ago.

thecipherbrief.com · by Tom Nagorski · December 22, 2024

SPECIAL REPORT — As we look back at the major national and global security events of 2024, it’s tempting to overuse certain words: stunning; staggering; seismic; paradigm shift. You get the idea. Maybe, in the case of this particular year and our particular focus, those words aren’t really exaggerations. It has been a mind-bending 12 months.

Nowhere has the impact been more profound than in the Middle East, where assumptions have fallen like dominoes, with implications that will last a long time and reach well beyond the region.

So we start there, in this compilation of stories and events that changed the world in 2024. There were many to choose from.

No one saw it coming; the fall of Assad

It was the story that caught the world off guard, the one that even the most prescient forecasters hadn’t seen coming: a lightning-fast rebellion that ended the brutal reign of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

The nature of the revolt was also a surprise. First, there was the speed with which a coalition of rebel groups captured city after city, culminating in a takeover of the capital, Damascus, and Assad’s rushed departure. In 11 days, Syria’s 13-year-long civil war and 53 years of Ba’ath Party and Assad family rule had come to an end.

Second, there was the absence of large-scale violence; even those who believed the regime would be overthrown – at some point – had imagined a bloody end.

It was, as we said here, “a kind of Berlin Wall moment for Syria,” and a seismic event for the entire Middle East.

On the day after Assad’s ouster, Cipher Brief expert Ambassador Gary Grappo, a diplomat with decades of experience in the Middle East, said he never thought he’d see it happen. “The day was certainly going to come,” Amb. Grappo told us. “I was just not certain I’d be around to see it.”

The impacts were felt from Russia to Iran — two nations whose once powerful influence in Syria took a hit; in Turkey and Israel, which both made military incursions into the country in the rebellion’s aftermath; and in the U.S., which still maintains a military presence in the country (double the number, we just learned – now roughly 2,000 troops) as part of a mission to counter the Islamic State.

“Just look at a map,” Cipher Brief expert and former top NATO Commander Adm. James Stavridis said, on the day after the rebels reached Damascus. “If you think of it as that old game of Risk we played as kids – poof, goes the bridge that runs from Iran over to Syria into Lebanon to the Mediterranean Sea. Poof, go the Russian bases on the Mediterranean, the warm weather port that they have cherished the ideal of for so long. Their ability to operate in that eastern Mediterranean, gone overnight. All of this is a remarkable twist of fate.”

Two weeks after the rebellion, uncertainties abound. Will clashes between the country’s competing factions devolve into a new civil war? Could ISIS or other terrorist groups find safe haven in the power vacuum? And what will the many powers jockeying for influence in Syria do next?

But for now, this was a moment to celebrate, for millions of Syrians, and perhaps for the region writ large. The Economist reminded us of an Assad regime slogan – qaidna lil abad – or “our leader, forever.” That’s what many people thought, until a stunning two weeks at the end of 2024.

North Korean troops fighting – and dying – in Europe

From another part of the world, another headline that would have seemed unimaginable a year ago: thousands of “elite forces” from North Korea, fighting — and now reportedly dying — in a European war.

The deployment of more than 11,000 North Koreans turned the Russia-Ukraine war into a truly global conflict. It was also a dramatic example of collaboration within the so-called “Axis of Authoritarians,” the anti-U.S. quartet made up of Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.

The North Koreans deployed first to Russian bases for training, to learn the language and the operational workings of their new fellow soldiers. In the last weeks of the year, they were in the fight – trying to push back Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk Province (more on that below). Officials in Ukraine and the U.S. said several hundred North Korean troops had been killed or injured in the fighting.

As with other items on this list, the North Korean deployment carried implications well beyond the battlefield.

“I think this means that we have to stop thinking of North Korea as just an isolated rogue threat, and start thinking of the country as an international collaborator that could cause harm to the broader international community,” Dr. Naoko Aoki, a political scientist at RAND, told The Cipher Brief.

Depending who you asked, the deployment was either a sign of Russian desperation, given the country’s staggering losses in Ukraine, or a clever way to make practical use of the new “Axis”, and the Russia-North Korea relationship in particular. Both analyses may be true. And the Russia-North Korea wing of that “axis” may well bring fresh trouble in the new year.

Another Cipher Brief expert, Ambassador Joseph DeTrani, had one big worry.

“North Korea is now aligned with a revanchist Russian Federation, with a mutual defense treaty that commits each to come to the defense of the other if attacked,” DeTrani told us. “The likelihood of an emboldened North Korea, now aligned with Russia, using conventional weapons to incite conflict with South Korea is greater than any time since the Korean War.”

Ukraine invades Russia

There’s another headline that would have seemed fanciful one year ago, but it happened. Two and a half years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, thousands of Ukrainian troops stormed into Russia’s Kursk province, in the first large-scale invasion of Russian territory since the second world war.

It was a strategic and dangerous gambit by the Ukrainians, but it worked – and a second surprise came in the slow and ineffective Russian response. The Kremlin vowed swift retribution and the recapture of its territory, but at this writing, more than four months later, the Ukrainians are still there. It’s hardly a game-changer for the war, but many experts said the Kursk assault sent powerful messages to all sides: Russia saw Ukraine could bring the war to its front door; the West saw Ukraine was not backing down; and the Ukrainians showed the world they were still fighting to win.

“It is very significant because the only way for us to win, whatever the political definition of victory is, is to do something outside of the box, something which is not according to the book,” Andriy Zagorodnyuk, a former Ukrainian Defense Minister, told us. “Because according to the book, the Ukrainian and Russian army would fight very similarly, and then the resources difference would kick in, and that’s what happens with pretty much all symmetrical wars. So we need to fight asymmetrically.”

The incursion – and its staying power – have also laid bare fundamental weaknesses in Russian defenses. And the occupation has given Ukraine two things it badly needed: a bargaining chip if and when negotiations begin to end the war; and the ability to deliver a dose of their own medicine to the Russians.

When the pagers exploded – and what came next

One moment — or series of moments — in September changed two fundamental assumptions in the Middle East, about Israel and its arch enemy Iran.

Over the course of two days in Lebanon, thousands of pagers exploded in the hands or pockets of operatives of the militant group Hezbollah. 12 people were killed and more 2,000 were wounded, but the effects reached well beyond the casualty toll. The operation showed the depth of Israeli intelligence agencies’ penetration of Hezbollah, drove Hezbollah operatives to seek alternative communications, and sent the group’s leadership reeling.

Things only got worse, from the perspective of Hezbollah, when it became clear that the mid-September pager attacks were only the opening salvo in a bigger onslaught.

Ten days after the first pagers blew up, Israel assassinated the longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, and then embarked on an air and ground campaign that decimated the group’s leadership and arsenal of weapons. All of which weakened their patron Iran as well.

“Hezbollah as a fighting force has been seriously degraded and diminished,” Ambassador Dennis Ross, Mideast envoy in both the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations, told The Cipher Brief. “Its entire leadership cohort has been eliminated. Its command and control [capability] is largely in tatters. It cannot trust its communications… Hezbollah operatives and fighters are focused now on their own survival.”

Cipher Brief expert Paula Doyle, a former Assistant Deputy Director for Operations at CIA, posed questions that showed the enormity of the moment. “Are Hezbollah and the other groups now nervous that Iran does not have their back? And that they therefore cannot re-equip, cannot rebuild, cannot retrain fast enough to keep up with the pace of Israel’s actions? This is a major change.”

Hezbollah heads into 2025 as a shadow of its former self. And that’s largely due to the operation that set off those pagers in Lebanon, on that mid-September afternoon.

Iran and Israel go to war

For years it’s been a nightmare scenario for the Middle East: Israel and Iran would climb the so-called “escalation ladder” from small-scale or proxy attacks to major military strikes against one another. It happened twice in 2024, first in April and then again in October, exchanges that brought the Middle East to the brink of an unprecedented, full-scale regional war.

Iran launched its first-ever major missile and drone attack against Israel in April, in response to an Israeli air strike that had killed three Iranian generals and four others at Iran’s embassy in Damascus. Israel countered, but war seemed to have been averted – and then a heavier exchange played out in October.

To some, the twin episodes of strike-counterstrike meant that the nightmare scenario had arrived.

“I would argue that perhaps we’re in the wider war now,” former CENTCOM Commander and Cipher Brief expert Gen. Frank McKenzie told us in October. “We continue to redefine what a wider war is, as each step is crossed. I think we entered a period of ‘wider war’ back in April, when Iran attacked Israel directly.”

Here, as with Ukraine’s Kursk invasion, there was a secondary surprise in what didn’t happen: Iran proved unwilling or unable to make good on pledges – including public vows made by the country’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – to rain a heavy retaliation down on Israel.

“I think Iran here is on really tricky ground, really uncertain ground,” former Defense Secretary Mark Esper told us. “They no longer have a viable proxy in Hamas. Their proxy, their favorite one, the crown jewel in their ring of fire, Hezbollah, has been decimated. The leadership is gone. They’re on their back heels…so the question is, what is left for Iran to do?”

“Salt Typhoon” – the cyberattack that the NSA missed

Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Jen Easterly, has a wish: that the names given to two major attacks linked to China sound less like cool spy novels, and more like what they really are. “I wish I hadn’t ever heard any of these names, like ‘Volt Typhoon,’ ‘Salt Typhoon,’ ‘Midnight Blizzard,’ ‘Tempest Panda’…that really glorify these villains that frankly want to do enormous harm to the United States of America,” she said. “I’m on a mission to try and rename some of these bad actors to things like Weak Weasel and Doofus Dingo.”

For now, though, “Salt Typhoon” and “Volt Typhoon” are still the names for a series of attacks that have targeted – successfully – critical U.S. infrastructure. Salt Typhoon was the one that struck in 2024 – or, to be more accurate, the one that came to light in 2024. It involved a cyber invasion and breaching of major American telecommunications companies – including AT&T and Verizon. The attacks were startling both for their brazenness and the time it took for the cybersecurity officials to realize what was happening. In fact, as the National Security Agency (NSA) Director General Timothy Haugh said, in a piece we published earlier this month, the NSA knew nothing of Salt Typhoon until it received an alert from Microsoft. “We did not see activity in U.S. telecommunications networks,” he said.

Salt Typhoon didn’t just show China’s ability to breach American telecommunication companies; U.S. officials said the hackers also reached into files associated with federal wiretapping operations, likely compromising intelligence community investigations. The earlier attack, the one known as Volt Typhoon, had also caught authorities flatfooted. “It combines this perfect storm of ‘not ready,’” Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery told us, adding that recent research showed water supply systems lacked proper security, infrastructure, and public-private collaboration. “All three elements were missing,” Montgomery said. “It’s extremely vulnerable.”

Russia’s “hybrid war” against Europe

It’s known as “hybrid warfare,” war waged with a blend of traditional and unconventional tactics, and by its nature it’s often not something seen out in the open. But increasingly in 2024, the scope and gravity of Russia’s efforts in this space became clear, ranging from suspected arson attacks, alleged disruption of transportation and communication networks, and assassination plots.

“Russia’s lethal operations are meant to create fear and coerce governments to refrain from acting against Moscow’s interests,” Philip Wasielewski wrote in The Cipher Brief. He and others called these actions a form of terrorism, and urged a commensurate response.

“NATO must respond forcefully to these attacks so that Russia recognizes the inviolability of NATO soil,” Wasielewski said. “A failure to do so raises a risk that the alliance will face not only continued attacks, but likely ones of increased lethality.”

And again, given the nature of such activities, we may well not know the half of it.

Trump’s return

Any American presidential election carries global implications, and while Donald Trump is an unpredictable figure, his election may bring far-reaching national and global security implications.

As The Cipher Brief has reported, Trump will take office having pledged to end the Mideast and Ukraine wars, and curtail or end American aid for Ukraine. He has regularly criticized NATO, questioned other longstanding U.S. alliances, boasted of warm relations with dictators, and as a general matter vowed a retrenchment when it comes to U.S. engagement in many parts of the world.

To take a recent example, as the rebels routed Assad from power, and many Cipher Brief experts and others urged the U.S. to engage in what one called an “extraordinary opportunity,” Trump made his views clear: “THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED.”

Trump has also promised unprecedented tariffs against China – not a national-security issue, per se, but a policy that could easily bring national-security ramifications, depending on the response from Beijing. And he has suggested or pledged better relationships with a host of dictators – from Vladimir Putin to Kim Jong Un to Xi Jinping. He even invited Xi to his inauguration.

So without question, Donald Trump’s election was a global game-changer. But it bears repeating: the former and future president is unpredictable.

A resurgence for the Islamic State

It’s a measure of just how turbulent 2024 has been that this item barely makes the list.

The Islamic State made headlines in the early part of the year with attacks that showed its geographic reach – bombings in Iran that killed 95 people, and then an assault that killed more than 130 at a concert hall on the outskirts of Moscow. Other IS plots were thwarted, including one aimed at the American election and another reportedly targeting a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna.

The good news? Western intelligence appeared plugged in enough to have stopped several plots before they came to fruition; and in Afghanistan, where the Islamic State Khorasan (IS-K) makes its home, the group has a powerful enemy in the ruling Taliban.

But it’s also the case that IS attacks overall jumped in 2024, and as we reported last week, there are concerns that ISIS, the Islamic State’s franchise in Iraq and Syria, might take advantage of the chaos following the Syrian rebellion, and begin a renaissance in that country.

“Is there the potential for [IS] to come here (to the U.S.) because it’s broadened into the region?” Cipher Brief expert Javed Ali said in a conversation with us after the Moscow attacks. “You take it one step further: baked into the jihadist ideology are attacks against the U.S. homeland.”

Dangerous waters: Clashes on the South China Sea

The South China Sea has been a geopolitical flashpoint for decades, but it’s typically been a place where tensions are kept to a low boil. In 2024, China turned up the heat.

China has claimed increasing areas of the South China Sea, and attempted to create facts on the water, as it were, building up small, often uninhabited islands, and in some cases installing military outposts on those islands. China’s claims have been countered by Southeast Asian nations, and an international tribunal upheld a case brought by the Philippines on its claims of sovereignty in 2016.

But in 2024, Chinese and Philippine coast guard and naval vessels found themselves in increasingly hostile confrontations. In the most violent incident, a Chinese ship rammed a Philippine boat attempting to resupply a garrison of Filipino troops on the grounded warship Sierra Madre in the disputed Second Thomas Shoal. Philippine officials said Chinese crew members armed with spears and knives boarded their vessel, and that several Filipinos were injured in the incident. The Philippines have also taken a stronger rhetorical stand against China lately, under President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. Last month, Marcos signed laws reaffirming the reach of his country’s maritime territories and right to resources, including in the South China Sea. China issued a “stern protest” in response.

This is a national security issue for the United States as well, which has regularly sailed ships through the South China Sea as an expression of the right to navigation, and the U.S. has a longstanding alliance with the Philippines.

“If China physically attacks a treaty ally of the United States,” said Cipher Brief expert RADM Mark Montgomery (Ret), “it’s going to put us in a very tough position because this isn’t like Ukraine and Russia, where Ukraine was not a treaty ally. This becomes a credibility issue for the United States.”

It may well be that 2025 is one more year of high tension without actual kinetic conflict; but the South China Sea could just as easily vault to the top of a list like this one, one year from now.

Ethan Masucol contributed to reporting.

Read more expert-driven national security insights, perspective and analysis in The Cipher Brief.

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thecipherbrief.com · by Tom Nagorski · December 22, 2024

19. CIA Behavior Control Experiments Focus of New Scholarly Collection | National Security Archive

https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=9ddef985-2873-4fc6-a084-d1973d684609

CIA Behavior Control Experiments Focus of New Scholarly Collection | National Security Archive

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National Security Archive Publishes Key Records on Infamous MKULTRA Program

Agency Sought Drugs and Behavior Control Techniques to Use in “Special Interrogations” and Offensive Operations

Sidney Gottlieb’s CIA Personnel File, 1983 Deposition Testimony, Among Newly Available Documents

nsarchive.gwu.edu

Washington, D.C., December 23, 2024 – Today, the National Security Archive and ProQuest (part of Clarivate) celebrate the publication of a new scholarly document collection many years in the making on the shocking secret history of the CIA’s mind control research programs. The new collection, CIA and the Behavioral Sciences: Mind Control, Drug Experiments and MKULTRA, brings together more than 1,200 essential records on one of the most infamous and abusive programs in CIA history.

Under code names that included MKULTRA, BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE, the CIA conducted terrifying experiments using drugs, hypnosis, isolation, sensory deprivation, and other extreme techniques on human subjects, often U.S. citizens, who frequently had no idea what was being done to them or that they were part of a CIA test.

Today’s announcement comes 50 years after a New York Times investigation by Seymour Hersh touched off probes that would bring MKULTRA abuses to light. The new collection also comes 70 years since U.S. pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly & Company first developed a process to streamline the manufacture of LSD in late 1954, becoming the CIA’s chief supplier of the newly discovered psychoactive chemical central to many of the Agency’s behavior control efforts.

Highlights of the new MKULTRA collection include:

• A DCI-approved plan in 1950 for the establishment of “interrogation teams” that would “utilize the polygraph, drugs, and hypnotism to attain the greatest results in interrogation techniques.” (Document 2)
• A 1951 memo that captures a meeting between CIA and foreign intelligence officials about mind control research and their shared interest in the concept of individual mind control. (Document 3)
• A 1952 entry from the daily calendar of George White, a federal narcotics agent who ran a safehouse where the CIA tested drugs like LSD and performed other experiments on unwitting Americans. (Document 5)
• A 1952 report on the “successful” use of ARTICHOKE interrogation methods that combined the use of “narcosis” and “hypnosis” to induce regression and later amnesia on “Russian agents suspected of being doubled.” (Document 6)
• A 1956 memo in which MKULTRA chief Sidney Gottlieb signs off a project that would “evaluate the effects of large doses of LSD-25 in normal human volunteers” on federal prisoners in Atalanta. (Document 13)
• The 1963 report from the CIA’s inspector general, which led CIA leadership to reexamine the use of unwitting Americans in their covert drug testing program. (Document 16)
• The 1983 deposition of MKULTRA chief Sidney Gottlieb in a civil case brought by Velma “Val” Orlikow, a victim of CIA-sponsored projects conducted by Dr. Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal. (Document 20)

The challenges facing this documentation project were considerable, as CIA director Richard Helms and longtime MKULTRA chief Sidney Gottlieb destroyed most of the original project records in 1973. It is a story about secrecy—perhaps the most infamous cover-up in the Agency’s history. It is also a history marked by near-total impunity at the institutional and individual levels for countless abuses committed across decades—not during interrogations of enemy agents or in wartime situations, but during ordinary medical treatments, inside prison hospitals, addiction clinics, and juvenile detention facilities, and in many cases led by top figures in the field of the behavioral sciences. Despite the Agency’s efforts to erase this hidden history, the documents that survived this purge and that have been gathered together here present a compelling and unsettling narrative of the CIA’s decades-long effort to discover and test ways to erase and re-program the human mind.

The bulk of these records were drawn from records compiled by John Marks, the former State Department official who filed the first Freedom of Information Act requests on the subject and whose 1979 book, The Search for the “Manchurian Candidate”: The CIA and Mind Control: The Secret History of the Behavioral Sciences (New York, W. W. Norton & Company, 1979) remains the single most important source on this episode. Marks later donated his FOIA documents and other research papers to the National Security Archive. Many of the redactions in the documents have been effectively removed with the passage of time, as official investigations, civil depositions, and detailed histories have shed significant light on some of these episodes. In many cases, copies of declassified records donated by Marks to the National Security Archive bear his handwritten annotations.

The legacy of MKULTRA goes far beyond the various “subprojects” described in these documents and that were largely shut down by the mid-1970s. As author Stephen Kinzer points out, the CIA’s behavior control research programs “contributed decisively to the development of techniques that Americans and their allies used at detention centers in Vietnam, Latin America, Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, and secret prisons around the world.” MKULTRA techniques were cited in the CIA’s 1963 KUBARK interrogation manual that was the basis for prisoner interrogations in Vietnam and later in anti-communist dictatorships in Latin America.

While many of the MKULTRA projects were conducted in hospitals, laboratories, or other institutional settings, others were carried out in clandestine CIA safehouses staffed not by doctors or clinicians but by hard-nosed federal narcotics agents like George Hunter White. Under the direction of Gottlieb, White adopted the persona of a bohemian artist named “Morgan Hall” to lure unsuspecting victims to his “pad” where he and his CIA collaborators secretly experimented on them and recorded their behavior. An OSS veteran who had worked on “truth drug” development for the Army in World War II, White surreptitiously dosed many of his victims with LSD, a drug that the CIA had in abundance thanks to Eli Lilly, which had developed the capacity to produce the drug in “tonnage quantities” and had agreed to become the Agency’s supplier. Gottlieb, his deputy Robert Lashbrook, and CIA psychologist John Gittinger are among the CIA officials who frequently visited White’s safehouses.

Of particular interest is the mysterious 1953 death of Frank Olson, an Army chemist and aerosols specialist for the Special Operations Division (SOD) of the Army’s Chemical Corps, the CIA’s military partner in behavior control research. Officially ruled a suicide, Olson’s death from a 10-story fall in New York City came 10 days after Gottlieb and TSS staff spiked his cocktail with LSD during a CIA-SOD work retreat at Deep Creek Lake, Maryland. The drugging was later determined to have contributed to his death, but many, including members of his family, have questioned the conclusion that Olson—who was sharing a room with Lashbrook that night—threw himself out the window of the Statler Hotel.

At the center of it all was Sidney Gottlieb, the head of the Technical Services Staff (TSS) of the CIA’s Chemical Division and later director of the Technical Services Division (TSD). Gottlieb was “the CIA’s chief poison maker,” according to Kinzer, whose book, Poisoner in Chief: Sidney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control (New York: Henry Holt, 2019), is the definitive work on the mercurial chemist. From his position deep inside the CIA’s secret corridors, Gottlieb led the Agency’s decades-long effort to find ways to use drugs, hypnosis, and other extreme methods to control human behavior and, it was hoped, turn them into usable tools for intelligence agencies and policymakers.

Stories about the CIA’s involvement in unsuccessful efforts to assassinate Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of Congo and Cuban leader Fidel Castro, among others, are among the most legendary, if not the most successful, examples of the Agency’s efforts to operationalize the tricks and tools assembled by Gottlieb’s unit. Less well known is his role in drug experiments and “special interrogation” programs that left hundreds of people psychologically damaged and others “permanently shattered,” according to Kinzer.

Although MKULTRA was approved at the highest levels, it operated with virtually no oversight. As Marks notes, the initial MKULTRA budget authorization “exempted the program from the normal CIA financial controls” and “allowed TSS to start up research projects ‘without the signing of the usual contracts or other written agreements.’” With little accountability, boundless resources, and the backing of CIA covert operations chief Richard Helms, Gottlieb and his staff at TSS developed a series of bizarre experiments that they believed would enhance covert intelligence operations while at the same time improving the Agency’s defenses against the use of similar techniques by enemy forces.

By the time Gottlieb arrived at CIA in 1952, Project BLUEBIRD, which explored “the possibility of control of an individual by application of Special Interrogation techniques,” was already well underway. Led by Office of Security chief Morse Allen, the early BLUEBIRD experiments were performed by teams that included polygraph experts and psychologists and were conducted on detainees and suspected informants at secret U.S. interrogation facilities in Japan and Germany.

The elevation of Allen Dulles to deputy director of central intelligence in 1951 led to an expansion of BLUEBIRD programs under a new name, ARTICHOKE, and under the direction of Gottlieb at TSS. The new program was to include, among other projects, the development of “gas guns” and “poisons,” and experiments to test whether “monotonous sounds,” “concussion,” “electroshock,” and “induced sleep” could be used as a means to gain “hypnotic control of an individual.”

It was under ARTICHOKE that the Agency first began to more systematically recruit the top researchers and court the most prestigious institutions to collaborate in its mind control research. One of the first to participate was the deputy director of Boston Psychopathic Hospital, Dr. Robert Hyde, who in 1949 was the first American to “trip” on LSD after the hospital acquired samples of the drug from Sandoz laboratory in Switzerland. In 1952, the CIA began to fund the hospital’s LSD research, under which Hyde used himself, his colleagues, student volunteers, and hospital patients as his subjects. Hyde would work on four MKULTRA subprojects over the next decade.

Shortly after Dulles became DCI in 1953, he authorized MKULTRA, expanding the Agency’s behavior control research and refocusing it on the development of “a capability in the covert use of biological and chemical materials” in “present and future clandestine operations.” Many of the 149 MKULTRA subprojects were carried out through well-regarded universities like Cornell, Georgetown, Rutgers, Illinois, and Oklahoma. Dr. Carl Pfeiffer, the chairman of the Department of Pharmacology of Emory University, directed four MKULTRA subprojects, all of which involved the use of drugs, including LSD, to induce psychotic states. The horrifying series of experiments left many of his subjects—including prisoners at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary and juveniles housed at a detention facility in Bordentown, New Jersey—scarred for life.

Many other MKULTRA subprojects were established through grants from false foundations funded by the CIA. One of these, the Geschickter Fund for Medical Research, run by Dr. Charles Geschickter, a professor of pathology at Georgetown University, steered millions of CIA dollars into research programs at Georgetown and other institutions. As part of the agreement, the CIA gained access to a medical safehouse at the newly constructed Gorman Annex of Georgetown University Hospital along with a ready supply of patients and students to use as subjects for MKULTRA experiments.

Another prominent MKULTRA “cutout” foundation, the Human Ecology Society, was run by Cornell Medical Center neurologist Dr. Harold Wolff, who wrote an early study of communist brainwashing techniques for Allen Dulles and later partnered with the CIA to develop a combination of drugs and sensory deprivation that could be used to erase the human mind. Among the most extreme MKULTRA projects funded through Wolff’s group were the infamous “depatterning” experiments conducted by Dr. D. Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute, a psychiatric hospital at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. Cameron’s methods combined induced sleep, electroshocks, and “psychic driving,” under which drugged subjects were psychologically tortured for weeks or months in an effort to reprogram their minds.

These records also shed light on an especially dark period in the history of the behavioral sciences in which some of the top physicians in the field conducted research and experiments usually associated with the Nazi doctors who were tried at Nuremberg. While some medical professionals engaged by the CIA apparently struggled with the ethical issues raised by conducting harmful tests on unwitting human subjects, others were eager to participate in a program in which, according to one 1953 memo, “no area of the human mind is to be left unexplored.” Just as CIA psychologists later oversaw the torture of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and at CIA “black sites,” during the first decades of the 21st century, many of the doctors and clinicians recruited for MKULTRA work were leaders in the field, whose participation boosted the prestige of the program and drew others into it. Scholars and researchers looking at the involvement of psychologists and other medical professionals in the horrific U.S. detention and interrogation programs that have been exposed in recent years will find parallels and historical antecedents throughout this collection.

The collection is also of great value to those interested in learning more about the early years of the CIA and some of its major personalities, such as Allen Dulles, Richard Helms, Richard Bissell, Franks Wisner, and others, who envisioned and created an intelligence agency that favored bold, often covert, action and where controversial projects like MKULTRA could secretly take root and flourish.

The Documents

Document 01

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Interrogation Research Section to Chief, Security Branch, “Establishing of Security Validation Teams,” Classification unknown, September 27, 1949, 2 pp.

Sep 27, 1949

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 1

After returning from an overseas trip, the CIA’s Morse Allen summarizes his recommendations for the establishment of “security validation teams” in the U.S. and abroad that would combine the use drugs, hypnosis and the polygraph to perform a variety of intelligence functions, including the screening of Agency personnel and informants, the interrogation of suspected enemy agents, the processing of any “loyalty cases” that might arise, and the possible use of “operational hypnosis.” The teams would also gather information about the “interrogation techniques and special operational procedures being utilized by Russia and Russian dominated countries.”

Document 02

Chief, Inspection and Security Staff, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to Director of Central Intelligence, “Project Bluebird,” Top Secret, April 5, 1950, 12 pp.

Apr 5, 1950

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 9

Sheffield Edwards requests that DCI Roscoe Hillenkoetter approve plans for Project BLUEBIRD, sending it directly to the DCI rather than through the normal approval process due to “the extreme sensitivity of this project and its covert nature.” The memo indicates broad agreement among CIA offices “for the immediate establishment of interrogation teams for the operational support of OSO [Office of Special Operations] and OPC [Office of Policy Coordination] activities,” referring to the groups responsible for managing covert operations. The teams would “utilize the polygraph, drugs, and hypnotism to attain the greatest results in interrogation techniques.” Noting that there is “considerable interest in the field of hypnotism” across CIA offices, the idea of Bluebird would be “to bring all such interests within the purview and control of a single project.”

The project envisions “interrogation teams … utilizing the cover of polygraph interrogation to determine the bona fides of high potential defectors and agents, and also for the collection of incidental intelligence from such projects.” Each team would consist of a psychiatrist, a polygraph technician and a hypnotist. An office would be established in Washington “to serve as a cover for training, experimentation, and indoctrination” of psychiatrists “in the use of drugs and hypnotism.” When not deployed abroad, the doctors would be used “for defensive training of covert personnel, study, and experimentation in the application of these techniques.”

A handwritten annotation indicates that Hillenkoetter authorized $65,515 for the project on April 20, 1950.

Document 03

“Report of Special Meeting Held in [Deleted] on 1 June 1951,” Classification unknown, June 1, 1951, 6 pp.

Jun 1, 1951

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 6

In The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, Marks cites this fascinating account of an “informal get-together” between representatives of the U.S., British and Canadian intelligence services in which “all matters related to the influence or control of the minds of individuals were discussed.” The conversation among the allied intelligence services “ranged from the specific subject of means for extracting information to the broadest aspects of psychological warfare and propaganda.”

One foreign intelligence official (identified by Marks as the British representative) at first seemed skeptical about the idea of individual mind control and was more interested in programs that would research “the psychological factors causing the human mind to accept certain political beliefs” and “aimed at determining means for combatting communism, “‘selling’ democracy,” and preventing the “penetration of communism into trade unions.” However, “after lengthy discussions he became quite enthusiastic” about research into individual mind control, according to the meeting notes.

“All present agreed that there has been no conclusive evidence, either from reports on Soviet activities or in Western research, to indicate that new or revolutionary progress has been made in this field,” but “full investigation of the Soviet cases was essential and basic research in the field is most important because of the importance of this matter in connection with cold war operations… Even though no radical discoveries are made, even small gains in knowledge will justify the effort expended.”

Since the group had only discussed “pure research” and not the offensive use of mind control techniques, the author of the memo recommends that the U.S. strike “a clear separation between the intelligence and the research aspects” of the project when dealing with allied intelligence organizations.

Document 04

ARTICHOKE Project Coordinator to Assistant Director, Scientific Intelligence, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, “Project ARTICHOKE,” Top Secret Eyes Only, April 26, 1952, 9 pp. Apr 26, 1952

Apr 26, 1952

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 6

Bureaucratic authority within the CIA for the ARTICHOKE program bounced around during the early 1950s from the Office of Security to the Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI) before going back to Security and, finally, to the Technical Services Staff (TSS) under Sidney Gottlieb. Less than a month after ARTICHOKE was first transferred from Security to OSI, the new project director, Robert J. Williams, sent this memo to his boss, H. Marshall Chadwell, outlining the program’s major accomplishments and deficiencies and pointing to the need to involve, or even turn the program over to, the CIA Medical Staff since he sees it as “primarily a medical problem.”

Williams reports that “field tests utilizing special techniques for interrogation” had not occurred as previously planned since the Artichoke project leaders lack confidence “in the techniques presently available” for ARTICHOKE interrogations and have been unable “to come up with any new techniques offering significant advantages” known methods. A “major factor” contributing to these conditions, Williams writes, is “the difficulty in obtaining competent medical support, both for the operational teams and for the research effort.”

A seven-page attachment describes ARTICHOKE as “a special agency program established for the development and application of special techniques in CIA interrogations and in other CIA covert activities where control of an individual is desired.” In the weeks since taking over the program, “OSI has endeavored to evaluate known techniques and to uncover new ones using consultants, Armed Service contracts and whatever information may be available within CIA or through other CIA channels.” The new team was also working to “evaluate claims that the USSR and/or its satellites may have developed new and significant techniques for this purpose.”

While no new techniques had been discovered, presently known mind control techniques described in the attachment include the use of LSD and other drugs, hypnosis, the use of the polygraph, neurosurgery, and electric shock treatments. However, field testing of these techniques has been handicapped by the “inability to provide the medical competence for a final evaluation and for such field testing as the evaluation indicates. Repeated efforts to recruit medical personnel have failed and until recently the CIA Medical Staff has not been in a position to assist.”

Document 05

George White appointment book entry, June 9, 1952

Jun 9, 1952

Source

George White Papers, M1111, Dept. of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, Calif.

In his daily planner entry for June 6, 1952, federal narcotics agent George White notes a morning meeting with the Sidney Gottlieb of the CIA, jotting at the bottom of the page: “Gottlieb proposes I be CIA consultant – I agree.” Using the alias “Morgan Hall,” White would go on to run CIA safehouses in New York and San Francisco where unwitting individuals would be surreptitiously dosed with LSD and other drugs and subjected to other mind control techniques.

Document 06

Memorandum for Director of Central Intelligence, “Successful Application of Narco-Hypnotic Interrogation (ARTICHOKE),” Classification unknown, 3 pp.

Jul 14, 1952

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 6

In a memo to the DCI, the CIA Security Office reports on the “successful” use of ARTICHOKE interrogation methods on “Russian agents suspected of being doubled.” Using the cover of a “psychiatric-medical” evaluation, officials from the Security Office and the CIA Medical Office combined the use of “narcosis” and “hypnosis” to induce regression and, in one case, “a subsequent total amnesia produced by post-hypnotic suggestion.” In the second case, CIA handlers used “heavy dosages of sodium pentothal,” a barbiturate, “coupled with the stimulant Desoxyn,” a methamphetamine, “with outstanding success.” The officers involved believed “that the ARTICHOKE operations were entirely successful” and “that the tests demonstrated conclusively the effectiveness of the combined chemical-hypnotic technique in such cases.”

Document 07

Memorandum from CIA Acting Assistant Director for Scientific Intelligence to Deputy Director for Plans Allen Dulles, “Project ARTICHOKE,” Classification unknown, July 14, 1952, 2 pp.

Jul 14, 1952

Source

John Marks Collection, Box 6

This memo to Deputy Director for Plans Allen Dulles records a meeting of CIA office heads at which it was decided to transfer control of the ARTICHOKE project from OSI back to the Inspection and Security Office (I&SO) with the Office of Technical Services (OTS), home of Sidney Gottlieb and the Technical Services Staff (TSS), taking over responsibility for ARTICHOKE-related research and for maintaining contact with the Defense Department.

Those present at the meeting agreed that “the scope of Project ARTICHOKE is research and testing to arrive at means of control, rather than the more limited concept embodied in ‘special interrogations.’”

Document 08

Memorandum for CIA Inspector General Lyman Kirkpatrick, “Use of LSD,” Secret, December 1, 1953, 2 pp.

Dec 1, 1953

Source

Center for National Security Studies (CNSS) FOIA

Shortly after the death of U.S. Army scientist Frank Olson was linked to a CIA LSD experiment, this memo recounts steps taken by CIA Technical Services Staff (TSS) chief Willis Gibbons to account for LSD handled and distributed by TSS. Gibbons has “impounded all LSD material in CIA Headquarters in a safe adjacent to his desk” and was “stopping any LSD tests which may have been instituted or contemplated under CIA auspices.” CIA field stations in Manila and Atsugi, Japan, also have LSD on site. The CIA has also provided LSD to federal narcotics agent George White, who Gibbons said was “fully cleared.” Asked for any “reports on the use and effects of LSD,” Gibbons said he likely had “a drawer full of papers.”

Gibbons was not fully clear on how the CIA obtained LSD, but most of it came from the Eli Lilly & Company, according to this memo, which “apparently makes a gift of it to CIA.”

Document 09

Statement of Vincent L. Ruwet on Frank Olson death, December 1, 1953

Dec 1, 1953

Source

CNSS FOIA

Vincent Ruwet, the head of the Special Operations Division of the Army Chemical Corps and Frank Olson’s boss, gives a firsthand account of the last days and hours of Olson’s life, including comments on his state of mind during and in the days following the Deep Creek Lake experiment, in which he and other CIA and Army officials were unwittingly dosed with LSD.

Document 10

Memorandum for Director of Security, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, “ARTICHOKE [redacted] Case #1,” Classification unknown, ca. March 1954, 4 pp.

Mar 1954

Source

John Marks Collection

An internal memo describes the interrogation of “an important covert operational asset” by an operational unit of the CIA’s ARTICHOKE program. Conducted at an undisclosed safe house, the ARTICHOKE interrogation was meant to “evaluate his part reports; to accept or not accept his past accounts or future budgets; to determine his future potentialities and clearly re-establish his bonafides.” CIA interrogators applied ARTICHOKE techniques including hypnosis and “massive use of chemicals” under cover of medical treatment for a case of influenza. The report says that the subject “was held under ARTICHOKE techniques for approximately twelve hours” and that they were under “direct interrogation” for 90 minutes. Consultants who reviewed the interrogation report agreed that ARTICHOKE officials “took certain (probably calculated) chances in using the massive dosages of chemicals” but that “ultimate results apparently justified the measures taken.”

Document 11

Memorandum for Director of Central Intelligence, “Project MKULTRA, Subproject 35,” Top Secret, November 15, 1954, 13 pp.

Nov 15, 1954

Source

George C. Marshall Research Library, James Srodes Collection, Box 8, Folder: “AWD [Allen Welsh Dulles]: Mind Control 1953-1961”

The CIA’s Technical Services Section (TSS) requests authorization for a project at Georgetown University Hospital that would provide cover for research under the Agency’s “biological and chemical warfare program.” Using a philanthropic organization as a “cut-out,” the CIA would partially fund “a new research wing” of the hospital (the Gorman Annex) and would use one sixth of the new annex to conduct “Agency-sponsored research in these sensitive fields.” MKULTRA, the memo observes, provides research and development funding “for highly sensitive projects in certain fields, including covert biological, chemical and radiological warfare” but does not specifically authorize funds to establish cover for these programs.

An attachment describes the rationale for the use of a university hospital as cover for conducting such experiments, noting that “competent individuals in the field of physiological, psychiatric and other biological sciences are very reluctant to enter into signed agreements of any sort which would connect them with this activity since such connection might seriously jeopardize their professional reputations.”

The Agency’s clandestine funding and use of the hospital would be channeled through the Geschickter Fund for Medical Research, named for Dr. Charles Geschickter, a professor of pathology at Georgetown University Hospital who had been secretly working with the CIA since 1951. The Fund was used “both as a cut-out for dealing with contractors in the fields of covert chemical and biological warfare, and as a prime contractor for certain areas of biological research.” In addition to Geschickter, at least two other board members of the Fund were aware that it was being used to conceal the CIA’s “sensitive research projects.”

Agency sponsorship was “completely deniable since no connection would exist between the University and the Agency.” Three “bio-chemical employees of the Chemical Division of TSS” would be given “excellent professional cover” while “human patients and volunteers for experimental use will be available under excellent clinical conditions” and with hospital supervision.

The document was found among the papers of James Srodes, author of Allen Dulles: Master of Spies (Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 1999), which are housed at the George C. Marshall Research Library of the Virginia Military Institute.

Document 12

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Technical Services Section, Chemical Division, [Materials and Methods Under Research and Development at TSS/CD], draft, includes alternate version, May 5, 1955, 7 pp.

May 5, 1955

Source

John Marks Collection; George C. Marshall Research Library, James Srodes Collection, Box 8, Folder: “AWD [Allen Welsh Dulles]: Mind Control 1953-1961”

This document was apparently drafted by the TSS Chemical Division after a discussion in which DCI Dulles and others had questioned whether the use of Georgetown University Hospital as a “cut-out” for sensitive experiments was worth the considerable cost and had asked TSS “to draw up a handwritten list of advantages which such a place would afford our people.”

The response from TSS lists 17 “materials and methods” that the Chemical Division was working to develop, including:

• substances that “promote illogical thinking,”
• materials that would “render the induction of hypnosis easier” or “enhance its usefulness,”
• substances that would help individuals to endure “privation, torture and coercion during interrogation” and attempts at ‘brain-washing,’”
• “materials and physical methods” to “produce amnesia” and “shock and confusion over extended periods of time,”
• substances that would “produce physical disablement, including paralysis,
• substances that “alter personality structure” or that “produce ‘pure’ euphoria with no subsequent let-down,”
• and a “knockout pill” for use in surreptitious druggings and to produce amnesia, among other things.

TSS notes that private physicians are often quite willing to test new substances for pharmaceutical companies “in order to advance the science of medicine,” but that, “It is difficult and sometimes impossible for TSS/CD to offer such an inducement with respect to its products.” Outside contractors can be used during the “preliminary phases” of many CIA experiments, but “that part which involves human testing at effective dose levels presents security problems which cannot be handled by the ordinary contractor.”

Document 13

Memorandum for the Record by Sidney Gottlieb, Chief, Technical Services Section, Chemical Division, “MKULTRA, Subproject 47,” Classification unknown, June 7, 1956, 6 pp.

Jun 7, 1956

Source

John Marks Collection

In a memorandum for the record, Gottlib authorizes an MKULTRA subproject to be led by Carl Pfeiffer of Emory University, a frequent collaborator who conducted experiments on prisoners at the federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia. Here Gottlieb approves a request to continue Pfeiffer’s experiments, which include the development of “an anti-interrogation drug” and “tests in human volunteers.”

The attached proposal identifies the name of the study: “The Pharmacological Screening and Evaluation of Chemical Compounds Having Central Nervous System Activities,” summarizing it as the testing of “materials capable of producing alterations in the human central nervous system which are reflected as alterations in human behavior.” Facilities described in the redacted document include “auxilliary [sic] animal testing laboratories,” those used for “preliminary human pharmacological testing,” and additional facilities “for testing in normal human volunteers at [deleted] Penitentiary directed by [deleted].”

Among the “particular projects” on the agenda for the year to come are: (1) “To evaluate the effects of large doses of LSD-25 in normal human volunteers,” and (2) “To evaluate the threshold dose levels in humans of a particular natural product to be supplied by [deleted],” and (3) “To evaluate in human beings a substance which we now believe has the ability to counteract the inebriating effects of ethyl alcohol.”

Document 14

Memorandum for the Record by Sidney Gottlieb, Chief, Technical Services Staff, Chemical Division, “Accountability for Certain Expenditures under Subproject 42 of MKULTRA,” Top Secret, August 17, 1956, 1 p.

Aug 17, 1956

Source

John Marks Collection

Sidney Gottlieb was shown this one-page document during a 1983 deposition in a lawsuit brought by Velma “Val” Orlikow, a former patient at the Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal, site of some of the most horrific MKULTRA experiments. The memo describes accounting procedures for a CIA safehouse run by federal narcotics agent George White “for conducting experiments involving the covert administration of physiologically active materials to unwitting subjects.” Gottlieb writes that “the highly unorthodox nature of these activities and the considerable risk incurred” by White and his associates make it “impossible to require that they provide a receipt for these payments of that they indicate the precise manner in which the funds were spent.”

Document 15

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, “Fitness Report” of Sidney Gottlieb, Secret, June 16, 1958, 5 pp.

Jun 16, 1958

Source

Stephen Kinzer donation

A CIA “Fitness Report” evaluates the first six months of Sidney Gottlieb’s stint as a CIA case officer in Europe. Characterized as “very mature” and “highly intelligent,” the evaluation notes that Gottlieb’s “entire agency career had been technical in nature” before this new assignment, his “first indoctrination to operational activities.” Gottlieb displayed a “keen desire to learn” and a “willingness to undertake all types of operational assignments” despite being “considerably senior in age and grade to other officers at the branch.” Gottlieb’s “only apparent weakness,” according to the evaluation, “is a tendency to let his enthusiasm carry him into more precipitous action than the operational situation will bear.”

Document 16

John S. Earman, Inspector General, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, “Report of Inspection of MKULTRA/TSD,” Top Secret, includes cover memo dated July 26, 1963, includes attachments, incudes annotated extract, 48 pp.

Jul 26, 1963

Source

John Marks Collection

In a memo forwarding his report on TSD’s management of MKULTRA to the DCI, CIA Inspector General John Earman says that the program’s “structure and operational controls need strengthening”; that the Agency should improve “the administration of research projects”; and that “some of the testing of substances under simulated operational conditions was judged to involve excessive risk to the Agency.”

The attached report briefly reviews the history of the program and finds that many of the projects initiated during that time “do not appear to have been sufficiently sensitive to warrant waiver of normal Agency procedures for authorization and control,” and that TSD was managing the program without proper documentation and oversight.

“Over the ten-year life of the program many additional avenues to the control of human behavior have been designated by the TSD management as appropriate to investigation under the MKULTRA charter, including radiation, electro-shock, various fields of psychology, psychiatry, sociology, and anthropology, graphology, harrassment [sic] substances, and paramilitary devices and materials.”

“TSD has pursued a philosophy of minimum documentation,” according to the report, and the “lack of consistent records precluded use of routine inspection procedures and raised a variety of questions concerning management and fiscal controls.” There were only two people at TSD with “full substantive knowledge of the program,” but these were “highly skilled, highly motivated, professionally competent individuals” who relied on the “‘need to know’ doctrine” to protect “the sensitive nature of the American intelligence capability to manipulate human behavior.”

Earman’s report looks closely at how each phase in the development of and operationalization of “materials capable of producing behavioral or physiological change in humans” is managed by TSD, including arrangements with physicians and scientists where the Agency “in effect ‘buys a piece’ of the specialist in order to enlist his aid in pursuing the intelligence implications of his research.”

With respect to human testing, the IG identifies two stages: the first “involves physicians, toxicologists, and other specialists in mental, narcotics, and general hospitals and in prisons, who are provided the products and findings of the basic research projects and proceed with intensive testing on human subjects.” During this phase, “Where health permits, test subjects are voluntary participants in the program.”

In the “final phase” of MKULTRA drug testing, the substances are given to “unwitting subjects in normal life settings.” Earman says it is “firm doctrine” at TSD “that testing of materials under accepted scientific procedures fails to disclose the full pattern of reactions and attributions that may occur in operational situations.” Because of this, “TSD initiated a program for covert testing of materials on unwitting U.S. citizens in 1955.”

The reports focuses on drug experiments conducted at CIA safehouses in the U.S. and directed by Bureau of Narcotics agent George White. Some of the test subjects “have been informers or members of suspect criminal elements,” but unwitting subjects were drawn from all walks of life: “[T]he effectiveness of the substances on individuals at all social levels, high and low, native American and foreign, is of great significance and testing has been performed on a variety of individuals within these categories.”

Earman nevertheless recommends that the Agency terminate the testing of substances on unwitting U.S. citizens after weighing “possible benefits of such testing against the risk of compromise and of resulting damage to CIA” but is equally clear that such tests can continue to be performed foreign nationals. The Agency’s “deep cover agents overseas” were “more favorably situated than the U.S. narcotics agents” that ran the safehouses in the U.S., and “operational use of the substances clearly serves the testing function.”

Overall, MKULTRA materials had not been very useful in intelligence operations: “As of 1960 no effective knockout pill, truth serum, aphrodisiac, or recruitment pill was known to exist,” although “real progress has been made in the use of drugs in support of interrogation.” Among other obstacles, Some case officers “have basic moral objections to the concept of MKDELTA,” the program meant to operationalize materials and techniques developed through MKULTRA.

Document 17

John S. Earman, Inspector General, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Memorandum for the Record, “MKULTRA Program,” Secret, November 29, 1963, incudes cover memo dated August 27, 1975, 3 pp.

Nov 29, 1963

Source

John Marks Collection

This memo records a meeting held in the office of Deputy Director of Central Intelligence Gen. Marshall Carter to settle the one major point of disagreement among CIA officials over the inspector general’s MKULTRA recommendations: whether to continue with the testing of MKULTRA substances on unwitting U.S. citizens. Others present were Deputy Director for Plans Richard Helms, CIA executive director (and former inspector general) Lyman Kirkpatrick, current CIA inspector general John Earman, and Sidney Gottlieb, head of the CIA’s Technical Services Division (TSD).

Both Gottlieb and Helms “argued for the continuation of unwitting testing,” while Earman, Carter and Kirkpatrick disagreed. Carter was concerned with the “unwitting aspect,” and a discussion ensued “on the possibility of unwitting test on foreign nationals,” which “had been ruled out” due to opposition from “senior chiefs of stations” as “too dangerous” and who said they lacked “controlled facilities.” Earman finds this “odd,” emphasizing the slipshod nature of some of the safehouses used for unwitting tests in the U.S.

Concluding the meeting, the participants agree that if the Directorate for Plans determined “that unwitting testing on American citizens must be continued to operationally prove out these drugs, it may become necessary to place this problem before the Director [of Central Intelligence] for a decision.” The attached cover memo from 1975 indicates that the DCI decided to defer a decision on testing U.S. citizens for one year and requested that until then the Agency “please continue the freeze on unwitting testing.” The authors of the cover memo found “no record … that this freeze was ever lifted.”

Document 18

Memorandum from Donald F. Chamberlain, Inspector General, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to Director of Central Intelligence, “Destruction of Records on Drugs and Toxins,” Classification unknown, missing tabs, October 20, 1975, 4 pp.

Oct 20, 1975

Source

John Marks Collection

In this memo to the DCI, CIA inspector general Douglas Chamberlain describes efforts to recover Agency records on the MKULTRA and MKNAOMI programs, many of which were destroyed in 1973 on the orders of Richard Helms and Sidney Gottlieb.

Document 19A

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency letter to Sidney Gottlieb, Non-classified, April 30, 1979, 3 pp.

Apr 30, 1979

Source

Douglas Valentine donation

In a letter to the now-retired Sidney Gottlieb, the Agency requests his assistance with a CIA project to “investigate its past involvement with drugs, with emphasis on the use of drugs on unwitting subjects.” The questions mainly have to do with a “secondary” effort of the investigation “to assess the possibility of harm by the specific drugs in the quantities used, and to flesh out the report with enough details of the safehouse operations to lend credence to the report.”

Document 19B

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Memorandum for the Record, “Telephonic Response of Dr. Gottlieb to Our Letter of 30 April 1979,” Non-classified, 2 pp.

Apr 30, 1979

Source

Douglas Valentine donation

This document records answers given over the phone by Gottlieb in response to questions posed by the CIA in its letter of April 30, 1979 (Document 19A). Among other things, Gottlieb says that the LSD used by George White in the CIA safehouses was “packaged as a solution in approximately 80 microgram units in plastic ampules” and that follow-up with subjects “was conducted when practical.” Gottlieb estimates that there were approximately 40 tests on unwitting subjects that were “performed to explore the full range of the operational use of LSD,” including for “interrogation” and for “provoking erratic behavior.”

Document 20

Deposition of Sideny Gottlieb, PhD, in Civil Action No. 80-3163, Mrs. David Orlikow, et al., Plaintiffs, vs. United States of America, Defendant, May 17, 1983, 174 pp.

May 17, 1983

Source

Stephen Kinzer donation

This is the second of three depositions of Sidney Gottlieb by attorneys representing Velma "Val" Orlikow, a former patient of the Allan Memorial Institute, where CIA-backed staff performed horrific experiments on psychiatric patients during the 1950s and 60s.

Asked whether he was involved in “domestic field experimentation” with LSD, Gottlieb said, “If by what you mean ‘field experimentation’, is experiments that involve – that are taking place outside of Washington, D.C., and if by my personal involvement, you mean, was I aware of them or did I have something to do with their instigation, the answer is yes.” When Gottlieb is shown a document indicating that he had personally conducted an interrogation, he claims confusion before admitting that he had indeed been involved in “between one and five” interrogations.

Gottlieb nevertheless denies that the CIA intended to develop techniques to improve U.S. interrogations. “The primary objective of developing new techniques for interrogation … It has to do with the difference between something I have always objected to, namely, that this whole program wanted to create a Manchurian Candidate. The program never did that. That was a fiction, as far as I am concerned, that Mr. Marks indulged in and this question you are asking has to do with that and this is a sensitive area in my mind.”

Asked whether the CIA had tried to identify “techniques of producing retrograde amnesia,” Gottlieb said it was something that they “talked about,” but that he could not “remember any specific projects or specific research mounted in response to that question.” Asked if the CIA ever used “psychosurgery research projects,” Gottlieb said his “remembrance is that they did.”

Gottlieb also describes the role played by the Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology, which he says “was to act in a security sense as a funding mechanism so that the involvement of CIA’s organizational entity would not be apparent in projects that we were funding.” The Geschickter Fund operated much the same way, according to Gottlieb: “It was made as a mechanism to funnel funds for research activities where CIA didn’t want to acknowledge its specific identity as the grantor.”

Gottlieb evades most of the questions about the most important issue before the court in the Orlikow case: the extreme “psychic driving” and “depatterning” experiments conducted by Dr. Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute. Again and again, Gottlieb claims to not remember key events and details about the CIA's relationship to Cameron’s terrifying experiments.

Gottlieb is somewhat more forthcoming about his knowledge of MKULTRA projects in the U.S., including experiments conducted by Dr. Harris Isbell of the NIMH Addiction Research Center in Lexington, Kentucky, which Gottlieb said he visited “at least three or four times.” Gottlieb said Isbell did “some of the early and basic work between dose and response of LSD” on prisoners from the Narcotics Division Hospital. Gottlieb also says he was aware that Isbell offered inmates drugs in exchange for their participation in the project. Asked whether reports that Cameron kept some subjects on LSD for 77 consecutive days was “consistent with the research he was conducting,” Gottlieb said it was, noting that Cameron “had some interest in the quantum effects of LSD, repeated ingestion.” Asked about files on the CIA safehouses run by narcotics agent George White, Gottlieb replies, “They were all destroyed. They don’t exist anymore,” adding, “They were specifically destroyed when the files were destroyed in ’72, ’73.” Asked about White’s purported use of “prostitutes to test methods of slipping drugs to unwitting persons,” Gottlieb said, “the involvement of prostitutes in the West Coast activity had to do with the MO, the modus operandi of this whole drug culture.”

The plaintiffs’ attorneys also ask Gottlieb about the CIA’s work with Dr. Carl Pfeiffer of Emory University, who performed drug experiments on prisoners at the Atlanta federal penitentiary and elsewhere, and Dr. Harold Isbell of the National Institutes for Mental Health, who had conducted drugs tests on patients at the Addiction Research Center in Lexington, Kentucky.

Notes

Kinzer, pp. 274-77.

Stephen Kinzer, Poisoner in Chief: Sidney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control (New York: Henry Holt, 2019), p. 2.

Marks, p. 61.

Marks, p. 24; Kinzer, pp. 38-39.

Kinzer, p. 55.

Marks, pp. 60-61; Kinzer, pp. 69-71.

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Memorandum, “Mushrooms -- Narcotic and Poisonous Varieties,” June 26, 1953.

nsarchive.gwu.edu

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