Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

"Belief in the truth commences with the doubting of all those 'truths' we once believed."

– Friedrich Nietzsche

"Civilization is not destroyed by wicked people; it is not necessary that people be wicked but only that they be spineless."

– James Baldwin

"The only way to deal with the unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.

– Albert Camus

1. China’s Xi, Now Alone Atop His Military, Is the Sole Voice in Tackling Taiwan

2. Missiles filled with water and broken silos. Inside Xi’s corrupt military

3. Iran’s Gen Z Helped Propel the Protests. They Paid With Their Lives.

4. Before Any Strike on Iran, U.S. Needs to Bolster Air Defenses in Mideast

5. Ukrainian drone schools say there's little the West can teach them about fighting a drone war

6. Venezuela’s New Leader Is Trying to Run Out the Clock on Trump

7. The Hottest Commodity in the Mining Business: American Generals

8. Exclusive — Trump’s ‘Quiet Hammer’: How CIA Director John Ratcliffe Has Revitalized Spy Agency in President’s First Year Back

9. Kari Lake promotes Trump on Voice of America. Does that break the law?

10. Fighting with Live Data: XVIII Airborne Corps’ Experience with Its Operational Data Teams

11. Pentagon Defends Restrictions on Media Outlets

12. PRC Targets NATO Frontline States

13. U.S. Allies Play Risky Game With Tilt to China

14. If NATO Dies, Long Live NEATO

15. Why NATO Won’t Collapse

1. China’s Xi, Now Alone Atop His Military, Is the Sole Voice in Tackling Taiwan

Summary:

Xi Jinping has purged five of six senior generals he selected three years ago, including the arrest of Gen. Zhang Youxia, leaving Xi as the dominant voice directing strategy toward Taiwan. Analysts cited here judge a near-term invasion less likely, with Beijing pivoting to coercion below open conflict: blockade-style exercises, integrated military posturing with economic and cyber pressure, and “legal warfare” that uses PRC law to target Taiwanese officials and raise travel risk. Some warn Xi’s “one-man committee” heightens command-and-control strain and miscalculation risk. Beijing also reads U.S. resolve as weak under the Trump administration.

Comment: Two points from Sun Tzu: "All warfare is based on deception" and "Never assume your enemy will not attack, make yourself invincible." I am skeptical of assessments that call invasion less likely (which is of course what we want -no invasion at all) because they make us complacent. Is that China's intent?

China’s Xi, Now Alone Atop His Military, Is the Sole Voice in Tackling Taiwan

WSJ

Leader has freer hand to deal with self-ruled island that Beijing claims as its own

By Lingling Wei

Jan. 31, 2026 10:00 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/world/china/chinas-xi-now-alone-atop-his-military-is-the-sole-voice-in-tackling-taiwan-388bdabd

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has purged five of the six senior generals he handpicked to lead the military three years ago. casares/epa/shutterstock/Shutterstock

In purging his top generals, Chinese leader Xi Jinping put the command of the armed forces in the hands of one man—himself. Now, his vision alone will decide the course of Beijing’s looming confrontation with Taiwan.

The arrest of Gen. Zhang Youxia, a close ally and childhood friend the Chinese leader called “big brother,” removes any internal authoritative voices who could slow Xi’s hand in any move against Taiwan, the democratic, self-governing island that Beijing claims as part of its territory.

The timing is critical. The Chinese military is racing toward a 2027 deadline Xi has set for “modernization,” often interpreted as readiness for a Taiwan contingency.

A near-term invasion of Taiwan, though, is now less likely, said foreign-policy and military analysts, now that Xi has purged five of the six senior generals that he had handpicked to lead the military just three years ago. Xi is pivoting to a campaign designed to break Taipei’s resolve without firing a shot, these analysts said.

Beijing will increasingly lean on tactics that fall just below the threshold of open conflict, the analysts said. This includes relentless exercises intended to simulate a maritime and air blockade of Taiwan, displaying the blunt force behind Beijing’s psychological offensive.

“Xi’s approach at the moment is a broader coercive campaign that integrates military posturing with economic and cyber pressure,” said Laura Rosenberger, the senior national-security official and the top American envoy to Taiwan under former President Joe Biden.

Beijing is also opening new fronts through “legal warfare,” using domestic Chinese law to target Taiwanese officials and raising the risk for Taiwanese people to travel to the mainland, as activities once considered routine political expression can now be reclassified as criminal offenses.

China is engaging in cyberattacks aimed at paralyzing Taiwan’s energy and healthcare infrastructure, Taiwanese officials say. Meanwhile, Beijing’s intimidation of countries like Japan aims to leave Taiwan diplomatically stranded.

The message: China’s military leadership may be in flux, but Xi’s focus on Taiwan remains unrelenting, and his ability to strangle Taiwan’s supply lines and exhaust its economic resilience remains unyielding.

Xi’s motives for removing Zhang—announced on Jan. 24—remain a mystery.

Zhang Youxia was a close ally and childhood friend of Xi. Wang Zhao/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Chinese military leaders were told in a closed-door briefing that Zhang leaked nuclear secrets to the U.S. and accepted bribes—serious enough charges to justify ending such a senior official’s career, though the Communist Party doesn’t always tell even its own leadership ranks the full or true story behind Xi’s moves. At a press briefing Thursday, a Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman warned against unfounded speculation and referred back to the original announcement of the probe into Zhang’s alleged violations of party discipline and state law.

Another emerging theory is that Zhang and Xi disagreed over when the Chinese military should be ready for combat with Taiwan. Xi wanted the military to “achieve joint operational capability for a Taiwan invasion by 2027, whereas Zhang clearly placed this goal closer to 2035,” said a Jan. 26 analysis of official records by analyst K. Tristan Tang at the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington, D.C.,-based think tank.

Following Zhang’s arrest, Tang noted, an editorial in the army’s flagship newspaper accused Zhang of having “seriously trampled” on the military’s chairman responsibility system—the principle that codifies the absolute command of Xi, the chairman, over the military. This choice of words, Tang said, suggests that Zhang’s approach represented “a political challenge that subverted Xi’s authority.”

Maintaining a credible military option remains the backbone of Xi’s approach, Rosenberger said, because “that provides the essential leverage Xi needs to attempt to exhaust Taipei’s resolve.”

The Trump administration maintains that it doesn’t support any unilateral change to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait and will keep a military posture to maintain it.

Other analysts say any potential policy rift between Zhang and Xi might have been over how to man, train and equip the military.

“For a U.S. deterrence strategy to be effective, we need Xi Jinping to be surrounded by competent generals who will give him objective advice,” wrote Drew Thompson, a former Pentagon strategist now with the Singapore-based S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, in a recent analysis.

By gutting the military’s top decision-making body, Thompson noted, Xi will have a harder time with command and control, creating the operational risk of a leader trying to command a million-man army through a “one-man committee.”

“Without Zhang Youxia,” Thompson said, “the risk of miscalculation goes up.”

Trails from projectiles launched toward the Taiwan Strait during Chinese military drills. Kyodonews/ZUMA Press

The removal of Zhang highlights a higher level of confidence about the prospect of “reunification” than Xi has shown at any point since he rose to power in 2012, according to people who consult with Chinese officials. This confidence is bolstered by his absolute control over the military.

It also stems from a fundamental reassessment of Washington’s resolve. Beijing views Trump as having little appetite for a costly military intervention in the Taiwan Strait.

Even the Trump administration’s recent $11.1 billion arms sale to Taiwan, the largest in history, has been interpreted in Beijing as “promoting the defense industry” rather than a security commitment, said Yun Sun, director of the China program at the Washington, D.C.,-based Stimson Center.

“Beijing is convinced it may never see a U.S. president more indifferent to the Taiwan Strait than Trump,” Sun said.

Xi sees his coming meetings with Trump this year as a tactical opening to further erode Taipei’s confidence. By potentially offering trade concessions, such as multibillion-dollar orders for Boeing aircraft, Xi aims to secure the kind of transactional statements from Trump that could sow doubts in Taipei about the U.S. commitment to its defense.

However, administration officials say the White House is focused on blunting Beijing’s aggression through a “denial defense” anchored in the First Island Chain—the string of islands stretching from Japan through Taiwan to the Philippines that acts as a natural barrier to Chinese naval expansion.

In addition, while the recently signed U.S.-Taiwan “Silicon Pact” seeks to reshore advanced semiconductor manufacturing, officials say it simultaneously reinforces Taiwan’s security. By hardwiring the island’s industrial ecosystem into the American economy, they say, the pact effectively converts Taiwan’s high-end silicon output into an indispensable U.S. national security asset.

Overall, by raising the cost of military action for China, U.S. officials say Washington aims to prevent a Chinese military attack—and domination of the region—without engaging in needless confrontation.

Write to Lingling Wei at Lingling.Wei@wsj.com

WSJ

2. Missiles filled with water and broken silos. Inside Xi’s corrupt military

Summary:

U.S. intelligence community assessed in 2024 that some western China missile silos used construction materials that were too heavy and that some missiles were filled with water, not fuel. Xi Jinping responded by removing the entire leadership of the People's Liberation Army Rocket Force, then widened an anti-corruption purge that has dismissed hundreds of officers over 14 years. The campaign recently expanded to oust Gen. Zhang Youxia. Analysts cited argue Xi is using corruption probes to enforce loyalty, strip cliques, and accelerate reforms aimed at Taiwan readiness by 2027 and global military primacy by 2049, even as purges may cut expertise at the top.

Comment: If corruption is both a real weakness and a lever of political control, how should Taiwan and its partners judge PLA readiness when purges remove senior expertise while modernization and drills intensify? How can we use these conditions to our advantage in the cognitive domain?

Missiles filled with water and broken silos. Inside Xi’s corrupt military

The Telegraph · Memphis Barker

Beijing purges armed ranks as president primes troops for Taiwan

Senior Foreign Correspondent

Memphis Barker is a Senior Foreign Correspondent for The Telegraph and its former Foreign Editor. He has previously written for The Independent and covers a variety of areas, from US relations to the Russia-Ukraine war. He previously worked for The Economist as their Pakistan Correspondent.

01 February 2026 6:00am GMT

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/02/01/xis-corruption-purge-to-make-army-ready-to-invade-taiwan/

Memphis Barker Senior Foreign Correspondent

01 February 2026 6:00am GMT

At the press of a button, the lids of the missile silos in western China should open to launch nuclear weapons capable of reaching the United States.

But according to US intelligence released in 2024, the materials used to construct them were too heavy. Not only that, some of the missiles were filled with water rather than fuel.

The scandal – or some form of it – appears to have driven Xi Jinping, China’s president, to remove the entire leadership of Rocket Forces, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) division responsible for Beijing’s nuclear deterrent, in the months before the leak was published.

The purge was part of a colossal effort to stamp out corruption in China’s military ranks. Since Mr Xi took power 14 years ago, he has dismissed hundreds of officers and filed criminal charges against some of the most powerful figures in the armed forces.

Last week, that campaign expanded to oust Gen Zhang Youxia, the highest-ranking uniformed commander in the PLA and a childhood acquaintance of the president.

Xi Jinping ousted Gen Zhang Youxia (right of Mr Xi), the highest-ranking uniformed commander in the PLA Credit: Xinhua / Alamy

While the eradication of endemic graft clearly motivates Mr Xi, analysts told The Telegraph his hatchet job on the PLA is also driven by his desire to reshape the world’s second-largest army into a modern fighting force – one that is ready to invade Taiwan by 2027 and overtake the US as the world’s top military by 2049.

Corruption, in this view, forms both a serious threat to the PLA and a tool through which the president has been able to direct the military towards these goals – and ensure it remains entirely loyal to his own rule.

“In its scope and scale, it’s breathtaking,” Jonathan Czin, who served as a China analyst in the CIA for 17 years, told The Telegraph.

Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Asia Society think tank, said the president had built a “much larger political discipline apparatus around an initial anti-corruption campaign, which also targets disloyalty, incompetence and other failures to suitably implement Xi’s policies”.

The case of Gen Zhang provides the clearest hint that the purges reach beyond simple housekeeping.

Announcing the investigation, the Chinese newspaper PLA Daily declared that he had “seriously trampled upon the system of chairman responsibility”, a reference to Mr Xi’s years-long campaign to enforce total allegiance to his wishes as chairman of the Central Military Committee (CMC), the body that directs PLA strategy and operations.

What exactly he did remains shrouded in the fog of Chinese high politics. He has been accused of leaking Chinese nuclear weapons secrets to the US, but rumours suggest Gen Zhang may have opposed the president’s timeline for an invasion of Taiwan.

The general’s recent speeches had laid out his focus on a training programme that would, by its nature, have pushed back a complex crossing of the Taiwan Strait, noted K Tristan Tang, an analyst.

He had also praised “collective leadership” in the PLA and stressed loyalty to the Communist Party – small but important blows against the principle of loyalty to one man alone.

At the moment, corruption appears to be the only objective the CMC is equipped to tackle. Mr Xi’s purges have reduced the body to just two members; himself and Zhang Shenmin, the anti-corruption watchdog.

That has generated speculation that Mr Xi’s scythe has cut the PLA to the bone, stripping away the expertise that would be needed to handle even the most basic of combat tasks, let alone an invasion requiring the full might of the navy, air force, cyber and space divisions in total concert.

Be careful with such interpretations, warned Mr Czin, who is now a senior fellow at the Washington-based Brookings Institute think tank.

“I think [the purges] shows not that Xi’s is distracted from operational issues, but that he’s laser-focused on them,” he said.

China is holding drills in waters around Taiwan Credit: Lin Jian/Xinhua

In truth, Mr Xi may well prefer to reunify Taiwan through a political process as the costs of an invasion would be staggering.

Taiwan’s politics appear to be leaning his way, with elections due in 2028 while a pro-Beijing party is performing well in the polls.

But he is “serious about wanting to have options,” said Mr Czin. “He wants the military to be up to snuff and prepared, and he’s willing to be so unforgiving of the PLA because he’s so focused on the underlying objectives.”

Christopher K Johnson, another ex-CIA China analyst, echoed Mr Czin, saying that the idea put forward by some that the PLA blood-letting is solely intended to shore up Mr Xi’s position is wide of the mark.

“I think it’s more a manifestation of his impatience with his generals, that they are not getting it done in a timely manner,” he said.

“I’m not saying he’s in a hurry, but he’s getting older and might be facing some whispers it’s time to think about stepping down.

“What better way to show, ‘don’t f--- with me’, than to take down the entire high command?”

Mr Xi’s twin campaign of corruption purges and vast military spending has transformed the PLA into a force unrecognisable from the one he inherited.

Under Deng Xiaoping, the military had been encouraged to run commercial enterprises, while government funds were diverted to transforming the economy. As a result, the PLA operated a host of dodgy businesses, from dance troupes to factories and high-end hotels – with top brass continuing to profit despite a 1998 ban on outside fundraising.

In strategic terms, the force was designed to ward off invasion from the United States or Soviet Russia, a legacy of the Cold War that left Beijing’s military planners with an oversized ground army.

Mr Xi’s corruption campaign began as part of an effort to assert his authority for radical change, said Mr Czin. In 2014, CMC vice-chairmen Xu Caihou and Guo Boxio were charged with taking bribes in exchange for offering promotion, a widespread practice that had undermined the PLA – and reportedly still does – for generations.

“The guys he went after were ‘made men’,” Mr Czin said. “It was a high stakes gamble. By uprooting these people, it gave Xi the political latitude to undertake this massive reform that his predecessors tried to impose on the PLA.”

In 2015, the president cut the size of the army by 300,000 troops. Command structures were reorganised to prevent the formation of graft-prone cliques.

At the same time, the taps were opened on a spending programme that has by now delivered China the world’s largest navy, second-largest combat air force and a missile arsenal that is rapidly catching up with – and, in some areas, outmatching – that of the United States.

The official military budget is $250bn (£200bn), but analysts believe the true figure is higher as much remains off the books. The secrecy has allowed graft to continue, but the much-publicised corruption campaign has kept it below the threshold to seriously undermine Beijing’s military modernisation.

“The corruption is real, it’s been pervasive,” said Mr Czin. “But the military modernisation is incredibly impressive. It’s a big enough and well-resourced enough effort that there’s enough space for both of these things to coexist side by side.”

By now, the PLA can “walk and chew gum”, he added. In November, Mr Xi fired nine generals, including seven who previously served in the Eastern Theatre, the branch responsible for Taiwan. The next month, he ordered the largest drills to date around the island.

To adopt the metaphorical style of Chinese state media for a moment, the road may be bumpy – but the destination is unchanged.

3. Iran’s Gen Z Helped Propel the Protests. They Paid With Their Lives.

Summary:

Protests in Iran escalated into an antiregime uprising when Gen Z joined demonstrations that began with bazaar workers protesting economic collapse. Young Iranians, shaped by internet access, high youth unemployment above 20 percent, and dashed hopes after the nuclear deal’s collapse, pushed demands beyond economic relief toward political change. The regime responded with an internet blackout and a sweeping crackdown. Human-rights researchers estimate deaths may exceed 10,000, with more than 6,000 confirmed, including at least 137 minors. Many victims were teenagers, illustrating both Gen Z’s central role and the regime’s willingness to use lethal force to preserve control.

Comment: Revolution, resistance, and insurgency. These phenomena are taking place around the world and are the natural extension of politics and especially grievance politics yet I would surmise that they are the least studied phenomena in our national security community.

Can we help the oppressed to free themselves through activities to enable a resistance or insurgency to coerce, disrupt, or overthrow a government or occupying power? Has our government made such a decision (e.g. is there a presidential finding to take such actions)? If so, how would we do that? One method is through and with an underground, auxiliary, or perhaps a guerrilla force (but not necessarily). Again, if we are willing to do this do we have the will to follow through with our assistance and help support what comes next? Or are we going to continue to suit back and see what happens (our normal course of action). Or do we think overt military threats and possibly strikes will do the trick? There are no easy answers to these questions.

But ultimately the fundamental question is: what is the acceptable durable political arrangement that protect, sustain, and advance US national security interests? Once we determine that then we can develop the strategy and the campaign plan to support that strategy and achieve the strategic objectives.

Iran’s Gen Z Helped Propel the Protests. They Paid With Their Lives.

WSJ

A generation who grew up in a more connected world rebelled against a failing economy and strict social rules

By Feliz Solomon

Updated Feb. 1, 2026 1:25 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/irans-gen-z-helped-propel-the-protests-they-paid-with-their-lives-80675ef3

Protesters rallied in Tehran on Jan. 8, the day the regime shut down internet access in Iran. Anonymous/Getty Images

On Jan. 7, Parviz Afshari received the last messages his son, Sam, would ever send him: “I’m planning to join the protest tomorrow / But don’t tell Mom.”

Relatives found the boy’s body four days later, among rows of corpses laid out on a morgue floor in the Iranian city of Karaj, his father said in a phone interview from his home in Germany.

Sam, who had just turned 17, is one of an expanding list of teenagers and other young people emerging as victims of the brutal crackdown on protests in Iran, a country where almost half of the population is under 30. Among the dead were athletes, artists and students whose photographs and brief biographies have since flooded social media, creating a digital memorial of young lives snuffed out under an internet blockade.

Ranks of youth often form the front lines of mass protests—from China’s 1989 pro-democracy demonstrations to the Arab Spring uprisings of the early 2010s, to Myanmar’s youth rebellion against a military coup in 2021. The Gen Z protest movement that has rolled around the globe in recent years has felled governments in places as far apart as Bangladesh and Bulgaria.

The demonstrations in Iran took on a different tenor, initially spearheaded by conservative bazaar workers disgruntled at the collapse in Iran’s currency. The regime acknowledged their concerns and promised to make economic concessions. But when young people joined in, the protests morphed into an antiregime uprising that presented the greatest challenge to the country’s Shiite cleric rulers in their almost five decades in power. The crackdown was swift and decisive.

Sam Afshari, who was killed in the crackdown at age 17, had been planning to move to Germany this year.

The scale of the violence in Iran is still coming into view. The regime shut down the internet on Jan. 8, the night Sam disappeared, and moved to crush the protests that had swelled in cities nationwide. Most of the country was under a near-total communications blackout for weeks, making information slow to transmit and difficult to verify. Connectivity remains heavily restricted.

Still, stories have trickled out, mostly via Starlink satellite connections and testimonies of people who either left the country or got online using foreign SIM cards near its borders. Human-rights researchers who are painstakingly piecing together evidence say the death toll may surpass 10,000, which would make it the deadliest episode of political suppression in modern history.

Iranian authorities said more than 3,100 people were killed and alleged, without providing evidence, that most of the deaths were linked to terrorism.

The U.S.-based nonprofit Human Rights Activists in Iran puts the confirmed death toll at more than 6,000. Of the dead that it has identified so far, at least 137 people were under the age of 18 when they were killed. Tallies by other human-rights groups suggest about half of those killed were likely members of Iran’s Gen Z, those born roughly between 1997 and 2012.

They were the first generation of Iranians to grow up with widespread access to the internet, exposing them to the outside world like never before. They witnessed a brief window of optimism with the easing of sanctions in 2016, which raised hopes of an economic rebirth—until Iran’s nuclear deal collapsed two years later and plunged the nation further into isolation.

Some 42% of Iranians are under 30 years old, according to the United Nations population agency. Their prospects have shrunk as the economic situation has worsened—youth unemployment is above 20%—and many feel the ultraconservative Islamic regime is out of touch.

Young Iranians last took to the streets en masse in 2022, outraged over the death of a young woman in custody of the country’s “morality police,” who accused her of wearing her headscarf improperly.

The U.N. says at least 551 people were killed when authorities crushed those protests, known as the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement.

“These young Iranians take to the streets fully aware that they may be met with bullets and batons, and do so because they believe their future is worth fighting for,” said Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute who grew up in Iran. “Iranian Gen Z wants to be part of the world and, in very basic terms, be able to express themselves freely, have economic opportunities, and live with dignity,” she said.

Rebin Moradi, 17, was found dead days after he told family he was planning to join a protest after a soccer game.

Like many of his generation, Sam belonged to a scattered family. Parviz, his father, moved to Germany in search of opportunity when the boy was about 10. The distance was painful, Parviz said, but they spoke regularly on WhatsApp video calls, sometimes three times a week. Sam was his only child.

Back home in Karaj, Sam studied English and German languages and was planning to join his father in Bavaria later this year to complete his education in information technology. He loved computers, his father said, but his greatest passion was swimming.

When he didn’t come home, his family hoped that he had only been detained. Local authorities said they had no record of his arrest and that the family should check the hospitals. One by one, they scoured the city’s medical centers until they came across a medic who said they had seen the boy.

The medic told them Sam was in critical condition being treated for a single gunshot wound in the back of his head, until authorities came and took him and other patients away. The medic advised them to check the morgues, Parviz said.

They found him inside a body bag on Jan. 11 with a second bullet wound that tore through half of his face and made him almost unrecognizable, Parviz said.

“My son could have built the future of the country, this regime is just killing kids who are asking for freedom,” said Parviz, sobbing. “It isn’t fair.”

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Relatives of three other teenagers killed in the crackdown shared similar stories with The Wall Street Journal. One, a 16-year-old from the city of Kermanshah, told his parents he was going to the library but never returned.

Another, 17-year-old soccer player Rebin Moradi, called his family as he was leaving a game and told them he was joining a demonstration on his way home. They found him four days later in Tehran’s Kahrizak morgue.

And another, Amirali Heidari, was days away from his 18th birthday when he joined a protest in Kermanshah with a group of close friends, according to a relative who lives abroad. A witness who later fled the country told the relative he saw security forces shoot Heidari in the chest and then beat him to death with the butt of a rifle as he lay bleeding on the ground, the family member said.

Amirali Heidari, who was also 17 when he was killed, had joined a demonstration in Kermanshah, western Iran.

As young as he was, Heidari felt a duty to fight for his generation’s future, the relative said. The relative fled Iran years ago after being badly injured at an antiregime protest. He said his own history with the regime had an impact on the young boy, who took up the fight in his absence.

“The younger people always take more risks, in protests and in life,” said Ghazal Abdollahi, an Iranian artist who went into exile after participating in the 2022 protests. For her, too, the struggle was personal—her mother is a well-known activist who spent many years imprisoned.

“This was their time,” she said.

Write to Feliz Solomon at feliz.solomon@wsj.com

WSJ

4. Before Any Strike on Iran, U.S. Needs to Bolster Air Defenses in Mideast

Summary:

Before any U.S. strike on Iran, the Pentagon is reinforcing regional air and missile defenses to blunt expected retaliation. Under the Trump administration, the U.S. is deploying additional THAAD and Patriot batteries to bases across the Gulf, moving eight Navy guided-missile destroyers into missile-defense positions, and forward deploying F-15E, F-35, and EA-18G aircraft. Recent Iranian missile attacks, including strikes on Al Udeid Air Base, underscored defense shortfalls despite largely successful interceptions. To sustain defenses, the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin agreed to quadruple THAAD interceptor production, though near-term capacity remains constrained.

Comment: Will we deploy air and missile defense capabilities from Korea again as we did a few months ago?

How do finite U.S. air defense stocks constrain our options if Iran responds with sustained missile and proxy attacks?

What risks arise for deterrence when Gulf partners restrict basing or overflight to avoid Iranian retaliation?

Before Any Strike on Iran, U.S. Needs to Bolster Air Defenses in Mideast

WSJ

The Pentagon is taking steps to better protect Israel, Arab allies and American forces if Iran retaliates

By Lara Seligman

, Shelby Holliday

and Michael R. Gordon

Updated Feb. 1, 2026 8:21 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/before-any-strike-on-iran-u-s-needs-to-bolster-air-defenses-in-mideast-faca35a9

President Trump inspected a Thaad antiballistic missile system in 2019. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

President Trump’s promised “armada” has arrived in the Middle East, headed by the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier battle group, and sophisticated F-35 jets have moved closer to the region.

Trump has yet to say whether and how he might use force. But American airstrikes on Iran aren’t imminent, U.S. officials say, because the Pentagon is moving in additional air defenses to better protect Israel, Arab allies and American forces in the event of a retaliation by Iran and a potential prolonged conflict.

The U.S. military could conduct limited airstrikes on Iran if the president were to order an attack today, U.S. officials say. But the kind of decisive attack that Trump has asked the military to prepare would likely prompt a proportional response from Iran, requiring the U.S. to have robust air defenses in place to protect Israel as well as American troops, the officials say.

The military already has air defenses in the region, including destroyers capable of shooting down aerial threats. But the Pentagon is deploying an additional Thaad battery and Patriot air defenses to bases where U.S. troops are stationed across the Middle East, including Jordan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, according to defense officials, flight tracking data and satellite imagery.

Thaads can intercept ballistic missiles above the Earth’s atmosphere, while Patriots defend against lower-altitude, shorter-range threats.

“The air defense question is key—the extent to which we have sufficient materiel to ensure that our troops and assets in the region are going to be protected from some kind of Iranian retaliation,” said Suzanne Maloney, a former State Department official on Iran policy in both the Bush and Obama administrations.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East, declined to comment for this article.

The importance of air defenses was on display in June when the U.S. helped defend Israel against barrages of Iranian missiles during its 12-day war with Iran.

Then, the U.S. carried out its “Midnight Hammer” operation against three Iranian nuclear sites using B-2 bombers and submarine-launched cruise missiles. The Iranians responded the next day by firing 14 missiles at the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, which is home to the U.S. air command center in the region and is used by American warplanes.

A satellite image shows damage after an Iranian attack in June on the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. Planet Labs PBC/AP

American and Qatari Patriot batteries largely blocked that attack. But the Pentagon later acknowledged that one of the Iranian missiles had struck the base, though it didn’t result in any injuries and did minimal damage.

Trump hasn’t been clear about his goals with Iran. Yet a broader and more sustained series of U.S. attacks aimed at dissuading the Iranian regime from violently repressing protesters, forcing it to end uranium enrichment or even toppling the Iranian government, could lead to a heavier Iranian response this time around.

“Midnight Hammer was a very specific” mission, Lt. Gen. Jason Armagost, the deputy commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, told reporters at the Mitchell Institute Airpower Forum on Thursday. “It was like a play in a game. It wasn’t the game writ large.”

If the U.S. were to undertake a major air campaign, Maloney and others say, Tehran would respond with as much firepower as it could muster, deploying its arsenal of short- and midrange ballistic missiles against U.S. and Israeli positions.

It would also likely mobilize its proxy forces, directing Shia militia groups to launch attacks in the region. Israel has battered Hezbollah in Lebanon and defeated Hamas in Gaza. But Tehran could encourage Yemen-based Houthis to target tankers and launch drone and missile strikes against civilian and military infrastructure in the region, and Iraqi militias and extremists groups in Syria could also mount attacks

The prospect of a renewed U.S. and Iranian confrontation has stirred concerns among some Persian Gulf states. Last week, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates said that they wouldn’t allow their airspace and territory to be used by the U.S. to attack Iran. The announcements were intended to insulate those Gulf states from Iranian retaliation if the Americans strike.

Gulf states are also readying their own air defenses. Saudi Arabia has purchased seven Thaad batteries, a few of which have been delivered, a Gulf state official said.

The Iranians have likely been making their own preparations, too. “The Iranians will learn from Midnight Hammer. They will learn from Rising Lion,” said Armagost, using the names respectively for the U.S. and Israeli air campaigns against Iran. “They will understand things differently and they will change.…So I would say we have to be prepared for them to be different.”

The U.S. has also deployed three squadrons of F-15E fighters to Jordan, which could play a role in shooting down Iranian drones. Those fighters targeted Iranian drones when Tehran attacked Israel in April 2024 in what the Air Force called the “largest air-to-air enemy engagement in over 50 years.”

Several Navy guided-missile destroyers, which are also capable of taking out aerial threats, have been moved into the Middle East. The U.S. now has eight destroyers within range to shoot down Iranian missiles and drones, including two near the Strait of Hormuz, three in the North Arabian Sea, one near Israel in the Red Sea and two in the Eastern Mediterranean, according to a Navy official and open source photos.

Other military preparations are continuing apace. On Thursday, six F-35s from the Vermont National Guard were seen landing in the Azores, moved from the Caribbean region to a position that is closer to the Middle East. Vermont National Guard F-35s took part in January’s operation to capture former Venezuela leader Nicolás Maduro. Some Navy EA-18G Growler electronic-attack aircraft recently left Puerto Rico and arrived in Spain.

Personnel work on a U.S. Air Force F-35 Lightning II jet fighter on the tarmac in Puerto Rico. Eva Marie Uzcategui/Reuters

The Thaad deployment is a particularly strong sign that the U.S. is preparing for a potential conflict, since the U.S. has only seven operational batteries, and the units have been stretched thin over the past year.

“It is expensive to move Patriots and THAADs. The probability that they’re going to be used starts to go up” with this much movement, said Seth Jones, a former Defense Department official.

Each Thaad, which stands for Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, can hold 48 interceptors between six launchers. It needs about 100 soldiers to reload, analyze data, perform maintenance and shoot interceptors around the clock.

Thaads played an important role in protecting Israeli population centers from Iranian attacks over the summer, especially as Israel ran low on its own Arrow interceptors, The Wall Street Journal reported. But the U.S. burned through munitions at a furious clip, firing more than 150 missiles, amounting to roughly a quarter of the interceptors ever purchased by the Pentagon.

To rapidly increase the production of Thaad interceptors, the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin said Thursday that they had signed a framework agreement to quadruple capacity from 96 to 400 a year. The announcement came just weeks after another deal to increase production of Patriot interceptors. Neither deal is expected to make a big difference if a conflict breaks out in the coming weeks, however.

While the U.S. already had Patriots at some locations in the Gulf, satellite imagery shows that an additional Patriot was set up at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar over the past week.

In January, the U.S. military announced a coordination cell at the Qatari base aimed at strengthening air and missile defense cooperation with Gulf partners.

Additional air defenses moving to other bases in the region will help better protect U.S. installations and population centers, but could also strain units and supplies if a broader conflict breaks out, analysts say.

“The U.S. military obviously has finite resources, but air defense is a perfect example of where the resources are much more finite,” said Mara Karlin, who worked in the Pentagon during the Bush, Obama and Biden administrations. “They’re incredibly valuable. Every single combatant commander wants more.”

Write to Lara Seligman at lara.seligman@wsj.com, Shelby Holliday at shelby.holliday@wsj.com and Michael R. Gordon at michael.gordon@wsj.com

WSJ

5. Ukrainian drone schools say there's little the West can teach them about fighting a drone war

Summary:

Ukrainian drone schools argue Western militaries have little to teach them about drone warfare against Russia because Ukraine has learned at unmatched scale and speed under battlefield pressure. Instructors say their curricula come almost entirely from Ukrainian combat experience and continuous feedback from soldiers at the front, not from allies, except for training tied to donated equipment. Tactics and technology shift so fast that lessons are rewritten as often as every other week, with techniques kept only if they work in practice. The schools claim Ukraine is now positioned to export drone and counter-drone lessons to partners, and some allies are already seeking that expertise.

Comment: "We are from America and we are here to help" does not resonate in Ukraine. But we have a lot to learn from Ukraine. If battlefield learning cycles have collapsed to weeks, how should U.S. and allied forces redesign doctrine, procurement, and training so we can continue to work “through, with, and by” partners AND update TTPs (tactics, techniques, and procedures) in near real time?

The answer is you have to be on the ground and engaged. This can't be done remotely.

Ukrainian drone schools say there's little the West can teach them about fighting a drone war

Business Insider · Sinéad Baker

Jan 28, 2026, 5:08 AM ET

Ukraine's drone schools are training operators to take on Russia.
They say their teachings don't include any Western guidance, only Ukrainian insight.
Ukraine has more modern drone warfare experience than many of its partners and is helping them train for it.
https://www.businessinsider.com/ukrainian-drone-schools-say-west-cant-teach-them-drone-war-2026-1

Ukrainian drone schools say that Western militaries have little to offer them when it comes to training drone operators to fight Russia. Western armies know war, tactics, and combat power, but Ukraine has significant experience in novel elements of modern drone warfare learned over years of hard fighting.

Drones of all kinds are used more in Russia's war against Ukraine than in any previous conflict in history, and they have been central to Ukraine's survival, accounting for a large share of attacks.

While drones are not new to Western militaries, they have never been used or adapted at this scale or speed. Facing an existential adapt-or-die situation, Ukraine is writing its own lessons.

Ukraine has a host of drone schools that have designed curricula to make the country's operators as effective as possible. And officials at three of them told Business Insider that their lessons are only informed by Ukrainian experiences.

"As of today, we do not receive any particularly useful information from our allies regarding the use of drones," other than training on any equipment that allies provide, one said.

John Moore/Getty Images

Vitalii Pervak, CEO of another training school, Karlsson, Karas & Associates, said that said 100% of his school's teachings come from feedback or information from soldiers who are in the field.

One example he gave was in stopping enemy drones: "All experience in striking down drones is based only on the experience of the Ukrainian Defense Forces."

He said there isn't time for theoretical tactics that may not work when needed most. "We are in a situation where we need to respond quickly to new drones and the tactics of their use by the enemy," he said. "Accordingly, techniques are being tested in practice, and only those techniques that really work are being retained."

A fast-changing battle

Another drone school, Dronarium, said the school's training "is based on existing combat experience, which changes very rapidly."

Because of that pace, instructors said Ukraine is often better positioned to share lessons than to receive them. "In this sense, at the moment it is rather us who can share valuable information with them, rather than our foreign partners sharing it with us," Anastasia Sobova, Dronarium Academy's chief business development officer, told BI.

Ukrainian soldiers have been receiving Western training throughout the war, with mixed feedback. Some has been well received, while other elements have been deemed irrelevant to the kind of fighting Ukraine faces now.

Ukraine's troops say combat tactics can become out of date in a matter of only weeks; the drone war is no different.

Ximena Borrazás/Getty Images

Matt McCrann, CEO of the US arm of DroneShield, a company making counter-drone systems for the US and Europe, recently told Business Insider that the speed of battlefield changes has shifted weapon development cycles from months and years to weeks.

Things change so fast on the battlefield that the schools need to frequently rewrite their lessons, sometimes as fast as every other week.

These drone schools stay on top of changes by sending their instructors to the front, maintaining constant contact with program graduates and other soldiers who send updates from the battlefield, and testing new technology.

Viktor Taran, the CEO of the Kruk Drones UAV training center, said that his school's graduates exchange messages with the school to share new information about what's happening on the battlefield or get advice from teachers.

Ivan Antypenko/Suspilne Ukraine/JSC "UA:PBC"/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images

"Cadets go to the front line, type questions in those chats, or provide information about new enemy tactics." The information they get from those on the front line goes into the teaching for the next groups.

Pervak said in his school, "We constantly update our instructors' knowledge. Some instructors occasionally visit combat units of the UAV to see firsthand what has changed, what remains relevant, and what can be discarded."

Many Western militaries, including the US, acknowledge they are behind on drone warfare and that their tactics need updating. It is an area where Ukraine is helping partner nations that have assisted it in its defense.

The West is learning

Western and NATO militaries are closely watching the war, concerned that Russia could threaten Europe and that drones would play a major role in any wider conflict. That worry has intensified efforts to learn from Ukraine's experience, particularly in drone operations and counter-drone tactics. The Ukrainians are attempting to meet that demand for expertise.

Ukraine agreed to help Poland with drone warfare training and has helped train Norway's drone operators.

Ukrainian military specialists traveled to Denmark to participate in counter-drone exercises. Copenhagen said in April it intended to send unarmed soldiers to Ukraine for drone warfare training, though it is unclear if that has taken place.

The UK says Ukraine has influenced its drone doctrine as well. Britain leads an international effort to train Ukrainian troops, known as Operation Interflex, and those Ukrainian soldiers often arrive with more real-world drone experience than their trainers.

JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP via Getty Images

Lt. Col. Ben Irwin-Clark, commanding officer of the 1st Battalion of the UK's Irish Guards, told Business Insider that one surprise from the training was "how much we would learn." His unit now trains in drone warfare and 3D printing drone parts based on Ukrainian lessons.

Pervak described sharing expertise as a way to repay allies for their support. "Not forgetting the fact that we are truly grateful for the remarkable support from our allies, it is time now to share our latest battlefield experience."

Drones might not dominate a NATO war against Russia to the same extent they do in Ukraine — in part because Western militaries possess capabilities Ukraine lacks — but they are no longer viewed as a niche tool. Ukraine's experience has led to a realization that this tech may very well be the future of warfare.

Business Insider · Sinéad Baker

6. Venezuela’s New Leader Is Trying to Run Out the Clock on Trump

Summary:

Delcy Rodríguez is trying to outlast Trump administration pressure by trading economic concessions for time while slow-walking political change. She has freed 303 political prisoners, with more than 700 still detained, and pledged a vague general amnesty while announcing the closure of El Helicoide. She is offering U.S. access to oil and backing a new hydrocarbons law to ease foreign investment. Marco Rubio is pursuing phased stabilization, recovery, and transition, but POTUS is not prioritizing an election timetable. Critics fear Rodríguez aims to consolidate power and preserve a managed status quo.

Comment: Delcy Rodriguez says: "You have the wristwatch but we have the time." If economic wins come first, what leverage remains to force measurable democratic steps, and on what timeline?

How should Washington judge “progress” (e.g., what are our metrics) when releases and amnesty language are reversible while security forces publicly pledge allegiance to Rodríguez?

Venezuela’s New Leader Is Trying to Run Out the Clock on Trump

WSJ

Delcy Rodriguez offers Washington economic wins on oil while slow-walking human-rights and democratic reforms

Ian Lovett

in Bogotá, Colombia, and

Vera Bergengruen

in Washington

Jan. 31, 2026 8:00 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/world/americas/venezuelas-new-leader-is-trying-to-run-out-the-clock-on-trump-f5564b52

Delcy Rodriguez, a key figure in Venezuela’s recent administrations, has cast herself as the architect of a new order. Leonardo Fernandez Viloria/Reuters

After the raid that captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the Trump administration called on his vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, to release hundreds of political prisoners—a test of her willingness to break with Maduro’s repression.

Nearly a month later, 303 political prisoners have been freed, according to a Venezuelan human-rights organization, while more than 700 remain behind bars. Rodriguez on Friday pledged a general amnesty for political prisoners—without making it clear who would be released or when.

Her handling of U.S. pressure over political prisoners reflects Rodriguez’s broader strategy, said current and former U.S. officials and the Venezuelan opposition. She aims to outlast Trump’s focus on her country by giving ground on demands that benefit her, such as allowing foreign investment in oil and other areas, while slow-walking political concessions that would lead to real change.

The ultimate goal is to preserve her position, the officials and opposition figures said, at the top of a system that Maduro, with her help on international trade and economics, created over the past 12 years.

“The best strategy for Delcy is just to wait the U.S. out,” said Ricardo Hausmann, a former minister of planning in Venezuela and professor at the Harvard Kennedy School.

A woman in Caracas holds photos of people labeled as political prisoners while waiting for news about their release. Pedro Mattey/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

As the 2026 midterms approach, U.S. involvement in Venezuela could become a political liability for Trump, giving Rodriguez and her allies an incentive to run out the clock, people involved in U.S. discussions about Venezuela said. A majority of American voters reject deeper U.S. involvement in Venezuela, according to a recent Wall Street Journal poll, and disapprove of Trump’s engagement abroad instead of focusing on the economy.

In calls with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with whom she has been speaking three times a week, Rodriguez has offered to cooperate on the Trump administration’s plans, particularly opening Venezuela’s oil sector to American companies, U.S. officials say.

The 56-year-old interim leader appears to be betting that time is on her side, offering the U.S. president the kind of economic deals and concessions he prizes to convince him that a managed status quo is better than a destabilizing, uncertain transition.

So far, the strategy seems to be paying off.

Trump has repeatedly praised Rodriguez as a “terrific person” who is making “tremendous progress.” He has said Rodriguez will eventually visit the White House and floated a visit to Venezuela himself. “We have a very good relationship with the leaders of Venezuela, and we’re going to keep it that way,” Trump said Tuesday.

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Rodriguez has cast herself as the architect of a new order while keeping tight control over how changes are carried out. In her call this week for a general amnesty, she said it would cover what she called “the entire period of extremist violence from 1999 to the present.” That includes Maduro’s term and that of his predecessor, the late Hugo Chávez, who turned Venezuela into a socialist economy that collapsed with a decline in oil prices a decade ago. Over that time, Venezuela has been roiled by civic unrest, the exodus of eight million citizens and an attempted coup in 2002.

She also announced the closure of the Helicoide, a Caracas detention center known for its brutal conditions for political prisoners.

In practice, who gets released—and when—will depend on the final text of the law. Rodriguez said those convicted of “serious human-rights abuses” wouldn’t get amnesty. She didn’t define those crimes.

Rubio has outlined a three-phase plan that focuses first on stabilization, then recovery and finally a political transition. But Trump has made it clear that he isn’t giving priority to a timetable for free elections, people involved in the discussions said.

A White House official said that the U.S. now has control and leverage over Venezuela’s interim authorities and that the Venezuelan people would be responsible for making transformational changes to their country.

The U.S. has dispatched a team of diplomats to potentially reopen the embassy in Caracas. Trump ordered U.S. officials to reopen commercial airspace over Venezuela, clearing the way for American carriers to resume service to and from the country for the first time since 2019.

Travelers wait at Venezuela's Maiquetia International Airport. Ronald Pena R/EPA/Shutterstock

A few hours later, the National Assembly approved a new hydrocarbons law to ease the path for foreign investment in oil—ending a quarter-century of state-imposed barriers to entry for most international energy companies.

For Venezuela’s opposition, the fear is that the arrangement with Rodriguez could harden into a long-term status quo.

“We are just acknowledging reality, and that is we have to work with the people who are in charge of the government,” Rubio told lawmakers on Thursday.

Rubio, a Cuban-American who had long called for Maduro’s ouster, is perceived as the architect of Trump’s strategy in Venezuela and in Latin America generally. Though he insisted the end goal is a democratic Venezuela that “looks nothing like this,” Rubio declined to say if U.S. officials have a plan to make it happen.

“It can’t take forever,” he said when asked whether Rodriguez remaining in power in six months would be a failure. “If progress isn’t being made, we’ll have very different feelings about it.”

Venezuela’s new leader, Delcy Rodríguez, is a socialist true believer who helped Nicolás Maduro maintain his grip on power for more than a decade as the country’s economy crumbled. Photo: Reuters

In Trump’s first term, Rodriguez was sanctioned for her role in helping Maduro “maintain power and solidify his authoritarian rule.” She was also designated for a travel ban in the European Union, which froze her assets. Those sanctions remain in place.

If Trump gets what he wants on economic policy in Venezuela, the president could be reluctant to make free elections a priority over the current economic and diplomatic arrangements, said former U.S. officials and people involved in discussions with the White House.

Still, some in the Trump administration are wary of the current arrangement with Rodriguez. The first senior U.S. official to meet with Rodriguez was Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe, who on a Jan. 15 trip to the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, warned regime figures to end support for drug traffickers. A recent U.S. intelligence assessment cast doubt on Rodriguez’s willingness to distance herself from China, Iran and Russia, one of Trump’s demands, said a U.S. intelligence official.

“They’re hoping to wait out Trump, that’s why we can’t allow that,” Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R., Fla.) said about Rodriguez’s interim government. “As soon as they think they have the upper hand, they’ll tell us to go away.”

Some Trump officials have sought to reassure lawmakers, foreign leaders and business executives that the cooperation with Rodriguez is temporary. U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright has told American executives there would be elections in 18 to 24 months, a person present said.

So far, prominent members of Venezuela’s opposition have been reluctant to criticize Trump’s strategy, at least publicly.

María Corina Machado, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning opposition leader who is currently exiled in the U.S., privately told Rubio and other U.S. officials on Wednesday that she wanted to return to Venezuela as quickly as possible.

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado on a visit to Capitol Hill earlier this year. Luke Johnson/Getty Images

“Things are happening in Venezuela that were unthinkable just a few days ago,” Machado said, referencing the period before the U.S. raid.

Still, Machado was skeptical about working with Rodriguez. “We are willing to facilitate a genuine transition,” she said, “not a Russian-style transition where mafias remain in control.”

On Wednesday, Venevision, one of the country’s major television networks, broadcast comments from Machado from Washington—the first time in years the channel had given airtime to the opposition leader. The move drew a rebuke from Diosdado Cabello, the interior minister and de facto leader of some of Venezuela’s paramilitary forces.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, wearing a red tie, speaks with Rodriguez's brother, National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez. Leonardo Fernandez Viloria/Reuters

In some settings, Rodriguez says she’s working well with Trump and Rubio. In others, she rails against “Washington’s orders.”

All the while, she has been working to consolidate power.

On Wednesday, Venezuela’s military and police—including Cabello, widely seen as a figure who could undermine Rodriguez’s rule—pledged allegiance to Rodriguez in a ceremony broadcast on state television.

Henrique Capriles, a Maduro adversary who is a lawmaker in Venezuela’s National Assembly, said he warned that the opposition couldn’t simply rely on the U.S. to ensure there would be free elections.

“The opposition must unite around a common goal,” he said, “which is democratic change in Venezuela.”

Write to Ian Lovett at ian.lovett@wsj.com and Vera Bergengruen at vera.bergengruen@wsj.com

WSJ

7. The Hottest Commodity in the Mining Business: American Generals

Summary:

Western critical-mineral miners are hiring retired U.S. generals, admirals, and colonels to win access to Pentagon money and navigate Washington. The article says at least 12 senior retired officers joined boards or leadership roles in the past year as the Department of Defense spends billions to rebuild domestic supply chains after China cut the U.S. off for much of last year. These retirees help with introductions, Capitol Hill engagement, and vetting foreign-partner deals for Pentagon concerns. Examples include Almonty Industries hiring retired Gen. Gustave Perna and retired Brig. Gen. Steven Allen, and United States Antimony adding retired Gen. Jack Keane.

Excerpts:

Western miners have added at least a dozen former American generals, colonels and admirals to boards or to senior leadership roles over the past year, hoping to tap the billions of dollars the Department of Defense is shelling out to rebuild domestic supply chains after China cut the U.S. off for much of last year.

The retired former generals guide the geologists and finance executives who run mining companies through the less-familiar terrain of Washington. They make introductions to defense companies, scrutinize business deals with foreign partners to make sure they won’t raise flags with the Pentagon, and give advice about whom to meet on Capitol Hill.

Comment: Good work if you can get it I guess. Is this article overhyping the contributions of general and flag officers? On the other hand if these officers are helping us to outcompete China in this area that is critical to US national security, is this a bad thing? Aren't these GOFOs then continuing to contribute to the security of America? Why shouldn't they be compensated for their experience, expertise, and knowledge (their unique intellectual property)?

The Hottest Commodity in the Mining Business: American Generals

WSJ

Rare-earth companies bring in retired military brass to navigate Washington and win Pentagon contracts

By Jon Emont

Feb. 1, 2026 8:00 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/business/the-hottest-commodity-in-the-mining-business-american-generals-84cb799e

U.S. Army Gen. Gustave Perna and Brig. Gen. Steven Allen—both retired—were brought on by miner Almonty Industries. Rod Lamkey/CNP/Zuma Press; Yonhap News/Newscom/ZUMA Press

Companies that mine critical minerals are looking more like defense contractors these days. One sign: Many are hiring retired generals.

Western miners have added at least a dozen former American generals, colonels and admirals to boards or to senior leadership roles over the past year, hoping to tap the billions of dollars the Department of Defense is shelling out to rebuild domestic supply chains after China cut the U.S. off for much of last year.

The retired former generals guide the geologists and finance executives who run mining companies through the less-familiar terrain of Washington. They make introductions to defense companies, scrutinize business deals with foreign partners to make sure they won’t raise flags with the Pentagon, and give advice about whom to meet on Capitol Hill.

Almonty Industries AII -0.32%decrease; red down pointing triangle, a North American company that mines tungsten in Europe and South Korea, picked up two retired American generals last year. Retired four-star Army Gen. Gustave Perna, a logistics expert, joined the company’s board in March and retired Army Brig. Gen. Steven Allen enlisted as chief operations officer in December.

Board positions can earn former generals tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Retired Gen. Richard B. Myers, a board member at rare-earth miner MP Materials, brought in $240,000 in 2024, based on fees and stock awards.

United States Antimony, whose namesake metal is used to harden bullets, brought a retired four-star Army general, Jack Keane, onto its board in August, after a search that stretched for longer than a year to find the right former military official. Critical Metals, a British Virgin Islands-based company developing a rare-earth mine in Greenland, last year appointed a retired four-star general and a retired rear admiral to an advisory board.

“The guys that have worked in the Pentagon before, they know how all this works,” said Tony Sage, chief executive of Critical Metals. “I’m a miner. I don’t know how this works.”

Once Critical Metals begins extracting rare earths in Greenland, it plans to ship them to partners in the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Romania for refining, after which they would be sold to Western defense companies and other buyers. Sage said the brass on his advisory board have helped him make connections in the defense industry.

For their part, generals say they want to help break America’s reliance on China for critical minerals. “My value is trying to help them understand the Department of War,” said Keane, whose 37-year military career included a stint as the Army’s vice chief of staff.

MP Materials runs a mine and processing facility in Mountain Pass, Calif. Bridget Bennett for WSJ

Keane said he provides advice about how to navigate Washington and may engage with government officials without directly lobbying on behalf of U.S. Antimony. The company landed a $245 million Pentagon contract a month after Keane joined the board, which Keane wasn’t involved in.

Gary Evans, the CEO of U.S. Antimony, said Keane’s presence has been a boon. “We have three grant requests going to D.C. this month for different things,” Evans said in January. “So, we just felt like having someone of his caliber and his connections on our board, to give us advice, to give us direction when we need it, would be helpful.”

Perna, who helped lead Operation Warp Speed to develop the Covid-19 vaccine, said he advised Almonty Industries but doesn’t get involved in deals.

Perna said his standard advice was along the lines of, “Why are you knocking on that door? You should be over here.”

MP Materials, the largest U.S. rare-earth miner and processor, has had a retired general on its board since 2020, when it began receiving Pentagon funding. In July, the Pentagon said it would invest hundreds of millions of dollars in MP, part of a deal under which the company will build a new rare-earth magnet production facility.

The government continues to make new deals. USA Rare Earth, an emerging rare earth and magnet producer, announced $1.6 billion in potential funding from the Department of Commerce on Monday, with some shares in the company to be owned by the U.S. government. Retired Army Gen. Paul Kern has served on USA Rare Earth’s board since 2020.

U.S. defense companies such as Lockheed Martin often have retired generals on their boards.

Having a big-name military figure can attract investors, which is especially important for early-stage miners raising funds to construct a mine. It suggests “a level of access in the Pentagon that can help this company differentiate itself,” said Chris Berry, who runs House Mountain Partners, a minerals consulting firm in Washington, D.C. “This is the junior miners’ attempt to sort of separate themselves from the pack.”

Write to Jon Emont at jonathan.emont@wsj.com

WSJ

8. Exclusive — Trump’s ‘Quiet Hammer’: How CIA Director John Ratcliffe Has Revitalized Spy Agency in President’s First Year Back

Summary:

Matthew Bole portrays John Ratcliffe as POTUS’s “quiet hammer,” claiming he has redirected the Central Intelligence Agency toward “America First” priorities, greater risk tolerance, and renewed focus on mission and recruiting assets. It cites Ratcliffe’s early visit to Venezuela, where he met acting leader Delcy Rodríguez after the reported capture of Nicolás Maduro. He says Ratcliffe dismantled DEI programs, increased declassification activity, launched Mandarin recruitment videos aimed at Chinese officials, reorganized mission centers, improved cooperation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and supported operations including “Midnight Hammer” and the capture of Mohammad Sharifullah.

Exclusive — Trump’s ‘Quiet Hammer’: How CIA Director John Ratcliffe Has Revitalized Spy Agency in President’s First Year Back

Breitbart · Matthew Boyle 26 Jan 2026 Washington, DC

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2026/01/26/exclusive-trumps-quiet-hammer-cia-director-john-ratcliffe-revitalized-spy-agency/

CIA Director John Ratcliffe has emerged as President Donald Trump’s “quiet hammer,” a source close to the White House told Breitbart News for an in-depth profile of the world’s premier spy agency in the first year back in office for Trump.

This source specifically pointed to how Trump sent Ratcliffe down to Venezuela just 12 days after the daring mission in which U.S. forces captured now-ousted leader Nicolas Maduro. Ratcliffe, Trump’s highest-ranking and first cabinet-level official to visit the nation since Maduro’s capture, met with acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez.

“Ratcliffe has become Trump’s quiet hammer,” this source close to the White House said. “He goes in, accomplishes whatever mission the President gave him, then disappears back into the shadows. The Agency seems to have adopted the same approach, so Trump actually deserves credit for turning the CIA into an instrument of America First power.”

For this story, Breitbart News spoke with CIA officials, Director Ratcliffe himself, and many others across the administration and those familiar with the Agency’s actions for a year-in-review look back at how Ratcliffe has handled reshaping and reforming the CIA in Trump’s vision — a monumental task given the damage done to the Intelligence Community (IC) during previous administrations and under previous CIA directors particularly John Brennan during Barack Obama’s administration.

Photo courtesy of the CIA

“Under Director John Ratcliffe, CIA is back to focusing on mission and is executing on President Trump’s national security priorities,” CIA Director of Public Affairs Liz Lyons told Breitbart News. “This is a more aggressive CIA willing to take risks to give the United States a decisive advantage. In less than a year, CIA helped deliver historic wins — especially in the Middle East and Western Hemisphere — to safeguard American interests and bolster our National Security.”

One of the biggest flaws that Brennan and others who politicized intelligence introduced to the CIA was a dwindling of Agency assets and spies over time — basically, as the CIA became more focused on politics, it became less focused on mission-critical objectives.

One major accomplishment of Ratcliffe’s so far as CIA director has been the total dismantlement of any Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion — or DEI — programs at the Agency. He disbanded all DEI initiatives and eliminated all DEI-related programs there, and he returned the CIA to a culture of merit.

Ratcliffe has also been on a transparency tear at the CIA since he was confirmed. He released thousands of documents related to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. He also tasked CIA professionals with decades of combined experience with conducting reviews on lessons learned when it comes to the procedures of analytic tradecraft employed in the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) shortly after the 2016 presidential election — where the IC made inaccurate conclusions about Trump and Russia — and declassified that review so the public could see it.

He worked, too, with Attorney General Pam Bondi to declassify underlying intelligence in the so-called Durham report showing that the “Russia collusion” was indeed falsified as part of a coordinated operation to destroy Trump’s presidency in his first term — and he declassified and released a previous assessment from 2016 that raised concerns about then-Vice President Joe Biden and his family’s business dealings in Ukraine. He even made a public assessment right at the beginning of the year last year that the CIA believes the COVID virus was more likely the result of a lab leak than a natural origin.

Photo courtesy of the White House

“I don’t want to comment much on criminal matters the Department of Justice may be perusing, but I will say this: Individuals in the Intelligence Community who abused the public’s trust, weaponized their roles against President Trump, and politicized intelligence, should be held accountable,” Ratcliffe told Breitbart News when asked about all of this and whether there may be some consequences looming for those who did wrong in the past. “We made it clear from day one, we won’t stand for it anymore; if you’re a political operator rather than a public servant, you’ve got to go. We are focused on mission now at CIA, and it’s clearly contributed to the Agency’s ability to deliver for the President and the American people.”

Ratcliffe keeps a chart printed out on his desk at CIA headquarters at Langley showing those thinning numbers of Agency assets from before Trump returned to the White House — numbers now back on the rise with Trump in the Oval Office and Ratcliffe manning the wheel at the CIA — and has been known to pull out the chart in meetings with top officials. He reminds these senior operations officers that, along with foreign intelligence collection, the effectiveness of CIA assets — dependent upon the numbers being higher — is the metric by which the CIA is constantly being measured.

Asked about this legendary chart, Ratcliffe told Breitbart News he almost had it framed and hung in his office, but decided against doing that because it contains classified information.

“I considered having it framed and hung on the wall in my office, but the metrics are classified, and sometimes people are in my office who aren’t cleared to see that kind of thing,” Ratcliffe told Breitbart News. “But that’s the scorecard. Are we recruiting assets? Are we stealing our adversaries’ secrets and giving President Trump the best possible information so he can continue calling the shots and delivering results for the American people? We’re relentless about that.”

Ratcliffe’s CIA has taken the effort to recruit American assets directly to America’s greatest adversaries. For instance, the CIA this past year released a series of Mandarin-language videos targeted at recruiting Chinese officials to help the American cause. Agency sources told Breitbart News that the effort has been enormously successful in getting new volunteers from inside and outside the Chinese government and in procuring other valuable resources. Countering China has, of course, been one of both Trump’s and Ratcliffe’s long-stated priorities for the United States.

Photo courtesy of the White House

The CIA has also taken some major steps under Ratcliffe and Deputy Director Michael Ellis over the past year to streamline the Agency’s operations, including merging two offices that separately focused on the Western Hemisphere and on Counternarcotics activities into one singular unit: the Americas and Counternarcotics Mission Center (ACMC). The Agency has also worked more closely than ever before with the FBI — as Ratcliffe previously told Breitbart News in an interview right after his confirmation, it was a goal of his, given his close friendship with FBI director Kash Patel, to see the two entities work better together — settling down historic tensions between the CIA and the FBI. The CIA also launched a new Mission Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI), aimed at implementing innovative strategies for technology both as a tool and a target. Ratcliffe is also working to find ways to best use Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the intelligence world.

Over the course of the past year, the CIA has also — true to Ratcliffe’s persona as Trump’s “quiet hammer” — significantly helped in several of the biggest operations of the U.S. government worldwide, including most recently Operation Absolute Resolve, which saw the capture of Maduro. But that was hardly the only big one: The CIA was also integral to the U.S. bombings of Iran’s nuclear program last summer through Operation Midnight Hammer and also helped capture the mastermind of the Abbey Gate bombings at Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) in Afghanistan in the chaotic deadly withdrawal of U.S. forces from there in former President Joe Biden’s first year in office.

Ratcliffe told Breitbart News that he is particularly proud of the capture of “Jafar,” or Mohammad Sharifullah, in the first months of Trump’s return to the White House because it sent a massive message worldwide that Trump would no longer tolerate the proliferation of terrorism that Biden did.

Photo courtesy of the White House

“It sent an early message that President Trump was shifting the paradigm all over the world,” Ratcliffe said of Jafar’s capture. “That level of cooperation with the Pakistanis is a direct result of the outcome of the 2024 election. The Biden administration’s conduct during the withdrawal from Afghanistan was a national embarrassment that cost the lives of our service members. President Trump immediately reestablished American credibility and is delivering justice for those families. It set the tone right away.”

Dr. Sebastian Gorka, the Senior Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council (NSC), told Breitbart News that when he looked in Jafar’s eyes upon his capture, he saw “apocalyptic evil.” In that interview with Gorka taped at the White House in the spring, Gorka gave a special shoutout to the Intelligence Community — and specifically the CIA and Ratcliffe — for their role in locating and helping capture Jafar.

Beyond Maduro’s and Jafar’s captures, the CIA was also instrumental in Operation Midnight Hammer — the U.S. military airstrikes that wiped out Iran’s nuclear program in one night. CIA sources told Breitbart News the Agency’s technical collection helped inform military planning for the strikes, and in their aftermath helped the U.S. correctly assess that Iran’s nuclear program was decapitated for the time being.

Breitbart · Matthew Boyle26 Jan 2026Washington, DC1,920

9. Kari Lake promotes Trump on Voice of America. Does that break the law?

Summary:

Kari Lake used Voice of America’s Persian service to praise POTUS repeatedly in a five-minute segment during a one-hour special on his first year back, and the piece says critics view this as violating the firewall meant to protect editorial independence. NPR reports Lake faces court challenges over her authority at U.S. Agency for Global Media, layoffs and reinstatements after an executive order, and scrutiny from Judge Royce C. Lamberth. NPR says Persian service leadership under Ali Javanmardi promoted POTUS, limited critics, and blocked Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Radio Farda from transmitters during Iran internet blackouts, drawing bipartisan pushback as Congress funds the networks.

Excerpt:

"Listening to Kari Lake, she sounded more like a press secretary for the president than the head of an independent news service," Stengel says. "We never wanted it to sound like a state broadcaster in an authoritarian country that would air hagiographic biographies of the Dear Leader."

Comment: VOA, et al, should absolutely be explaining POTUS policies to foreign target audiences so that they understand America's intentions and actions. Although hagiography may be distasteful to some and will likely not have the desired strategic effects on foreign target audiences, I am not sure it "breaks the law." I think the problem is that Ms Lake seems to be trying to communicate in a way that makes sense to POTUS' American political base and that there is a lack of understanding of what effectively influences foreign target audiences.

Kari Lake promotes Trump on Voice of America. Does that break the law?

NPR · David Folkenflik · January 30, 2026

https://www.npr.org/2026/01/30/nx-s1-5683246/kari-lake-trump-voa-pnn-iran-firewall-propaganda

Trump administration official Kari Lake praised the president effusively in a January 2026 appearance on Voice of America's Persian language service. As she oversees the network's parent agency, critics say her comments violated the spirit and perhaps even the letter of federal law that seeks to safeguard Voice of America's editorial independence. Voice of America

Kari Lake, who oversees the parent agency of the Voice of America, has hit legal and political roadblocks in her drive to dismantle the government-funded broadcaster.

She has instead accelerated her use of the U.S. government-owned network to promote President Trump and his views — in possible violation of federal law and policies.

To mark the completion of Trump's first year in office last week, Lake was interviewed on Voice of America's Persian-language service through an interpreter. During the five-minute segment, she praised Trump repeatedly.

Lake lauded Trump's actions toward Iran, called him "the president of peace" and reiterated Trump's tenuous claims he had ended eight wars and conflicts.

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Lake said Trump was "putting out fires" throughout the world with a policy of "peace through strength." She also castigated judges who ruled against Trump and the administration, citing an "out-of-control judiciary," and she trashed former President Joe Biden's record, which she termed "horrific." NPR reviewed her original remarks in English and the interpretation offered to viewers in Iran, the service's target audience.

"VOA is telling the story of the brave Iranian people and their fight for freedom," Lake says in a written comment to NPR. "That story cannot be told without sharing statements from President Trump or the support the Iranian people have for him."

The segment, part of a glowing one-hour special on Trump's first year back in the White House, was also broadcast on Voice of America's Chinese language service, in which her remarks could be heard in English.

Lake is a familiar pro-Trump guest on such conservative news outlets as Fox, Newsmax and OANN, where she shares baseless claims of election fraud and comments on topics like immigration and Venezuela. None of them have any direct link to her federal job.

Given Lake's role overseeing the parent agency of Voice of America, her appearance last week was a sharp departure for the network.

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In separate interviews, 11 current and former Voice of America journalists and officials at its federal parent, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, said they could not recall anything like it. Most spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing professional retribution, given ongoing links to the agency, its broadcasters or the federal government.

By law, the chief executive of the U.S. Agency for Global Media is required to respect what is often called a firewall, designed to shield editorial staffers and their news decisions from politics. Since late July, Lake has periodically fashioned herself as the agency chief, though she is currently signing her official emails as deputy CEO.

Critics say her recent appearance on Voice of America tramples on that firewall.

"These are precisely the reasons why you would have a charter and why you would have to adhere to the highest principles of journalistic ethics — to avoid these kinds of situations," says David Kligerman, the former general counsel of the U.S. Agency for Global Media under both Trump and Biden.

During Trump's first term, Voice of America host Greta Van Susteren interviewed then-Vice President Mike Pence and twice interviewed President Trump during foreign trips, all in 2018. No one objected: Trump and Pence were powerful public officials. The interviews were newsworthy.

Veterans of the agency and Voice of America tell NPR that having their boss on the air in a partisan role is different.

"It seems to contradict the spirit and the sense of the firewall," says Rick Stengel, the former top editor of Time magazine, who sat on the agency's governing board while serving in the U.S. State Department during the Obama administration.

"Listening to Kari Lake, she sounded more like a press secretary for the president than the head of an independent news service," Stengel says. "We never wanted it to sound like a state broadcaster in an authoritarian country that would air hagiographic biographies of the Dear Leader."

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After losing elections, Lake rises at broadcast agency

Lake is a former local TV news anchor turned unsuccessful MAGA candidate in Arizona, where she ran for both governor and U.S. Senate and lost. Early last year, Trump installed her atop the U.S. Agency for Global Media. But Lake's ability to lead the agency is being challenged in court.

Before taking office, Trump announced he wanted to name Lake to be the director of the Voice of America.

According to two journalists at the network with knowledge, Voice of America editors were nervous enough about her arrival that they half-jokingly discussed offering Lake her own show in hopes of saving the network from evisceration or being turned into a pro-Trump propaganda channel. (Those people spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.)

Yet Trump does not have the legal authority to appoint the agency's chief executive. That power rests with a bipartisan oversight board whose members are confirmed by the U.S. Senate, under laws designed to insulate the network from political interference.

Upon entering the White House, Trump dismissed the board members. That meant there was no legal way for him to install Lake or anyone else atop Voice of America.

Instead, last March, Trump issued an executive order that the agency be reduced to the bare minimum required by law. He named Lake as senior advisor to the U.S. Agency for Global Media. She testified that she held all but five percent of the power the agency's CEO would normally wield.

Lake moved swiftly to lay off 85% of the workforce in response to Trump's executive order. Those staffers have been whipsawed by a series of court rulings that reinstated their jobs, followed by fresh rounds of layoffs.

Last July, the White House named Lake deputy CEO at her own urging, according to her testimony in court.

Lake said in a sworn affidavit that she became acting CEO in late July, though the White House made no formal announcement of it.

Trump has not nominated her to be CEO, which would require confirmation from the U.S. Senate. As NPR has reported, under the law it's not clear she is eligible to hold the position of acting CEO, either.

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Neither the U.S. Agency for Global Media nor the White House has responded to NPR's numerous requests for documentation of her appointment as acting CEO. Nor has Lake, for that matter.

U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth, who is presiding over a series of cases challenging her actions at the agency, has questioned Lake's honesty and the validity of the administration's legal defenses. He has ordered her to bring back enough employees to meet the expectations set by Congress when it put money aside for the agency. He has not yet ruled on the legality of Lake's authority.

Compelled to bring back some VOA journalists, Lake has emphasized the Persian-language service

In recalling some journalists to work, Lake has put a special emphasis on the Persian-language service, given the current upheaval and crackdown in Iran.

Lake's choice to run that service is a veteran former Voice of America journalist, Ali Javanmardi, who left the network in 2019, according to current and former colleagues. Javanmardi also has praised Trump on the air: "Perhaps for the first time," Javanmardi told viewers this month, "the leader of the free world is standing alongside the people of Iran." His X (formerly Twitter) feed and his LinkedIn profile display in the background a photograph of a bloodied but undaunted Trump just after the unsuccessful assassination attempt on his life in Butler, Pa.

The LinkedIn profile for Ali Javanmardi, who is overseeing the Voice of America's Persian-language service, features a photograph of President Trump moments after the unsuccessful assassination attempt in Butler, Pa. Under Javanmardi's leadership, the service has promoted Trump and kept his critics off the air. AliJavanmardi's LinkedIn account/LinkedIn

Javanmardi has urged editors and producers not to book guests who may be critical of Trump, according to colleagues who spoke on condition they not be named. (They cited fears of workplace retaliation.)

NPR has also reviewed a text from a Voice of America journalist who said the Persian-language service canceled an appearance by a former Trump foreign policy adviser, Elliot Abrams, because he had been critical of the president on Iran. (Abrams did not respond to an email seeking comment.)

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In another instance, a journalist for Voice of America Persian told a foreign policy commentator that the network's management could not allow any critique of the president. The commentator declined to appear on air, the text exchange shows.

During the hour-long special on which Lake appeared, Voice of America Persian host Payam Yazdian offered effusive praise of Trump's return to the White House. Yazdian called Trump's first year back "the start of an exciting period of national success, and the return of global respectability."

Voice of America Persian anchor Payam Yazdian presented a one-hour program last week that presented a glowing assessment of President Trump's first year in office for viewers in Iran. Kari Lake, who is running the network's federal parent agency, repeatedly praised the president in her appearance on the show. Voice of America

Additionally, Javanmardi has discouraged coverage of Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran's last shah, according to two journalists with knowledge of events who spoke on condition of anonymity, citing concerns of professional reprisals.

Pahlavi has become a rallying point for some of those opposed to the current regime, even as the repressive record of Pahlavi's father repels many Iranians and Iranian-Americans.

"Ignoring or sidelining [Pahlavi] is not neutrality, it's an editorial failure," wrote former BBC journalist Ali Hamedani, who runs his own Persian-language radio service in London.

Javanmardi blames the Iranian government for online criticism of his work.

"In my new job at VOA, my primary mission is to ensure it aligns with the US foreign policy and conveys @POTUS's support for the people of Iran," he wrote in a social media post on Jan. 18.

Lake is backing him up.

"We are not in the business of selecting Iran's political leadership. That would be irresponsible of any outside news organization," she writes in the statement to NPR. "That decision belongs solely to Iran's 93 million citizens, who have a right to self-determination."

Iranians gather while blocking a street during a protest in Tehran, Iran on Jan. 9. The nationwide protests against failing government economic policies started in Tehran's Grand Bazaar in late December. The demonstrations spread to universities and other cities. MAHSA/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images

Like Lake, Javanmardi's legal authority to direct news coverage appears shaky.

He has been described on the network's airwaves as a senior adviser overseeing Voice of America's Persian, Kurdish and Afghan television services.

According to three colleagues who spoke on condition of anonymity, however, Javanmardi works for the U.S Agency for Global Media, not Voice of America. His email address has a USAGM domain. (The colleagues spoke on condition of anonymity, citing fears of retribution.)

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As an employee of the parent agency, his involvement in news decisions could run afoul of the same firewall that critics say Lake ignored by appearing on Voice of America.

Javanmardi and USAGM did not respond to NPR's requests for comment or questions about his job or title.

Kari Lake, who at the time was running for one of Arizona's U.S. Senate seats, spoke at the Road to Majority conference in Washington, D.C. on June 21, 2024. The conference host, Faith and Freedom Coalition, advocates for incorporation of Christianity in American government. ALLISON BAILEY/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty/AFP

Largely ignored by Lake, Congress moves to sustain international networks

In a rebuke of the Trump administration, House and Senate lawmakers have drafted spending bills that include $643 million for the U.S. Agency for Global Media for fiscal year 2026. The House passed its version of the legislation earlier this month.

While that amount is far less than what Congress allocated in the past, it is four times what the Trump administration had requested for the agency, funds that Lake intended to use to shut it down.

The lawmakers also set aside money for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. It has operated on a shoestring since Lake sought to cut off its funds. Like Voice of America Persian, its Persian-language service, called Radio Farda, is aimed at audiences inside Iran.

When authorities severed access to the Internet, the network's executives appealed to the U.S. Agency for Global Media to use their shortwave and mediumwave radio transmitters in Kuwait and elsewhere.

Lake has repeatedly condemned Radio Free Europe for broadcasting into Hungary, where Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has cracked down on the independent press. In June, when the U.S. bombed Iran and the Iranian regime blocked web access, she did not allow Radio Farda access to the transmitters.

In a posting on Facebook on Jan. 13, Lake said she and Radio Free Europe CEO Steve Capus agreed "we need to have a unified message so we are not sending mixed messages to the people of Iran." But she said Capus has not fulfilled his side of the bargain. (Capus and Radio Free Europe did not comment for this story.)

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Radio Farda still has not been allowed to use the transmitters.

Her refusal has frustrated some influential lawmakers.

"It's been a week since the regime in Tehran blacked out the internet, and 10 months since USAGM blacked out its transmitters for Persian-language @RadioFarda_ from @RFERL," Republican Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky tweeted on Jan 15. "What a waste of America's tremendous capacity to share the truth."

On a conservative commercial talk radio show last week, Lake called Radio Farda "a propaganda site run by Radio Free Europe."

NPR's Ayda Pourasad and D. Parvaz contributed to this story.

NPR · David Folkenflik · January 30, 2026

10. Fighting with Live Data: XVIII Airborne Corps’ Experience with Its Operational Data Teams

Summary:

The article argues decision advantage now depends on fighting with live data and building a data-centric foundation for CJADC2 and future AI/ML tools. XVIII Airborne Corps evolved from a 2022 Data Warfare Company, to dispersed developers and analysts across staff sections, then consolidated multifunctional Operational Data Teams (ODTs) under the Corps G-5, with G-6 retaining cloud and cybersecurity specialists. ODTs are deployable teams using industry-style product cycles, governance, and an agile problem framing-to-MVP process aligned to the Corps campaign plan and 12-week program increments tied to exercises. A key example is a battle-damage assessment visualization delivered as a prototype in three months, MVP in six, and handed to an Army program of record in nine.

Comment: Extensive graphics at the link. This is our future.

If CJADC2 depends on “live data,” what must commanders give up, in staff habits and authority, so ODT governance and "cut lines" can prevent overextension and tool sprawl?

If ODT success requires contractors for skills soldiers lack, how do we sustain this capability in protracted conflict when access, funding, or authorities for contractors are constrained?

If a nine-month path from prototype to program-of-record is achievable, what should be the standard for transitioning battlefield software across echelons so rapid iteration does not break security accreditation and interoperability?

Fighting with Live Data: XVIII Airborne Corps’ Experience with Its Operational Data Teams

armyupress.army.mil

XVIII Airborne Corps’ Experience with Its Operational Data Teams

Col. Andrew J. Forney, PhD, U.S. Army

Maj. Ryan C. Herrmann, U.S. Army

Capt. Haley A. Steele, U.S. Army

Download the PDF

https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Military-Review/Online-Exclusive/2026-OLE/Fighting-with-Live-Data/

Publishing Disclaimer: In all of its publications and products, Military Review presents professional information. However, the views expressed therein are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Army University, the Department of the Army, or any other agency of the U.S. government.

January 2026 Online Exclusive Article

Online Exclusive Article Archive

Fighting with Live Data

Victory in modern warfare requires commanders to make better decisions faster than their adversaries. The news drives this home every day, whether it be from Ukraine, the Red Sea, Gaza, Iraq, or Syria. We exist in an age where accelerated data and platform development are integral to our warfighting capabilities. Achieving Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2)—the Department of War’s (DOW) current mission command approach for achieving decision dominance—requires adapting new technologies and synchronizing systems to provide, exploit, and visualize the right data rapidly.1 Critical to enabling CJADC2 is the ability to manipulate and utilize a variety of data sources to develop tools that support the commander’s data-driven decision cycle.2 The importance of this effort only grows as DOW establishes a foundation upon which to build future artificial intelligence/machine learning tools.

Even given this imperative, the Army has struggled with how best to leverage access to live datasets; new and emerging data-centric platforms; and a growing talent base of officers, warrant officers, noncommissioned officers, and soldiers to solve its most challenging operational problems. Current efforts associated with “transformation in contact” and the Army transformation initiative will not just rely on the integration of new technologies and data streams but will ultimately require a data-centric foundation to enable true continuous transformation.3 Understanding how best to build an enduring data-development capability within our formations while sustaining the unique manpower and skills required to employ this capability will remain one of the Army’s chief concerns over the next decade.

The XVIII Airborne Corps (XVIII ABC) began wrestling with this challenge in 2022. This article outlines the Corps’ approach to this problem—the operational data team (ODT). ODTs, as constructed within the XVIII ABC, provide commanders with an organic capability to develop and adapt the data-centric tools that help achieve realized CJADC2 while integrating critical new data sources. They enable commanders to use extant data sources to better see themselves in space and time and improve decision-making at an accelerated pace. The Corps pioneered the ODT concept and continues to collaborate across the Army data enterprise to shape the evolution of ODT organization and employment. XVIII ABC’s experience with ODTs provides a starting point for other Army units to establish their own ODTs and avoid the mistakes the Corps made early in the formation process.

XVIII Airborne Corps’ Operational Data Team Journey

XVIII ABC has experimented with different ODT organization structures and operational employment concepts during the past several years. That journey is summarized in three different phases as depicted in figure 1: the initial Data Warfare Company concept; distribution of software development and data analysis capabilities across Corps headquarters staff sections; and consolidation of those capabilities into ODTs under the Corps G-5 (strategy, plans, and policy).

Figure 1. Journey to the Operational Data Teams

(Figure by authors)

Initial organization: Data Warfare Company. The XVIII ABC commander saw an operational demand to expand the Corps’ innovation culture and officially activated the Data Warfare Company (DWC) on 1 June 2022.4 The DWC had its own unit identification code and command team and reported directly to the Corps’ chief innovation officer, an Army colonel. The DWC was initially staffed with a small number of military graduates of the Joint Special Operations Command Global Analytics Platform, and Galvanize-trained software development and product management contractors supplemented them by providing cybersecurity/risk management framework expertise to facilitate regulatory Authority to Operate accreditation of DWC developed capabilities.5

DWC development efforts focused almost exclusively on everyday business-related requirements but could focus on urgent operational mission requirements as the need arose. As a separate company, the DWC enjoyed some autonomy and mission focus. Company administrative and logistics responsibilities, however, taxed the two-man company headquarters. Further, the eventual elimination of the Corps chief innovation officer position (an unauthorized billet) reduced the unit’s ability to advocate for direction among the Corps leadership and staff. Finally, the DWC lacked organic data-science expertise, as the Corps’ organic data-scientist-qualified operations research/systems analysts were assigned outside of the DWC. The DWC proved to be an unsustainable model, and the Corps looked to experiment with another approach.

Transitional organization: Distributed among multiple Corps staff sections. Next, Corps leaders decided to transition DWC personnel from an independent company and distribute them among different Corps headquarters staff sections. The software developers became the Data Activities Team within the Corps’ Knowledge Management Office. The data scientists remained split between the G-5 and G-35 (future operations). The cloud engineers and cybersecurity/risk management framework specialists were assigned to the G-6 (command, control, communications, computers, and cyber) staff, whom the Corps commanding general (CG) directed to assume all responsibility for cloud operations and system security accreditations.

During this phase, military software developers and product managers arrived from the Army Software Factory (ASWF) and data scientists and data engineers arrived from the Artificial Intelligence Integration Center training program.6 Software developers and data scientists began to work more closely together on operational mission capabilities, but their interaction with Corps staff sections was limited and stove-piped within areas of assignment. This model lacked the full staff integration necessary to leverage the capabilities of these teams.

Current organization: Operational data teams in Corps G-5. After struggling with scaling the impacts of the Data Activities Team across the Corps, Corps leaders reconsidered where the software developers and data scientists should reside within the Corps staff. The decision was made to organize them into a separate entity—the ODT—and assign them to the Corps G-5 (G-6 maintained cloud platform engineers and the cybersecurity specialists). This accomplished multiple tasks. First, the move aligned and synchronized ODTs’ development efforts with the Corps’ long-term planning activities and its cycle of internally and externally driven exercises. ODT development efforts now focused on operational mission capability requirements aligned with the Corps’ formally designated operational problems within its campaign plan (CAMPLAN). Second, it facilitated better interaction across the Corps’ staff sections and with subordinate organizations. Based on these several organizational iterations, XVIII ABC decided that the optimal near-term organizational structure for its ODTs is within the Corps G-5.

XVIII Airborne Corps’ Vision of an ODT Structure

The Corps ODT is a deployable and responsive team that enables commanders to fight with live data. They are organic, multifunctional teams with a range of skills that allow them to solve emerging operational problems at the speed of need. The team dynamically task-organizes based on operational requirements. Their required skills include roles determined by industry best practices and associated with product management, user experience design, software development, data science, and artificial intelligence/machine learning domains. To this end, XVIII ABC recommends the ODT manning structure depicted in figure 2. It represents a final operational capability toward which the Corps is working.

Figure 2. Concept of ODT Manning Structure and Capabilities

(Figure by authors)

XVIII ABC has collaborated with the Mission Command Center of Excellence in its effort to determine the echeloned employment of ODTs and to develop an ODT concept of operations. Figure 3 depicts the current XVIII ABC ODT echelon concept. Experimentation with this concept is part of the Army’s transformation-in-contact 2.0 initiative.

Figure 3. Concept of Echeloned ODT Support

(Figure by authors)

Integration of ODT Product Cycles with Corps Long-Term Planning and Exercise Cycles

Optimizing ODT finite resources—personnel, finding, and time—requires the strict alignment of the ODTs’ efforts against the corps’ most important operational demands. Prioritization was key: there will always be more data-centric operational problems than time to solve them. To enable the prioritization of myriad emerging demands, the G-5 and the ODT developed a governance process that aligned all activities against the Corps’ CAMPLAN and attendant critical operational problems. The G-5 and ODT hosted a series of working groups with the Corps staff to develop potential technical innovation objectives (TIO) intended to solve identified operational problems. The ODT, along with the G-5 and the Corps’ chief technology officer (an Army-sponsored highly qualified expert), reviewed the draft list of TIOs to assess their operational value alongside their development feasibility. Assessment results generated a proposed prioritization of TIOs for the ODT during its next product development cycle, known as a program increment (PI). Development cycles run for about twelve weeks but align within the Corps exercise cycle. Each PI culminates with a Corps exercise in which products in development can be tested with warfighting function product owners or new TIOs can be scoped.

After the ODT develops its initial TIO priorities for its next PI, the Corps deputy CG confirms the validity of the priorities. The ODT then develops a draft TIO implementation plan to be executed during the following PI development cycle. The implementation plans include what activities each ODT will do to fulfill operational software development or data science requirements. The ODTs present their implementation plans and recommended efforts to the CG, who then approves the way ahead for the PI and its inclusion in a corresponding exercise/experiment. The CG retains the authority to determine what falls above or below the ODTs effort “cut line” and to make decisions to dynamically retask ODT development efforts.

XVIII Airborne Corps’ ODTs Problem-Solution Development Process

The XVIII ABC ODTs address complex challenges through a rigorous problem-solution development methodology directly informed by industry best practices and training from the ASWF. This approach prioritizes understanding and solving problems—rather than implementing preconceived solutions—and is tailored to the specific complexity of each challenge, usually stemming from the Corps CAMPLAN and/or selected operation plans. The process begins with a staff element articulating a problem, not a desired solution, and progresses through a series of phases punctuated by key decision points (invest, divest, pivot) to ensure efficient resource allocation and maximize impact. Figure 4 depicts how an ODT tackles Corps problems, and figure 5 depicts a notional PI cycle.

Figure 4. How an ODT Tackles Problems for XVIII Airborne Corps

(Figure by authors)

Figure 5. A Notional Program Increment Cycle

(Figure by authors)

The methodology emphasizes thorough investigation and validation at each stage. Initial scoping focuses on understanding the operational problem, identifying stakeholders, assessing overall feasibility, and answering critical questions around goals, team responsibilities, user needs, pain points, technical feasibility, and potential risks. This is followed by deeper problem validation, framing potential solutions, and developing a minimum viable product (MVP) for testing. Throughout, an ODT prioritizes user feedback and iterative refinement, ensuring the final product directly addresses the identified need.

During exercises/experiments, an ODT’s involvement is aligned with a given solution’s maturity, shown in figure 6. If a product is in the scoping phase, the team focuses on user research to further refine the problem definition. For MVPs, exercises provide valuable opportunities for real-world assessment, bug fixing, and minor adjustments based on user feedback. Solutions in the discovery, framing, or development phases are generally held stable during exercises, allowing the ODT to focus on gathering data and validating assumptions for future iterations. This approach ensures that each ODT delivers impactful, user-centered solutions that directly support the Corps’ operational objectives. Results of the ODT’s activities during exercises/experiments become inputs for the next ODT TIO prioritization and development cycle.

Figure 6. What an ODT Does during Corps Exercises

(Figure by authors)

An Example ODT Effort: Battle Damage Assessment Visualization

In today’s fast-paced operational environment, timely and accurate intelligence is paramount. Recognizing the need for a more dynamic understanding of battlefield effects, the XVIII ABC ODT responded to a critical need from the Corps commander: a tool to visualize the attrition of a potential enemy’s integrated fires complex in real-time. The commander’s intent was clear—automatically visualize operational risks and opportunities based on real-time data. A crucial element of this capability was integrating it within the existing Corps targeting processes and leveraging the targeting data already present within the system. Working closely with the Corps G-2 (intelligence) section and industry partners, the ODT delivered a prototype in three months, an MVP in six months, and a full handoff to an Army enterprise-level program of record in just nine months.

Battle damage assessment (BDA) visualization provides commanders with both the statistical data and the crucial context needed to make informed decisions. The system answers two critical questions simultaneously: Where are there operational risks? and Where are there operational opportunities? Rather than simply knowing the number of enemy radars destroyed, commanders can now see the spatial impact of those strikes on the battlefield and in an enemy’s formation, enabling them to anticipate enemy reactions and proactively adjust their plans. Beyond this automated assessment, the tool also allows analysts to visualize the underlying data in tailorable charts and graphs, allowing analysts to create custom views for their command. Critically, the system ties together intelligence reporting with targeting data, creating a historical record of BDA. This allows for longitudinal analysis, identifying trends and informing future targeting decisions. This enhanced situational awareness fosters synchronization and coordination across the battlefield, ultimately allowing friendly forces to gain the initiative. The ODT’s success hinged on close interaction with other staff elements, breaking down traditional silos and fostering a collaborative environment.

This innovative solution is already gaining traction across the Army. The tool has been used in four exercises with the XVIII ABC, 101st Air Assault Division, and the 82nd Airborne Division. Following a successful handoff to the Army Intelligence Data Platform, managed by the U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command, the BDA visualization capability is looking to be adopted by commands like U.S. Army Europe and Africa and III Armored Corps. The BDA portfolio integrates data objects, workflows, and visualizations to deliver a comprehensive intelligence picture. This rapid development and successful implementation demonstrate the potential of data-driven decision-making and the critical role of dedicated ODTs in providing commanders with the tools they need to win on the modern battlefield.

Lessons Learned

XVIII ABC’s experience has highlighted key lessons learned about the use of ODTs:

A properly staffed and employed ODT provides rapid solutions to priority operational problems. An example of this point was the collaborative effort by the ODT, the Corps G-2 staff, the U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command, and the Army Intelligence Data Platform on BDA visualization that delivered a prototype in three months, an MVP in six months, and a full handoff to a program of record in nine months. The Army recognizes the ODT concept as a critical component of decision optimization, where an ODT serves as the action arm of decision optimization for commanders to achieve decision dominance at echelons above brigade.7
It is important to educate the Corps CG and staff about the agile process an ODT uses to scope problems and develop solutions. It follows industry’s best practices, and the ASWF trains its students to use it. Using the process helps ensure that
— ODT efforts address the right problems and develop good solutions, and do so in the fastest realistic time
— commanders and staff have realistic expectations about an ODT’s capacity to work on multiple operational problems; and
— commanders and staff understand their responsibilities in collaborating with an ODT. Their active participation is essential to defining the right problems to solve and developing the best solutions to them.
ODT product development efforts should be integrated into a command’s long-term planning processes and exercise cycles. Doing so enables the ODT to gain an understanding of the range of operational problems and to better recommend which ones it can help solve.
An ODT requires a priorities governance policy signed by the CG to ensure that ODT efforts stay focused on CG approved priorities. XVIII ABC’s early experience without a governance policy was that too many customers requested ODT resources at the same time. With no adjudication process to prioritize their efforts, ODT resources became overextended on unrealistic timelines.
An ODT requires personnel experienced in all the skill sets that enable rapid solution innovation for emerging problems at the pace of need. Further, given the rapid change of relevant technologies, ODTs require contractors to supplement military personnel to provide capabilities that those personnel have not acquired.
Some challenges require help from higher-level organizations. For example, current Army-wide manpower constraints may not allow an ODT force structure that XVIII ABC experience indicates is required. Commands experimenting with ODTs should document those challenges for higher headquarters’ support.

Summary

XVIII ABC’s experience with leveraging ODTs to solve its challenging operational problems has greatly increased the ability of the CG to make better decisions. The concept has proven mission critical to the operational success of the Corps headquarters. After several years of experimenting with them, the Corps has organized its singular ODT into two ODTs within an Operational Data Section in the Corps G-5 to align and synchronize their efforts with the Corps’ long-term planning activities and its cycle of exercises. Key factors contributing to the Corps’ success with its ODT include its combination of agile software development and data science related skill sets, a priorities governance process, a rigorous problem-solution development methodology informed by industry best practices and the Army Software Factory, and active collaboration between the ODT and the Corps staff and other stakeholders. XVIII ABC’s experience informs the evolution of ODT organization and employment across the Army enterprise.

The authors would like to thank Capt. Roberts G. Nelson, Capt. Robert P. Scalzo, Chief Warrant Officer 3 Luke J. Pilkington, and Mr. Jan W. Arny for their contributions to this article.

Notes

Joseph Clark, “Hicks Announces Delivery of Initial CJADC2 Capability,” U.S. Department of War, 21 February 2024, https://www.war.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3683482/hicks-announces-delivery-of-initial-cjadc2-capability/.
Alexander K. Adkins, “Achieving Decision Dominance: The Arduous Pursuit of Operationalized Data,” Military Review 105, no. 1 (January-February 2025): 88.
James E. Rainey, “Continuous Transformation: Transformation in Contact,” Military Review Online Exclusive, 9 August 2024, 2, https://www.armyupress.army.mil/journals/military-review/online-exclusive/2024-ole/Transformation-in-Contact/.
Joshua Cowden, “New Data Warfare Company Activates as Beacon of Innovation for XVIII Airborne Corps,” U.S. Army, 9 June 2022, https://www.army.mil/article/257441/new_data_warfare_company_activates_as_beacon_of_innovation_for_xviii_airborne_corps.
“Coding Training for Military Service Members and Veterans,” Galvanize, accessed 22 December 2025, https://www.galvanize.com/military.
“Help Shape the Army’s Digital Future,” Software Factory, accessed 22 December 2025, https://soldiersolutions.swf.army.mil/apply; “Artificial Intelligence Integration Center (AI2C),” Army Technology Transfer Program, accessed 22 December 2025, https://www.t2.army.mil/T2-Laboratories/Designated-Laboratories/Artificial-Intelligence-Integration-Center/.
U.S. Army Mission Command Center of Excellence, “Appendix B: ODT Concept and General Structure,” in Decision Optimization Concept of Operations (U.S. Army Mission Command Center of Excellence), 42.

Col. Andy Forney, PhD, U.S. Army, is the War Plans Division chief within HQDA G-3/5/7. His previous assignments include assistant chief of staff (plans), XVIII Airborne Corps; senior strategic Army advisor, Strategy and Force Development Division, Office of the Undersecretary of Defense (Policy); director, Commander’s Action Group, NATO Special Operations Component Command–Afghanistan; and director, Army Concepts, Futures and Concepts Center. He holds a master’s degree from the Joint Advanced Warfighting School and a PhD in history from Texas Christian University.

Maj. Ryan C. Herrmann, U.S. Army, is the XVIII Airborne Corps Operational Data Section chief and lead data scientist. His previous assignments include operations research/systems analyst, 3rd Infantry Division; commander, Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 385th Military Police Battalion; and crime intelligence fusion analyst, Directorate of Emergency Services, Fort Carson, Colorado. He holds a BS in geospatial information sciences from the U.S. Military Academy, an MS in operations research specialized in operational data science from the Naval Postgraduate School, and an MA in organizational security management with a focus in cyber security from Webster University.

Capt. Haley A. Steele, U.S. Army, is an Operational Data Team product manager in XVIII Airborne Corps. She holds a BS in computer science from the U.S. Military Academy and an MS in engineering management from the University of Texas at Austin. Steele was previously part of the first cohort at the Army Software Factory under Army Futures Command.

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11. Pentagon Defends Restrictions on Media Outlets

Summary:

The Pentagon defended new media restrictions imposed in October in a court filing responding to a December lawsuit by The New York Times. The Defense Department/War said the rules are meant to secure the Pentagon and prevent activity that could compromise national security, and that they provide explicit conduct standards. Reporters must sign a 21-page form limiting some journalistic practices, including seeking tips and making inquiries to Pentagon sources, with loss of press credentials for noncompliance. The Times argues the policy violates First Amendment press rights and Fifth Amendment due process by giving broad discretion to revoke passes. After Secretary Pete Hegseth tightened access, dozens refused to sign. Oral arguments are set for March 6.

Comment. Security and synchronization versus transparency and trust. And of course how do we defend the ideals and rights of our Constitution? How do we achieve the proper balance? This will be an interesting hearing.

Here is a question and conundrum: If you have taken our oath and you defend the Pentagon's restrictions on a free press and the court rules the restrictions unconstitutional, have you failed to uphold your oath to support and defend our Constitution? I would think you would not. However, if the court rules the restriction unconstitutional and the Pentagon continues the restrictions then those enforcing the restrictions would then be failing to uphold their oath, in my opinion. But I am not a lawyer; however, we all have a responsibility to understand our Constitution and use our best judgment to support and defend even if we are not lawyers.

And why can't we respect the traditional and necessarily adversarial relationship with the press so that it can perform the critical function of our federal democratic republic to hold the government accountable to the citizens of America?

Pentagon Defends Restrictions on Media Outlets

NY Times · Erik Wemple ·

The purpose of the new rules is to “stop activity that could compromise national security,” the Defense Department said in response to a New York Times lawsuit.

By Erik Wemple

Reporting from Washington

Jan. 31, 2026

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/31/business/media/pentagon-new-york-times-lawsuit.html

The Pentagon imposed restrictions on media organizations in October, calling them a reasonable initiative to balance national security with media access.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York Times

Reporting from Washington

Jan. 31, 2026

In a court filing late Friday, the Pentagon defended the restrictions it imposed on media organizations in October, calling them a reasonable initiative to balance national security with media access. The filing came in response to a lawsuit filed in December by The New York Times.

The purpose of the policy “is to secure the Pentagon and stop activity that could compromise national security,” the filing said, adding that the policy outlined “explicit and clear standards for conduct” at the Pentagon.

The rules require reporters to sign a 21-page form that sets restrictions on journalistic activities, including requests for story tips and inquiries to Pentagon sources. Reporters who don’t comply can lose their press passes. The restrictions replaced a far more streamlined set of rules.

In its complaint, The Times argued that the Pentagon policy violated the First Amendment rights of journalists, curbing their ability to “do what journalists have always done — ask questions of government employees and gather information to report stories that take the public beyond official pronouncements.” The newspaper also contended that the restrictions violated journalists’ Fifth Amendment rights to due process, because they granted the department “unfettered” discretion to revoke journalists’ press passes — even when they’re engaged in lawful news gathering activities.

For decades, properly credentialed journalists have been able to roam the hallways of the Pentagon and use an on-site work space. Shortly after his confirmation, Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, rolled back some of the media’s privileges, moving some major news outlets from the Pentagon work space. He later curtailed the areas where journalists could venture without an escort.

In October, the Pentagon set out grounds for revoking journalists’ press passes. Dozens of journalists refused to sign the new rules and surrendered their passes, though they have continued to report on the military. In their place, the Defense Department celebrated the arrival of a revamped press corps populated by pro-President Trump commentators and influencers.

In a post on X in October, Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, defended the changes. “Americans have largely abandoned digesting their news through the lens of activists who masquerade as journalists in the mainstream media,” he wrote. “We look forward to beginning a fresh relationship with members of the new Pentagon press corps.”

Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, at a media briefing in July.Credit...Mark Schiefelbein/Associated Press

The Times, in its suit, argued that Mr. Parnell’s comments reflected an effort to discriminate against some journalists on the basis of their viewpoint, in violation of the First Amendment. The Pentagon responded by pointing to negotiations in the fall with news media representatives in which it adjusted the restrictions.

“If the aim was to force out legacy news media, the department would not have accommodated so many of their requests and concerns in issuing” the policy,the department filing said.

The Pentagon claims that its policy doesn’t bar “constitutionally protected journalistic activities.” But journalists who solicit classified information or sensitive unclassified information — or encourage department personnel to violate disclosure laws and policies — could be considered a “security risk” and have their press credentials revoked.

A spokesman for The Times, Charlie Stadtlander, responded on Friday by pointing to the statement the newspaper issued when the lawsuit was filed. “The policy is an attempt to exert control over reporting the government dislikes, in violation of a free press’ right to seek information under their First and Fifth Amendment rights protected by the Constitution,” the statement read.

In its suit, The Times asked the court to vacate the policy’s provisions targeting news gathering and reinstate the previous system.

Both sides in the lawsuit agreed in December to skip discovery proceedings, placing the suit on a fast track. The lawsuit is scheduled for oral arguments on March 6.

See more on: U.S. Department of Defense, The New York Times

12. PRC Targets NATO Frontline States

Summary:

The article argues the People’s Republic of China is expanding across North Atlantic Treaty Organization frontline states via technology access, influence networks, and dual-use infrastructure that can weaken alliance cohesion and expose defense vulnerabilities. It cites concerns over PRC “smart cars” in Poland collecting personal and geospatial data for intelligence use, and describes united front work abroad, economic leverage through OBOR, and cyber activity. Frontline states are tightening data controls, restricting PRC tech, and blocking projects, including a Czech satellite ground station and Romanian nuclear and telecom decisions. It adds the PRC cooperates with Russia when useful, including alleged undersea cable disruption and Arctic dual-use activity.

Comment: If frontline states keep finding surveillance and remote-management risk in consumer and infrastructure tech, what minimum “trusted system” standard should NATO require across logistics, mobility, and base operations?

If the PRC can threaten alliance cohesion through data access and long-term dependencies, which "counter-leverage tools" should NATO prioritize: investment screening, export controls, or allied industrial substitution?

PRC Targets NATO Frontline States - Jamestown

jamestown.org · Anna J. Davis

Influence Operations Publication Eurasia Daily Monitor China

01.30.2026

Anna J. Davis

Shijie Wang

https://jamestown.org/prc-targets-nato-frontline-states/

01.30.2026 Shijie Wang

Executive Summary:

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is expanding its presence along the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) frontline through technology access, influence networks, and dual‑use infrastructure, creating openings that could weaken alliance cohesion and expose vulnerabilities in Europe’s defense posture.
NATO frontline states are responding to PRC‑linked cyber intrusions, surveillance‑capable consumer technologies, and intelligence‑driven infrastructure projects by tightening controls on data flows, restricting PRC technology in critical systems, and issuing broader security warnings to protect transatlantic defense networks.
The PRC cooperates with Russia, when convenient, in subversive activities against sensitive domains across NATO’s frontline. Ultimately, however, the PRC is not reliant on Russia to exploit NATO vulnerabilities and place sustained pressure on the infrastructure and information systems that underpin coordination across the Atlantic.

In December 2025, the Polish government announced that it was addressing serious threats to Polish and European security due to potential surveillance and sabotage linked to Chinese smart cars imported into the country (Rzeczpospolita, December 18, 2025). The announcement followed publication of a report by the Polish state-funded think tank, the Center for Eastern Studies, which warned that smart cars made in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are equipped with technologies that can collect extensive amounts of personal and geospatial data (Center for Eastern Studies, December 17, 2025). The report cites the PRC National Standardization Commission’s claim that smart cars pose a potential threat to national security because their data can be used for “intelligence analysis, assessment of military and civilian infrastructure, and analysis of patterns of activity in the defense and economic spheres” (军事情报分析、重要军事民用设施研判、重大军事经济等活动规律分析，进而给国家安全带来潜在隐患。) (PRC National Standardization Commission, August 22, 2023).

The PRC’s subversive activities, such as the Polish smart car threat, are not isolated incidents across the frontline of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). They instead reflect a multi-dimensional strategy that combines technology penetration, economic leverage, and hybrid operations. Moscow has not publicly taken Beijing’s activities in East and Central Europe as threatening to its own subversive behavior in Europe and its war against Ukraine (see EDM, January 16). In reality, there is little Russia can do to oppose a PRC presence in the region as it remains dependent on Beijing for military, financial, and diplomatic support (see China Brief, June 7, 2025). Chinese military experts have benefited from insights related to capabilities and vulnerabilities of autonomous systems used in Russia’s war against Ukraine as lessons in a potential conflict over Taiwan (see China Brief, March 28, 2025). While Beijing pitches itself as a stabilizing force in a turbulent world, evidence suggests a deliberate effort to reshape Europe’s security architecture and exploit vulnerabilities where they exist (see China Brief, February 28, 2025).

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) uses the united front work (统战工作) abroad to build relationships with individuals and their affiliated organizations, which it considers useful for solidifying the PRC as a global power (see China Brief Notes, April 10, 2024). It exploits technological dependencies by embedding dual-use infrastructure projects that can serve both civilian and intelligence purposes. Beijing also employs economic leverage through the One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative, which is presented as “win-win” investments that, in reality, create long-term dependencies. These efforts intersect with hybrid threats, as the PRC coordinates with Russia across critical domains, including undersea cables and cyber operations.

Frontline states are adopting defensive measures as PRC‑linked cyber and technology threats become more visible. In September 2025, a group of states, including Czechia, Finland, and Poland, along with the United States and other international partners, issued an assessment of global PRC state-sponsored espionage activities aimed at compromising telecommunications, government, transportation, lodging, and military infrastructure networks, among others (Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, September 2025). In March 2025, Czech authorities blocked the Chinese firm Emposat from operating a satellite ground station, following a warning from the Czech Security Information Service (BIS) about national security risks (TVP World, March 26, 2025). The decision reflects Prague’s heightened vigilance toward Chinese technology projects amid concerns over espionage and infrastructure vulnerabilities. Chinese companies, including Emposat, operate under the National Intelligence Law (国家情报法) and Cybersecurity Law (网络安全法), which require all entities to “support, assist, and cooperate with state intelligence work” (支持，协助，和配合国家情报工作) when requested (Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission, November 7, 2016; The National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China, June 27, 2017). This means any data collected through Emposat’s ground stations could be accessed by PRC security agencies.

In 2020, Romania canceled its 2015 deal with the China General Nuclear Power Corporation (中国广核集团, CGNPC) to construct new reactors at the Cernavoda nuclear power plant (Bursa, June 15, 2020). Later that year, the government banned Huawei from Romania for failing to meet Romania’s security requirements (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, November 1, 2020). In 2021, the Romanian government issued a memorandum that excludes companies based in the PRC from participating in tenders or investing in major infrastructure projects (G4Media; Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, February 1, 2021). Romania cited poor work quality and the unfair competitive advantage that Chinese companies receive due to state funding as the reasons for the memorandum (G4Media, February 1, 2021). Romania ultimately banned Chinese companies from government projects to maintain a positive relationship with its partners in the European Union and NATO, particularly after the United States had just placed CGNPC and other Chinese entities on a “blacklist” prohibiting most U.S. cooperation and technology exports.

In May 2025, the Czech government accused the PRC of conducting a cyber campaign since 2022 directly against the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, May 28, 2025). According to the Czech government, the campaign was carried out by the cyberespionage actor APT31 and affected an institution designated as Czech critical infrastructure (European Council, May 28, 2025). The investigation led the Czech government to issue a general warning to critical infrastructure operators of threats linked to data transfers and remote management from the PRC (National Cyber and Information Security Agency, September 3, 2025). The warning included data transmitting dangers related to smart meters, smartphones, smart watches, and some electric cars. The U.S. Department of Justice has identified APT31 as a cyberespionage program run by the PRC Ministry of State Security’s Hubei State Security Department, located in the city of Wuhan (U.S. Department of Justice, March 25, 2024). APT31 has a record of cyberespionage against the Finnish Parliament in 2019 and Norwegian officials in 2018 (Helsingin Sanomat, February 7, 2019; NRK, June 17, 2021; Cyber Defense Magazine, June 22, 2021; The Jamestown Foundation, December 2022).

In 2021, the Lithuanian government blocked a deal for the PRC state-owned enterprise Nuctech (同方威视) to supply baggage scanning equipment to its three international airports, citing national security concerns and the company’s legal obligation under the PRC law to cooperate with Beijing’s intelligence services (IntelNews, February 18, 2021). Later that year, the Lithuanian Ministry of National Defence recommended that public institutions and consumers avoid using PRC-made smartphones after the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) discovered built-in censorship capabilities in Xiaomi devices and security vulnerabilities in Huawei handsets (China Digital Times, September 22, 2021). Estonia has pursued similar decoupling measures. In 2020, the government rejected a proposal for the Tallinn–Helsinki undersea tunnel funded by the PRC’s Touchstone Capital Partners (点石基金), warning that the project could create strategic vulnerabilities through PRC control of critical infrastructure (GMF, July 31, 2020).

This vigilance also extended to the counter-intelligence domain. In 2021, an Estonian court sentenced NATO maritime scientist Tarmo Kõuts to prison for being recruited by PRC military intelligence, a rare public conviction of a PRC asset within a NATO member state (ERR, March 19, 2021). By 2025, Latvia also moved to purge PRC technology from its borders, awarding a contract for automated monitoring systems on its eastern border to the domestic firm Citrus Solutions (LSM, February 20, 2025). This project aims to establish a defense system entirely free of PRC components along the border with Russia.

The PRC has joined Russia in targeting critical undersea infrastructure in the Baltic and Arctic regions, as well as around Taiwan (see EDM, February 5, 2025; see China Brief, June 7, 2025). This coordinated action manifests as a form of hybrid warfare. In the Baltic Sea, PRC-owned commercial vessels, such as the “NewNew Polar Bear” (新新北极熊号) and “Yi Peng 3” (伊鹏三号), stand accused of utilizing “accidental” anchor-dragging incidents, in coordination with Russia’s shadow fleet, to sever critical gas pipelines and telecommunications cables connecting NATO allies (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, August 14, 2024; EJIL, December 31, 2024; CBS News, September 28, 2025). These cables carry essential energy and data flows that support NATO members’ military and civilian operations. Disruptions could affect power transmission and secure communications, creating vulnerabilities in regions already exposed to geopolitical tensions.

In the Arctic, the PRC leverages dual-use scientific research expeditions and infrastructure investments, such as observatories in Iceland and Svalbard, to conduct seabed mapping and intelligence gathering, laying the groundwork for future submarine warfare and control over Arctic shipping routes (High North News, August 30, 2024; Hudson Institute, January 19). Notwithstanding sanctions, the PRC and Russia are moving forward with joint projects in the Payakha oil field, Zarubino Port, and along the Northern Sea Route (The ASAN Forum, August 5, 2024). These establishments may eventually serve as resupply bases for PRC naval and intelligence ships, enabling them to overcome geographical barriers in the Arctic.

These developments indicate that the PRC is embedding itself across multiple transatlantic security domains. The combination of technology transfer, data access, influence networks, and collaboration with Russia, when convenient, is a systematic exploitation of NATO vulnerabilities. Russia ultimately remains a convenient yet expendable partner for the PRC in mounting sustained pressure on the infrastructure and information systems that underpin coordination across the Atlantic and shape future security dynamics in Beijing’s favor.

jamestown.org · Anna J. Davis

13. U.S. Allies Play Risky Game With Tilt to China

Summary:

Newsweek argues U.S. allies are edging toward China to hedge against an unpredictable Donald Trump, but the gamble may backfire. Keir Starmer went to Beijing and won a 5% tariff cut on Scotch, plus services cooperation signals, a visa waiver, and talk of a future deal, while AstraZeneca pledged $15B investment and Britain approved a large new Chinese embassy in London. POTUS warned such China ties are “very dangerous,” and floated 100% tariffs on Canada if it strikes a China trade deal. The piece says China offers limited concessions because allies are “desperate,” while U.S. backlash risks worsening ties with their main trade partner.

Comment: Are we at an alliance inflection point? Is Xi successfully undermining the silk web of alliances that we depend on for our national security?

U.S. Allies Play Risky Game With Tilt to China

Published

Jan 31, 2026 at 05:00 AM EST

updated

Jan 31, 2026 at 05:01 AM EST

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-china-xi-britain-canada-trade-security-11443011

By Matthew Tostevin

Newsweek is a Trust Project member

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s mission to China this week earned a five percent reduction in tariffs on scotch whisky exports and a stiff warning from U.S. President Donald Trump.

"Very dangerous," was the way Trump put it.

But Starmer was only the latest NATO ally leader to pay a visit to Chinese President Xi Jinping. Many pillars of the West are seeking to balance their global relationships because of the unpredictability of a U.S. president who has challenged longstanding norms, started tariff wars with both friends and adversaries, and threatened to take over Greenland and maybe Canada.

Starmer’s pilgrimage to Beijing followed visits by France’s president and Canada’s prime minister. Germany’s chancellor is due there next month. Trump himself is also visiting in April.

But as the Europeans and Canada tilt toward China, which they have previously described as a security threat and criticized for rights abuses, they may end up getting not only less business than they hoped for, but also an even worse relationship with a United States that remains their main trading partner, and is still the world’s most powerful country.

"China thinks it doesn't have to offer anything because everybody's desperate, so they all flock to China," Alicia Garcia-Herrero, a senior fellow at the Brussels-based Bruegel think tank, told Newsweek.

"It's a bit demeaning. It's like you go there. Yes, China is God. You come and flock and pray there, but nothing happens. No matter the fuss, it is still not enough to tilt the balance. The balance won't be killed by China. The balance will be killed by the U.S, continuing to undermine it."

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Starmer’s visit was a case in point. The cut in the scotch tariff was the only obvious immediate benefit for Britain, but the country only exported $320 million in whisky to China in 2023, a little over a fifth as much as it sold to the United States. Plus, China’s total exports to Britain that year were 300 times that amount of British whisky exports to China.

Starmer got a partnership on the services sector and a hint at a future trade deal, but nothing concrete. Then there was a visa-free deal to help British tourists to go to China—and spend money there—and the promise by Britain-based pharma giant AstraZeneca to invest $15 billion in China in research and manufacturing: another obvious benefit for China. Just as importantly, Britain recently gave China the go-ahead for a massive new embassy in London, raising U.S. concerns over its espionage potential.

"China is a vital player on the global stage, and it's vital that we build a more sophisticated relationship," Starmer told Xi in Beijing.

Xi in return mentioned how it was good that the UK had recognized a relationship with China was essential.

In an apparent swipe at Trump, Xi told Starmer "unilateralism, protectionism and power politics are running rampant," according to China’s Foreign Ministry.

He also alluded to Trump's aggression so far this year to wield the military might of the U.S. against even its allies in the cases of Greenland, and Ukraine.

"The international order is under great strain," Xi told Starmer. "International law can be truly effective only when all countries abide by it. Major countries in particular should set an example, otherwise the world will revert to the law of the jungle.

"As supporters of multilateralism and free trade, China and the U.K. should advocate and practice true multilateralism."

BEIJING, CHINA—JANUARY 29: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer (L) with Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) at his state visit to Beijing this week—the first ...Read More

Trump backlash

Trump was predictably unhappy over Britain’s increased trade ties, warning "it's very dangerous for them to do that, and it's even more dangerous I think for Canada to get into business with China." The U.S. president has already threatened 100 percent tariffs on Canada if it does a trade deal with China.

Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney went further than Starmer on his visit to Beijing on January 16, announcing a new "strategic partnership" with a reference to it taking place in "a more divided and uncertain world" that was clearly aimed at Trump.

Carney did a deal to improve access for China to Canada’s electric vehicle market, while the benefits for Canada would go to its farm products—perhaps unwittingly contrasting a high-tech China with an agrarian Canada.

"These moves are significant, as U.S. allies such as the U.K. and Canada seek to stabilize relations with China after years of strain," Eva Seiwert, Senior Analyst at the Berlin-based Mercator Institute for China Studies, told Newsweek.

"However, the emphasis is on pragmatic economic engagement rather than strategic realignment, with leaders repeatedly stressing that security and defense ties with the United States remain unchanged."

U.S. allies were clear-eyed about their cooperation with China, said Patricia M. Kim, fellow at the John L. Thornton China Center and the Center for Asia Policy Studies of the Washington, D.C.-based Brookings Institution.

"Many U.S. allies have direct experience with Chinese economic retaliation and longstanding concerns about Chinese overcapacity and its impact on their domestic industries and trade balances," she told Newsweek.

"They also continue to have deep-seated differences with China over values and governance. Even amid tensions with the United States, these realities set a hard limit on how far U.S. allies are prepared to move toward China."

The Canadian delegation meeting China's in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing two weeks ago. (Photo by Shen Hong/Xinhua via Getty Images)

China deficit

While China might seem appealing for its dramatic economic rise and leading-edge technologies, the United States is the European Union’s main trade partner and it has a significant trade surplus. With China, it has a large and growing deficit.

European countries have often sought partners abroad to support their way of life: from outsourcing security to the United States to buying cheap energy from Russia to betting on immigrant labor in the face of aging populations. It has not always ended well.

There is some irony in the fact that while Trump’s approach to ending the Ukraine war has been a major cause for the souring of relations with European countries, those same countries are now strengthening their ties with China, whose trade and technology have helped enable Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Not all U.S. allies have been courting China. Japan has gone in the opposite direction under Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who has taken the Sino-Japanese relationship to its lowest in years after comments on Taiwan that offended Beijing. She has also sought to establish a strong personal relationship with Trump.

South Korea's approach to Beijing has been more conciliatory, with President Lee Jae Myung making a four-day visit this month to reset ties that had been poor for years and especially under the previous strongly pro-U. S. administration.

While U.S. allies may feel that by building ties to China as a rising power, they might not only be hedging their economic bets, but also be jolting the United States into a less bullying approach toward its allies, it could turn out to be misplaced gamble when it comes to President Trump.

With China not willing to offer more to the Western leaders, the backlash from the Trump administration could end up being a harsher consequence of their diplomacy, said Garcia-Herrero.

"You leave China disenchanted and you still have a community in your country telling you ‘What are you doing? You are putting at risk the trans-Atlantic alliance?’ Then on top of that Trump comes and sets 100 percent tariffs on you. You’re like ‘why did I even go?’ she said. "You would have to receive a lot to take that risk and China is not offering it."

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14. If NATO Dies, Long Live NEATO

Summary:

Nathan Decety argues that a “rupture” has opened between the United States and Western Europe, making it prudent for Europe to build a new defensive alliance, “NEATO,” rather than rely on NATO’s existing U.S. anchor. He frames the Greenland crisis as the catalytic moment, claiming U.S. rhetoric and territorial maneuvering have pushed major European parties, including some on the populist right, into opposition. He proposes a core “Greenland eight” (France, Germany, the UK, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Finland) plus Poland, Iceland, and the Baltics, with Canada and others possibly joining. He says the EU is too slow and sabotage prone, and that NEATO must surge defense spending by 2030, accept welfare tradeoffs, and prioritize deterrence against Russia while also confronting China’s espionage and coercive leverage.

Comment: As an aide, there once was another proposal for a NEATO - the Northeast Asia Treaty Organization. That is what caught my attention in the headline. But obviously that is not what this article is about

https://taiwantoday.tw/Politics/Taiwan-Review/6549/SEATO-and-NEATO

If NATO Dies, Long Live NEATO

It is time for Europe to bite the bullet and build a new defensive alliance because the alternative of inaction is unthinkable.

By Nathan Decety

January 28, 2026https://cepa.org/article/if-nato-dies-long-live-neato/

Even since the end of the Cold War, Western Europe and the United States have had conflicting geopolitical ambitions and values.

But something profound has now changed. Canada’s Mark Carney calls it a “rupture,” and that doesn’t seem too far from the truth.

The current American administration says it hopes to save Europe from itself, from the risk that mass immigration will cause “civilizational erasure.” Its initial intention was to support MAGA-inclined parties across Europe, but that idea may not survive the current political weather — President Trump’s nationalism, seen in statements suggesting European NATO troops had “stayed a little back from the front lines” in Afghanistan, clashes with the populist right’s need to appear patriotic, and has caused a significant backlash.

An alternative perspective, which now seems to be gathering impetus on both sides of the Atlantic, is that Europe must disentangle much of its security apparatus from America’s. The current administration no longer sees Europe as a value-adding contributors to its diplomatic and military power. It will now leave Europe mostly to fend for itself (some key enablers will remain) while maneuvering to take European territories. The continent needs to wake up.

The Greenland crisis is a historic opportunity to align European foreign policy into a coherent, hard-power-backed new alliance. All major parties in the West, including the right-wing parties in France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, find themselves at odds with America’s ambitions.

A new defensive alliance is needed, anchored by the eight countries that sent troops to Greenland, and grounded in common Western European values that are increasingly at odds with their great geopolitical neighbors. Some might hope that the European Union can provide this defense, but it cannot — its slowness and vulnerability to political sabotage by small nations exploiting its byzantine rulebook have proved time and again that a fresh approach is needed.

The outlines of a common European defense alliance are fairly clear. The Greenland eight (that is, France, Germany, the UK, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, and Finland) would be joined by Poland, Iceland, and the three Baltic states. Canada, Belgium, and Luxembourg might also join for a total of 16 nations out of NATO’s 32. Given the geography (and Canada notwithstanding), the new alliance might reasonably be termed the North-East Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NEATO for short.

Other alliance members would feel a magnetic pull, though a number might resist. Some Central and Eastern European states still hope the currently Russophilic US will ultimately provide support against Russian invasion or bullying, but would countries with such recent experience of invasion and national erasure really bet their futures on this? The response of populist right-wing governments in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia would be fascinating weather vanes for this push-pull dynamic.

Likewise, Italy, Spain, and NATO’s other southern members would need to make difficult decisions. In different ways, many are less hostile to Russia and more dubious about the benefits of a new grouping that’s likely to be more hardline on the Kremlin. But they may fear the risks of standing alone, particularly given their exposure and interests in a volatile North Africa and the Middle East.

It’s likely that in time these countries would seek to align themselves with this new power block, since NEATO will share interests in resisting Russia’s hostility and a secure Mediterranean. Europe will then have a cohesive defensive alliance to protect its interests in the world, a liberal democratic counterweight to China and Russia, and far more powerful than its nearby neighbors.

It’s doubtful that such a development would assist US interests. Washington would face a more assertive and capable Europe, which is free to make decisions that a US administration would dislike. Donald Trump was infuriated by the deployment of European NATO troops to Greenland, assessing it was a response to his threats of possible military action (although the administration has also demanded greater NATO involvement in the High North). Denmark’s government reportedly issued its troops with live ammunition and ordered them to fight any attempt to seize the island, though this may have been posturing rather than a genuine belief that this was likely or imminent.

Taken as a whole, the events of the last year, and especially the last month, have fostered a sad realization for European countries. After 80 years of unprecedented peace and prosperity, the greatest period of the West’s so-called Great Enrichment, there is now a credible threat that European territory may again be invaded by a hostile power.

The new NEATO should focus its forces on the continent and shift all relevant and available military assets to the region to support deterrence. It should regard the United States as a possible, and hopefully a likely friend, but must also understand that this is an era of rivalry and a pursuit of the national interest. That means Washington will make decisions counter to Europe’s interests. Similarly, China’s growing cyber espionage, unbalanced trading behavior, and expanding hard power pose a serious threat requiring continental unity.

It must understand Russia’s military and shadow warfare threat, and robustly counter them. NEATO’s members must commit to much higher defense spending by 2030, which means in particular that laggards like the UK and France will have to embrace the serious political pain and possible social disorder that will inevitably result from cuts to welfare spending.

The Greenland crisis is a historic opportunity for Europe to accelerate its journey as its own power bloc, independent from cajoling in an increasingly fractured world. It is the logical continuation of the German Zeitenwende and would indicate that a great continent has learned the lessons of its past.

Surely 1938 was sufficient to show that appeasement and disarmament do not work. Is it necessary to learn that lesson again?

Nathan Decety is a macroeconomic and geopolitics strategist and a Captain in the US Army Reserves, with extensive experience in financial management roles and in military deployments. He advises clients on global affairs, macroeconomic conditions, labor markets, and growth strategy. His research focuses on war outcomes and military effectiveness.

Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.

15. Why NATO Won’t Collapse

Summary:

Ramon Marks argues NATO is unlikely to collapse because it can adapt. He says Europe must assume primary responsibility for its defense inside NATO, but the United States is not leaving. He points to about 80,000 U.S. troops in Europe, no signals of base closures, and the 2026 National Defense Strategy stating the United States will keep a vital NATO role while providing “critical but more limited” support. He frames burden sharing as a strategic necessity given U.S. demands elsewhere. He also warns Europe’s values based soft power, especially EU handling of Ukraine, has outpaced its hard power and helped trigger catastrophe. He cites recent UK France action against a Russian “ghost fleet” tanker as a model.

Comment: If NATO endures through burden shifting, what concrete military capabilities must Europe field fast enough to deter Russia without the U.S. backstopping every crisis.

Why NATO Won’t Collapse

The National Interest · Ramon Marks

January 30, 2026

By: Ramon Marks

https://nationalinterest.org/feature/why-nato-wont-collapse

Topic: Diplomacy, and Military Aid

Region: Europe

The longstanding Western alliance is far more likely to evolve and accommodate US demands for a strengthened Europe.

NATO Europeans are reluctantly facing the fact that they must assume, after more than 75 years, the primary responsibility for their own defense under the NATO framework. They can no longer expect the United States to remain their overarching protector. The controversy over Greenland has even heightened concern that the United States may withdraw from the NATO alliance altogether.

The just-released 2026 National Defense Strategy, however, points to the opposite: the United States is not abandoning NATO. Roughly 80,000 US troops are based in Europe, and there is no indication that bases will be closed or that personnel and supplies will be returned to the United States. Ironically, the biggest military base in Germany is still American, not German. US forces remain fully engaged with European allies, whether conducting joint infantry maneuvers and operations in Poland and Latvia, or conducting sorties with NATO allies’ warships in the Baltic Sea or the Mediterranean. The United States has not gone quiet in NATO.

The 2026 National Defense Strategy (NDS) makes it clear that the United States will “continue to play a vital role in NATO itself…” What has changed is that the United States is now consistently pressuring its allies to share greater defense burdens. Thanks to US diplomacy and the Ukraine war, European allies committed at the 2025 Hague NATO summit to increase defense spending to 5 percent of national GDP. The NDS reaffirms that while the United States will “prioritize incentives for allies and partners to take primary responsibility for their own defense in Europe,” the Pentagon will nonetheless continue to provide “critical but more limited US support.”

The NDS calls for greater burden-sharing by allies is not grounded in isolationist sentiments or anger over Greenland, but rather in the hard reality that Russia is not the only global challenge the United States faces. The NDS points to the fact that the US military must be ready to deal not just with Europe, but also with the Middle East, China, the Korean Peninsula, the Western Hemisphere, and even Africa, where the United States recently conducted a military operation in Nigeria against Islamic extremists.

The United States has its hands full. Calling on NATO Europe to pick up more of its own regional load is the strategic imperative. In fact, at NATO’s founding in 1949, General Dwight Eisenhower anticipated that the US military’s dominant role in the alliance would be short-lived. He said that “[i]f in ten years, all American troops stationed in Europe for national defense purposes have not been returned to the United States, then this whole project will have failed.”

Eisenhower’s vision for NATO and a temporary American role did not pan out, but fortunately, the alliance still endured. Placing more responsibility at this point in the hands of Europe’s military is not a temper tantrum over Greenland or a sign of growing isolationism. It is a long-needed, strategic adjustment among capable allies to help the Pentagon cope with rapidly growing challenges in other parts of the world.

Accompanying the challenge of building European hard power is a need for Europe to tone down its aggressive use of values-based soft power. A dangerous disconnect has grown between the ambitious soft power aims pursued by the European Union in Brussels and NATO, Europe’s real military capabilities.

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The consequences of Brussels’ bungled negotiations with Ukraine over EU accession show how its overambitious use of soft power can lead to catastrophic strategic outcomes for the entire continent. Brussels utterly underestimated how Russia might react to potential Ukraine accession to the EU. George Kennan had warned for decades that any effort to integrate Ukraine into the West would be treated as a red line for Russia. In 2008, when William Burns was US ambassador to Russia, he warned in a cable titled “Nyet Means Nyet” that any Ukrainian movement toward the West could provoke an extreme Russian reaction. Even Angela Merkel had quiet concerns about any Western deals with Ukraine.

Nevertheless, EU negotiators treated the Ukraine discussions as purely economic and regulatory matters with no potential security risks. Moscow viewed the process as a major strategic threat, designed to place Kyiv firmly in the Western camp and ultimately in NATO.

Brussels trade diplomats then took their misjudgments about Moscow to a whole new level when they needlessly triggered a major domestic political controversy inside Ukraine over Yulia Tymoshenko, a former Ukrainian prime minister, who had been convicted and sentenced by Ukrainian courts to seven years in prison for corruption. Brussels took it upon itself to view her prosecution as a violation of the rule of law and to call for her release as part of any EU deal with Kyiv.

That demand sparked a polarizing political controversy in Kyiv. Ukraine’s president, Victor Yanukovych, and his supporters considered Tymoshenko to be their most formidable and dangerous political rival. The EU’s push for Tymoshenko’s release played a major role in Yanukovych’s decision to halt talks with Brussels and pursue trade talks with Russia. In turn, his move toward Moscow prompted the 2014 Maidan Square protests, which forced the democratically elected Yanukovych to flee to Russia.

Three days after Yanukovych was driven out of office, Russia sent its “Green Men” into Crimea. The EU nonetheless pressed on, accelerating its negotiations with the new government. An EU Association Agreement was signed in March 2014, shortly after Crimea was occupied.

From that point until 2022, Ukraine’s integration into the West gained momentum. In 2019, Ukraine passed a constitutional amendment, committing the country to full EU and NATO membership. Russia launched its Ukraine invasion in 2022, and the rest is history. Total casualties in the war so far are estimated to be close to 2 million. If European allies want to prevent such horrific outcomes in the future, they will have to adopt a more careful diplomatic approach in pursuing their goals for the liberal order. Soft power is not enough to deal with Moscow.

Short of an outright Russian invasion against an Article 5, NATO ally, the United States, with all its global responsibilities, cannot be expected to serve as a military backstop for its European allies in every situation where they overplay their soft-power hand. European allies have no choice but to increase their own deterrent military capabilities if they truly want to be a credible force for stability and progress in Europe.

Some hopeful signs of European military resurgence are now emerging. In addition to pledges of defense budget increases, two NATO allies, Britain and France, recently cooperated on an operation that led to the seizure by French Marines of a “ghost fleet” tanker carrying sanctioned Russian oil. Taking on an even larger naval role, alongside willing European allies, to vigorously enforce Russian oil sanctions would be a step in the right direction.

That kind of operation could give European allies greater leverage to influence affairs in their own backyard, including the Ukraine peace negotiations. At this point, they are basically bystanders in the process, watching from the sidelines as Washington controls those discussions.

The NATO alliance will survive. The United States will not abandon NATO, even over Greenland. But to endure, the alliance must evolve. America’s allies must become peer military partners of the United States. Dwight Eisenhower was basically right. Ultimately, it will be up to a prosperous and capable Europe to assume primary responsibility for safeguarding its own regional security. A strengthened European NATO will send a powerful message to the world about the collective will of Western democracies to preserve their values and help maintain a stable world order through hard power.

About the Author: Ramon Marks

Ramon Marks is a retired international lawyer and a regular contributor to The National Interest. During his legal career, he represented both foreign governments and multinationals on trade and sanctions law matters, including testimony to Congress on export controls and related national security issues.

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

https://apstrategy.org/

Executive Director, Korea Regional Review

https://www.upi.com/Korea-Regional-Review/

Editor-at-large, Small Wars Journal

https://smallwarsjournal.com/

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

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

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

Access NSS HERE

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Why NATO Won’t Collapse

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The longstanding Western alliance is far more likely to evolve and accommodate US demands for a strengthened Europe.

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