Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

"Only life lived for others is worthwhile."

- Albert Einstein

“Socrates said, “The misuse of language induces evil in the soul.” He wasn’t talking about grammar. To misuse language is to use it the way politicians and advertisers do, for profit, without taking responsibility for what the words mean. Language used as a means to get power or make money goes wrong: it lies. Language used as an end in itself, to sing a poem or tell a story, goes right, goes towards the truth. A writer is a person who cares what words mean, what they say, how they say it. Writers know words are their way towards truth and freedom, and so they use them with care, with thought, with fear, with delight. By using words well they strengthen their souls. Story-tellers and poets spend their lives learning that skill and art of using words well. And their words make the souls of their readers stronger, brighter, deeper.”

~ Ursula K. Le Guin

"The hardest lesson I’ve had to learn as an adult is the relentless need to keep going, no matter how shattered I feel inside."

– Ernest Hemingway

1. Trump will nominate free speech lawyer to public diplomacy role

2. Trump Writes a New Playbook for Quagmires in Gaza and Ukraine

3. China Tries to Play the Role of Peacemaker in Ukraine

4. Trump Says He and Putin Agreed to Begin Talks on Ending Ukraine War

5. Opinion: God Bless ‘America,’ but God Help Ukraine and Europe Fend for Themselves!

6. Pentagon's Hegseth sees growth in defense spending despite Musk review

7. Three Steps to Build America’s Naval Power

8. Hegseth didn’t request $137K in military housing upgrades: Official

9. Philippines on Cusp of Major Defense Pacts with New Zealand, Canada

10. The Global South, Not Europe, Should Play Peacekeeper in Ukraine

11. Army enlisted leader sees ‘transformation’ at work in brigade visit

12. Plans to Buy ‘Armored Teslas’ Vanish From Procurement List

13. Wittman 'Positive' U.S. Can Maintain Power Balance Between China, Russia

14. Ukraine’s Daunting Choice: Trading Its Land and People for Future Security

15. Europe gasping for air as Trump makes his Ukraine move

16. T-Mobile’s Game-Changing Collaboration with Starlink has begun Nationwide Testing of Satellite-Based Connectivity

17. Taiwan Prepares for Trump’s Tariffs, and a Changed Washington

18. The silver linings in Trump's trade war storm clouds

19. The Nation Needs a Maritime National Security Strategy

20. Five Ways to Get NATO Allies to Spend 5%

21. Japan goes for broke with $1 trillion Trump bet

22. First Taiwan Strait trip of Trump administration ‘sent the wrong signal,’ China says

23. How America’s Allies Boost U.S. Intelligence

24. Trump closes down federal worker buyout offer after judge lifts hold

25. Actually, the #Resistance is working

26. The Trump Tracker: 36 Notable Moves in 24 Days

27. Now Putin is poised to invade Europe as Trump casts Ukraine aside

28. CSA Sends GEN George's Articles of the Month

29. Connecting the Force: Building US Military Interoperability for the Modern Battlefield

30. Melpomene Now (Fiction: AI and naitonal security)

1. Trump will nominate free speech lawyer to public diplomacy role

In addition to the Public Diplomacy nomination a number of other nominees were announced. You can track all administration nominees at this helpful Washington Post tracker at this link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/interactive/2025/trump-appointee-tracker/

The question is will Ms. Rogers take the lead in overseeing an effective information and influence campaign for the United States and orchestrate all the information levers and tools across the interagency? If not her, then who?

Excerpts:

Allison Hooker has been tapped for under secretary for political affairs, the third most senior role in the department. Hooker is an expert on Indo-Pacific security and previously served in Trump’s first administration as the lead Korea specialist on the National Security Council.

Trump has also tapped Thomas DiNanno of the Hudson Institute as under secretary for arms control and international security, meaning he could play a crucial role in potential “denuclearization” talks with Russia and China — something the president has said he wanted.

Christopher Pratt, who was the principal deputy special envoy for hostage affairs in the first Trump administration, has been selected to become assistant secretary for political-military affairs, a key role managing arms transfers and security partnerships.

Joel Rayburn, a former diplomat and Middle East specialist who worked for Sen. Bill Hagerty, a Tennessee Republican, has been tapped as the department’s top Middle East official. Paul Kapur, a professor at the US Naval Postgraduate School, will be nominated to lead the department’s efforts in South and Central Asia. And Caleb Orr has been selected to lead the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, which oversees global trade and sanctions efforts.

https://www.semafor.com/article/02/12/2025/trump-set-to-nominate-key-state-department-officials

Trump will nominate free speech lawyer to public diplomacy role

Mathias Hammer, Eleanor Mueller, and Ben Smith

Updated Feb 12, 2025, 11:23am EST

politics

North America

Joshua Roberts/File Photo/Reuters

The Scoop

US President Donald Trump is set to nominate a slate of top State Department officials, including the third-highest ranking position at the agency and several crucial posts overseeing arms control, the Middle East, and South and Central Asia, according to a list of nominees from the White House dated Feb. 11 obtained by Semafor.

The nominations include a New York lawyer, Sarah Rogers, who has defended the National Rifle Association on free speech grounds and litigated against content moderation. Her appointment to be the under secretary for public diplomacy — a role that had, in the Biden administration, been involved in efforts to combat false information on social media, signals that the Trump administration is planning to globalize its push to force social platforms to allow a wider range of speech.

Rogers will replace Darren Beattie, an outspoken and divisive MAGA figure who is acting in the role. Beattie, who was never expected to take the role on a permanent basis, had courted controversy in the past for associating with extreme figures and espousing foreign policy views at odds with Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s hawkishness.

Rogers has no obvious foreign policy experience, but brings a similar point of view on key issues around speech and social media platforms. A partner at the New York litigation boutique Brewer, Rogers represented the National Rifle Association alongside the ACLU in a winning appeal to the Supreme Court last March. She also represented the NRA against the New York State Attorney General, who was seeking to dissolve the organization, which the NRA beat back on First Amendment grounds. And she represented the playwright David Mamet in an amicus brief in support of a Texas law barring platforms from moderating content based on political viewpoints.

Know More

Rogers is one of a handful of top State Department officials proposed for Senate confirmation.

Allison Hooker has been tapped for under secretary for political affairs, the third most senior role in the department. Hooker is an expert on Indo-Pacific security and previously served in Trump’s first administration as the lead Korea specialist on the National Security Council.

Trump has also tapped Thomas DiNanno of the Hudson Institute as under secretary for arms control and international security, meaning he could play a crucial role in potential “denuclearization” talks with Russia and China — something the president has said he wanted.

Christopher Pratt, who was the principal deputy special envoy for hostage affairs in the first Trump administration, has been selected to become assistant secretary for political-military affairs, a key role managing arms transfers and security partnerships.

Joel Rayburn, a former diplomat and Middle East specialist who worked for Sen. Bill Hagerty, a Tennessee Republican, has been tapped as the department’s top Middle East official. Paul Kapur, a professor at the US Naval Postgraduate School, will be nominated to lead the department’s efforts in South and Central Asia. And Caleb Orr has been selected to lead the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, which oversees global trade and sanctions efforts.

The White House and State Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

2. Trump Writes a New Playbook for Quagmires in Gaza and Ukraine

Excerpts:

His solutions for Gaza and Ukraine look alike in some ways as well.

They stem from his belief in his powers of persuasion, a stated yearning to be seen as a deal-cutting peacemaker of historic significance, and a penchant for imposing decisions on weaker countries, including allies, said analysts who have studied both conflicts.

“What he wants in both situations is quiet, peace, a deal,” said William Wechsler, the senior director of the Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs at the Atlantic Council, a think tank. “Less American engagement and less American risk.”

A question is whether Trump might now try his game plan elsewhere, such as in Taiwan, where fears are growing that the president’s desire for a quick trade deal with Beijing might inspire him to use the democratic island as a bargaining chip.

Trump’s unorthodox approach also risks creating new strategic dead ends.

Trump Writes a New Playbook for Quagmires in Gaza and Ukraine

President’s blueprints for the world’s intractable problems represent rejections of decades-old U.S. policy

https://www.wsj.com/world/trump-writes-a-new-playbook-for-quagmires-in-gaza-and-ukraine-378b29c3?mod=hp_lead_pos2

By David S. Cloud

Follow, Alexander Ward

Follow and James T. Areddy

Feb. 12, 2025 9:19 pm ET

President Trump speaking near a portrait of Ronald Reagan at the White House on Wednesday. Photo: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

WASHINGTON—President Trump is rewriting the accepted playbook for solving the world’s intractable conflicts—offering talks to settle the Ukraine war with concessions to Russia and crushing hopes for a Palestinian state with his plan to resettle Gaza’s entire population.

His blueprints for both places are rejections of U.S. policy going back decades, a stark assertion that Washington’s conventional answers to these seemingly interminable clashes have been tried and have failed.

To Trump, Gaza and Ukraine look much the same. Thousands die needlessly. Cities lie in ruins. Ancient hatreds fuel endless fighting.

His solutions for Gaza and Ukraine look alike in some ways as well.

They stem from his belief in his powers of persuasion, a stated yearning to be seen as a deal-cutting peacemaker of historic significance, and a penchant for imposing decisions on weaker countries, including allies, said analysts who have studied both conflicts.

“What he wants in both situations is quiet, peace, a deal,” said William Wechsler, the senior director of the Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs at the Atlantic Council, a think tank. “Less American engagement and less American risk.”

A question is whether Trump might now try his game plan elsewhere, such as in Taiwan, where fears are growing that the president’s desire for a quick trade deal with Beijing might inspire him to use the democratic island as a bargaining chip.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth attended a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday. Photo: Omar Havana/AP

Trump’s unorthodox approach also risks creating new strategic dead ends.

In Ukraine, Trump’s push for peace has inspired some fears in Kyiv that he might seek a deal without the country’s buy-in that brings a temporary halt to fighting but doesn’t provide Ukraine with enough support to resist Russian efforts to subjugate it in the long term.

As Trump disclosed Wednesday that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed to begin talks on a peace deal, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth was laying out in Brussels the parameters of a possible agreement that ruled out Kyiv’s reclaiming all of its Russian-seized territory, as well as Ukrainian membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the deployment of U.S. troops as peacekeepers.

European officials said the administration’s concessions surrendered Trump’s leverage before talks even began.

“Trump always speaks about ‘peace through strength,’ and that is precisely the right approach with the Russians,” said a senior European official. “But here we have not really seen the strength part yet.”

While Trump vowed in comments to reporters Wednesday to continue U.S. military aid to Kyiv, he insisted that Putin’s desire for peace is genuine, a sentiment some analysts said is doubtful.

“Trump wants a cease-fire and some kind of arrangement that would sideline the Ukraine issue for a while,” said Tatiana Stanovaya, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, in a post on X. “But his vision still differs radically from Putin’s. For Putin, a real solution means a Ukraine that is ‘friendly’ to Russia.”

In 2016, Trump barnstormed his way to the presidency by blaming Washington for launching long-term occupations in Afghanistan or Iraq, with little to show for it. But he often found his ideas blocked by his advisers and his unfamiliarity with policymaking.

The peace deals that he did push through in his first term were also unconventional—and yielded mixed results.

The normalization pacts between Israel and four Arab states—the Abraham Accords—discarded decades of thinking in Washington and Middle East capitals that the century-old conflict required a Palestinian state for peace. But it didn’t catch on with other Arab countries. Hamas cited the sidelining of the Palestinian cause as a rallying cry for the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks that sparked the war with Israel.

In Afghanistan, Trump bucked Washington’s establishment in 2020 by striking a peace accord with the Taliban that didn’t include the U.S.-backed Kabul government. While the Biden administration was roundly criticized for its handling of the final troop withdrawal, many longtime observers of Afghanistan blasted the accord for not constraining the Taliban from restricting the education of girls and other hard-line policies.

In his second term, Trump is already proving more willing to pursue his own ideas.

“We inherited a world on fire thanks to a generation of so-called experts from the foreign-policy establishment,” said Brian Hughes, a National Security Council spokesman. “President Trump is quickly reversing their terrible mistakes, and America is once again the dominant force for peace and stability.”

Trump’s threats to seize the Panama Canal, to make Canada a U.S. state and to take control of Greenland have alarmed U.S. allies.

In Gaza, his plan to relocate the nearly two million Palestinians to Jordan and Egypt so the U.S. can “take” and rebuild the shattered enclave has been rejected by Arab governments and some Gazans who have said they would never abandon their homes.

No previous White House since the founding of Israel in 1948 has suggested the permanent removal of Palestinians from Gaza, which most U.S. presidents have seen as a part of an eventual Palestinian state.

Palestinians shopping at a market in the midst of destruction in southern Gaza. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/DPA/Zuma Press

But Arab and Israeli public support for side-by-side states has waned dramatically, especially since Oct. 7.

Trump sees all of the region’s players trying to turn the clock back to before Oct. 7, said Wechsler. The president’s plan to remove Palestinians from Gaza and have the U.S. take ownership of the strip for a real-estate project is designed to shake up a region that he sees as stuck in the past.

Yet Trump’s proposal is also one that people in Israel and the Arab world regard as unrealistic, with the potential to destabilize such countries as Egypt and Jordan that border Israel.

“Gaza seems like a nonstarter at best, which makes me wonder if it isn’t just a wild gambit to kick-start diplomatic paralysis with either the Egyptians and Jordanians,” said Reid Smith, vice president for foreign policy at Stand Together, a nonprofit founded by the Koch family.

Trump’s ideas for Gaza and Ukraine are being watched by other U.S. allies and adversaries, wondering if he might try similarly disruptive ideas in Taiwan and other hot spots.

For decades, Washington has been Taipei’s most important military backer, supplying the weapons needed to deter and defend against a potential attack by China. Beijing claims the island as its territory and hasn’t ruled out the use of force in asserting control over it.

“If China harbors doubt that the U.S. is going to follow through on its commitments to Taiwan, then we are not deterring China, we are tantalizing and emboldening China,” said Daniel Russel, a former U.S. diplomat and now vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute in New York.

The tense peace that exists rests on an array of agreements, understandings and practices that govern China-Taiwan relations, and they reflect delicate language and raw power honed over decades.

Troops at a military base in Taiwan last month. Photo: Ritchie B. Tongo/EPA/Shutterstock

Trump has mostly stuck to the traditional “strategic ambiguity” messaging over whether the U.S. would get involved in a China-Taiwan conflict that has been Washington policy for decades. But he has at times spoken in transactional terms about the island.

“The big question is whether the president thinks a grand bargain with Beijing, one that might include Taiwan, is possible,” said Richard Fontaine, chief executive of Center for a New American Security, something he said few around the president consider realistic or desirable.

“That would be very unconventional,” Fontaine said.

Write to David S. Cloud at david.cloud@wsj.com, Alexander Ward at alex.ward@wsj.com and James T. Areddy at James.Areddy@wsj.com

3. China Tries to Play the Role of Peacemaker in Ukraine

Is another form of strategic competition playing out?

Excerpts:

The Chinese offer, notably, envisions a U.S.-Russian summit without the involvement of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, according to the people in Beijing and Washington. The prospect of the U.S. negotiating the future of Ukraine and of European security with Russia and China is contrary to the West’s longstanding pledge to include Ukraine in any talks to decide its future.

The White House declined to confirm whether it had received China’s offer, but still rejected it. “Not viable at all,” a White House official said.

Asked about the proposal, the Chinese Embassy spokesman in Washington said he wasn’t aware of it, while adding: “We hope parties will work for de-escalation and strive for political settlement.”

Trump had said that he aimed to end the Ukraine-Russia war in his first 24 hours as president. Now, the administration says it will do so within its first 100 days.

U.S. officials blamed the delayed timeline on China’s support of Russia, which has allowed Moscow to keep fighting and resist international pressure for a cease-fire. Russia’s war efforts have also been backed by Iran and North Korea.

...

Xi has reasons to try to help Trump end the war in Ukraine. During his first presidential term, which started in 2017, Trump delayed trade action on China for a year while he sought Xi’s help in restraining North Korea.

Now, faced with the worst economic downturn in decades, the Chinese leader would like to get Trump in a dealmaking mood to defer further trade and other economic actions aimed at China. So far, the Trump administration has slapped 10% additional tariffs on Chinese products for China’s role in the fentanyl crisis in the U.S. The president promised to hit China with tariffs as high as 60%.

China Tries to Play the Role of Peacemaker in Ukraine

U.S. and Europe would view Beijing’s proposal skeptically given its close ties to Moscow

https://www.wsj.com/world/china-tries-to-play-the-role-of-peacemaker-in-ukraine-6a9175fe?mod=hp_lead_pos8

By Lingling Wei

Follow, Alexander Ward

Follow and Laurence Norman

Updated Feb. 13, 2025 12:51 am ET

Destruction in the front-line town of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. Photo: Serhii Korovayny for WSJ

As President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin signal they are prepared to start negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, China is pushing to play a role.

Chinese officials in recent weeks have floated a proposal to the Trump team through intermediaries to hold a summit between the two leaders and to facilitate peacekeeping efforts after an eventual truce, according to people in Beijing and Washington familiar with the matter.

The offer, however, is being met with skepticism in the U.S. and Europe, given deep concerns over the increasingly close ties between Beijing and Moscow.

On Wednesday, Trump said he had engaged with Putin directly to resolve the conflict. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he had a “lengthy and highly productive phone call” with Putin and both leaders agreed to visit each other’s countries and to open immediate talks to end the war in Ukraine. “I believe this effort will lead to a successful conclusion, hopefully soon!” he wrote.

Trump later told reporters in the Oval Office that he and Putin will “meet also probably in Saudi Arabia the first time,” though he didn’t specify when.

The Chinese offer, notably, envisions a U.S.-Russian summit without the involvement of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, according to the people in Beijing and Washington. The prospect of the U.S. negotiating the future of Ukraine and of European security with Russia and China is contrary to the West’s longstanding pledge to include Ukraine in any talks to decide its future.

The White House declined to confirm whether it had received China’s offer, but still rejected it. “Not viable at all,” a White House official said.

Asked about the proposal, the Chinese Embassy spokesman in Washington said he wasn’t aware of it, while adding: “We hope parties will work for de-escalation and strive for political settlement.”

Trump had said that he aimed to end the Ukraine-Russia war in his first 24 hours as president. Now, the administration says it will do so within its first 100 days.

U.S. officials blamed the delayed timeline on China’s support of Russia, which has allowed Moscow to keep fighting and resist international pressure for a cease-fire. Russia’s war efforts have also been backed by Iran and North Korea.

Since Xi Jinping was anointed China’s leader in 2012, he and Russian President Vladimir Putin have met in person more than 40 times. Photo: Alexander Shcherbak/Zuma Press

Vice President JD Vance, Trump’s special envoy for Russia and Ukraine, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, and a host of senior U.S. officials are heading to Europe this week to discuss the conflict with leaders there. Vance is scheduled to deliver a speech at the Munich Security Conference on Friday, expected to be the first public outline of the U.S. position for negotiations, administration officials said.

Two senior European officials said that Kellogg has told European diplomats that he aims to present Trump with options to end the war as soon as possible.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has resulted in hundreds of thousands of military and civilian casualties. Russia has shown little inclination to end the fighting as it makes slow but steady progress on the battlefield. Russian officials reiterated this week that the war will continue until all of Moscow’s goals are met, including further territorial gains, and the emergence of a neutral, militarily weak Ukraine.

In virtual remarks to business leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, Trump said, “Hopefully, China can help us stop the war with, in particular, Russia-Ukraine.” Some China experts in Washington said the American leader might use threats of tariffs on Chinese imports as leverage to get leader Xi Jinping to assist in resolving the conflict.

China’s offer reflects Xi’s desire to engage in negotiations with Trump to avert a broad economic assault by the Trump administration.

However, Xi doesn’t want any help in ending the war to compromise China’s close relationship with Russia, say the people familiar with Beijing’s thinking. The Chinese proposal doesn’t include any commitment from Beijing to reduce its enormous economic support for Moscow.

Soon before Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Beijing declared that its friendship with Moscow had “no limits.” Nonetheless, some policy advisers in China questioned whether Beijing was wise to align itself so closely with Russia, given how deeply intertwined the Chinese economy is with the West.

But as the war went on, Beijing forged stronger economic and diplomatic ties with Moscow, becoming a crucial lifeline for the Kremlin amid Western sanctions.

A monument marks the border of the contested Donetsk region. Photo: Serhii Korovayny for WSJ

Indeed, on the day of Trump’s inauguration last month, the Chinese leader held a call with Putin in which the two leaders pledged to further deepen ties. Russian state news agency TASS reported Monday that Xi will travel to Moscow in May to attend the annual commemorations of the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Since Xi was anointed China’s leader in late 2012, he and Putin have met in person more than 40 times.

“The personal relationship at the top cancels out heartburn in the Chinese bureaucracy over the cost” of Beijing’s alignment with Moscow, said Rick Waters, managing director for China at the political-risk consulting firm Eurasia Group and a former senior China official at the State Department.

“So Beijing is likely to offer Trump concessions that are more tactical, including a summit with Putin or involvement in post-ceasefire stabilization regimes,” Waters said. “It will not pressure Putin to get to a cease-fire.”

Beijing’s reluctance to distance itself from Moscow has undermined its credibility in the West and could limit any role it can play toward getting Russia to back down.

In Europe, Beijing’s support for Russia has produced deep skepticism about its intentions. Some top European officials have said they believe Beijing is comfortable with a protracted conflict that drains the U.S. and Europe of military resources and deepens Russia’s dependence on Beijing.

Yet at various points, top officials in Berlin and Paris have also said that China could be a key part of a durable peace plan because of the leverage it has on Moscow. As a result, Europe wouldn’t entirely dismiss Chinese participation in a peace deal and even a presence in enforcing such an agreement.

Part of China’s proposal to assist a Russia-Ukraine peace deal involves Beijing acting as a “guarantor” by sending peacekeeping troops to the region, the people familiar said.

However, concern has grown in Europe over a potential great-power deal that ignores the demands of Kyiv. Any China-led trilateral summit with Putin and Trump is likely to fuel those concerns, with many European officials believing that Trump could sideline European interests as some kind of grand bargain with Beijing.

Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Élysée Palace in December. Photo: Sarah Meyssonnier/Associated Press

European officials have said consistently that any peace negotiations must include Ukrainian and European leaders, whose security would be directly affected.

Ukrainian officials, while recognizing Beijing’s sway over Moscow, have expressed wariness about any Chinese efforts to help end the war.

Zelensky last year accused China of undermining a Ukrainian-led peace summit in Switzerland. He has also echoed Trump’s promise of “peace through strength,” saying that the best way to get Russia to halt its invasion would be for the West to provide additional military support to Kyiv and sanction Russia to weaken its war machine.

Xi has reasons to try to help Trump end the war in Ukraine. During his first presidential term, which started in 2017, Trump delayed trade action on China for a year while he sought Xi’s help in restraining North Korea.

Now, faced with the worst economic downturn in decades, the Chinese leader would like to get Trump in a dealmaking mood to defer further trade and other economic actions aimed at China. So far, the Trump administration has slapped 10% additional tariffs on Chinese products for China’s role in the fentanyl crisis in the U.S. The president promised to hit China with tariffs as high as 60%.

Write to Lingling Wei at Lingling.Wei@wsj.com, Alexander Ward at alex.ward@wsj.com and Laurence Norman at laurence.norman@wsj.com

4. Trump Says He and Putin Agreed to Begin Talks on Ending Ukraine War

Excerpts:

Fried said Hegseth didn’t exclude Ukraine’s membership to NATO, and only said that its membership couldn’t be part of any peace agreement. “There is no way on God’s green Earth that Putin would ever agree to Ukraine’s NATO membership as part of a peace agreement,” he said.

He noted that Trump and his aides have been sending out mixed signals to Moscow about negotiations over Ukraine, sometimes flattering Putin and sometimes threatening him with sanctions, tariffs and other punitive measures if he didn’t make a deal. Hegseth’s statement could be more positioning to ease Putin into talks, he said.

While Ukraine has said it wants all of its territory back, it also has acknowledged it would struggle to reclaim the roughly 20% occupied by Russia. Zelensky has said that he hopes Western partners will help Ukraine negotiate a diplomatic deal for the return of its territory.

Hegseth didn’t address the extent of weapons and military support the U.S. would provide Ukraine. According to the State Department, as of Jan. 20, the U.S. had provided Ukraine with $65.9 billion in military support. That has slowed significantly under the Trump administration.

Trump Says He and Putin Agreed to Begin Talks on Ending Ukraine War

U.S. president says he also spoke with Ukraine’s Zelensky as his administration pushes for a swift end to the conflict

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/ukraines-return-to-pre-2014-borders-is-unrealistic-objective-hegseth-says-9a1ebfd7?mod=hp_lead_pos1

By Alan Cullison

Follow, Nancy A. Youssef

Follow and Jane Lytvynenko

Updated Feb. 12, 2025 5:57 pm ET

Appeared in the February 13

5. Opinion: God Bless ‘America,’ but God Help Ukraine and Europe Fend for Themselves!

Opinion: God Bless ‘America,’ but God Help Ukraine and Europe Fend for Themselves!

kyivpost.com · by Bohdan Nahaylo · February 13, 2025

Trump Putin Zelensky

The latest statements from President Trump and his top officials concerning Ukraine and Europe suggest we are witnessing a worrying “game-changer” moment. What next?

By Bohdan Nahaylo

February 13, 2025, 12:53 pm

This combination of pictures created on February 12, 2025 shows (from L) US President Donald Trump, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin. (Photo by various sources / AFP)

So now we know more precisely what the new Trump administration has in store for Ukraine and Europe more broadly. And it’s probably even worse and scarier than we thought.

First, President Donald Trump unexpectedly held a “lengthy and highly productive” phone conversation with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin late Wednesday, Feb. 12.

The call, which seems to have focused mainly on stopping the war waged by Russia against Ukraine, was apparently made without prior consultation with President Zelensky.

Trump praised Putin’s purported receptiveness, both invited each other to visit their respective capitals, and the US leader also revealed that they had agreed to meet soon in Saudi Arabia.

Although the US president immediately informed Zelensky by phone about what had been discussed, the Ukrainian head of state, who is understandably concerned about the situation in which he and his country find themselves, did not provide any details about what he had been told.

Earlier, Trump’s new Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth had told Ukraine and its European supporters at a meeting in Germany: “The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement,” and “returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective.” He also dropped a real bombshell by declaring very bluntly that the US was no longer “primarily focused” on European security.

‘Not a Betrayal’ – Hegseth Defends Trump’s Peace Push Amid European Backlash

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday blindsided Ukraine and Washington’s European allies by agreeing to launch peace talks in his first publicly announced phone call with Putin.

Before that, Trump’s Special Envoy for Ukraine and Russia Keith Kellogg suggested Ukraine should hold elections despite the ongoing war and state of martial law, while Mike Waltz, Trump’s new US national security advisor declared: “An underlying principle here is that the Europeans have to own this conflict going forward… And then in terms of security guarantees, that is squarely going to be with the Europeans.”

At this grim moment, on the eve of the third anniversary of the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, while hoping for the best, it is necessary for the time being to prepare for the worst.

So, what do we glean from these takeaways? Putting it crudely but concisely: The US is passing the buck to Europe. “Cope with this mess yourselves and don’t rely on us anymore” seems to be the message. Apart from this virtual desertion, the Trump administration is prepared to make a deal with Russia at the expense of Ukraine’s territory, security, future and well-being, and even then, insisting that what’s left of Ukraine should pay with its mineral resources for the semblance of American backing.

Instead of helping a kindred democratic state under attack by a psychotic, despotic, international bully, the new leadership in Washington is telling the battered and bruised victim, “Be grateful that we are trying to give you respite, but empty your pockets, because values and principles are a thing of the past, and today we expect everyone to pay for our help, or rather, our services.”

Desperate for whatever support he can still garner from the US, Zelensky, understandably, is trying to put a brave face on things and hold out hope that with the help of Ukraine’s European supporters, Trump’s administration will not be able to sell out Ukraine so cynically.

Fine, Donald Trump won the elections with his populist emphasis on “Make America Great Again,” focusing mainly on domestic issues of primary concern to US citizens, but also promising, among other things that he would be able to stop Russia’s barbaric war against Ukraine within 24 hours. How and at what cost to Ukraine was not said.

So yes, the will of the majority of American voters to re-elect Trump for a second term must be respected, but that does not mean passively and uncritically accepting his fundamental policy shifts and their consequences at home and abroad.

What happens at home is for the American public to judge and react to. But when it comes to Ukraine – and its struggle for freedom with its far-reaching significance for the entire democratic world – disregard, indifference or cynicism are out of place.

This also applies to other statements and actions by the new US administration which call into question the principles and solidarity of the democratic, law-abiding world: turning away from Europe and NATO, sanctions against the International Court of Justice, closing down USAID, disturbing comments about Canada, Greenland, the Panama Canal, Gaza, etc.

We may well ask, “What has become of the USA that we knew and respected for so long?” The America that stood up for democratic values at home and abroad, willing to support the cause of freedom worldwide with actions and not just words. America with a Republican Party represented by President Ronald Reagan, who took on the Soviet “evil empire,” and a war hero like John McCain, who was a staunch supporter of Ukraine.

There are many other questions. Will America accept the visit of Russian war criminal Putin just because the Trump administration has decided to ignore international justice mechanisms? Will Saudi Arabia be willing to host Trump and Putin for peace talks after the US president’s comments on Israel and Gaza? And, more fundamentally, will Europe and NATO be able to regroup and rethink how to ensure their security in the face of America’s turning away from them under the Trump administration?

At this grim moment, on the eve of the third anniversary of the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, while hoping for the best, it is necessary for the time being to prepare for the worst.

Perhaps this moment of truth is also the spur that was needed to dispel complacency and adapt more effectively to changing realities and the challenges that have been made explicit. I am sure that this has not escaped the attention of many in the United States, and especially in Ukraine and Europe.

The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.

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Bohdan Nahaylo

Bohdan Nahaylo, Chief Editor of Kyiv Post, is a British-Ukrainian journalist and veteran Ukraine watcher based between Kyiv and Barcelona. He was formerly a senior United Nations official and policy adviser, and director of Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian Service.

6. Pentagon's Hegseth sees growth in defense spending despite Musk review

I do not see how this is possible. It will kind of defeat the purpose of DOGE and the "Great Reset" of the federal bureaucracy which surely must include the Pentagon. After all the wasteful and inefficient programs are identified and cut won't we be able to then spend that money on more effective programs? Everyone knows that the biggest savings of all must come from DOD (even the most ardent opponents of DOGE secretly hope DOGE will cut the Pentagon budget). Why would we need more money? (note my attempt at sarcasm)

Or has the SECDEF been co-opted already by the military industrial congressional complex that will only allow defense increases? (also note my sarcasm because the SECDEF is only "co-opted" by POTUS and will faithfully execute his agenda).

Pentagon's Hegseth sees growth in defense spending despite Musk review

https://www.msn.com/en-ph/news/world/pentagon-s-hegseth-sees-growth-in-defense-spending-despite-musk-review/ar-AA1yQ857

Story by Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali•

•

FILE PHOTO: U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth prepares to welcome Australian Defence Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles at the Pentagon in Washington, U.S., February 7, 2025. REUTERS/Nathan Howard/File Photo

By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday he wanted to increase overall U.S. defense spending and played down concerns over a pending audit by Elon Musk aimed at finding billions of dollars in waste at the Pentagon.

Speaking in Germany during his first trip overseas, Hegseth said he had already been in touch with Musk and expressed confidence in the effort to find billions in cost-cutting and to make the Pentagon more efficient.

"There's plenty of places (at the Pentagon) where we want the keen eye of DOGE, but we'll do it in coordination," Hegseth said, referring to Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.

"We're not going to do things that are to the detriment of American operational or tactical capabilities."

Still, Hegseth said he was already "intimately" involved with key committees in Congress about bolstering the U.S. military.

Musk's companies, like SpaceX, also hold major contracts with the Pentagon, which has raised significant conflict of interest concerns.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said the Pentagon will be an early target of Musk's DOGE, which will review U.S. defense spending once it finishes slashing spending at the Department of Education. Trump has said he expects Musk to find hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud and abuse at the Pentagon.

Leaders from across the political spectrum have long criticized waste and inefficiency at the Defense Department.

But Democrats and civil service unions say Musk lacks the expertise to restructure the Pentagon, and their efforts risk exposing classified programs.

Hegseth played down concerns of broad cuts of Pentagon agencies, like those seen at the U.S. Agency for International Development, saying: "The Defense Department is not U.S. AID"

"U.S. AID has got a lot of problems ... pursuing globalist agendas that don't have a connection to America First. That's not the Defense Department."Hegseth suggested Musk may target Pentagon efforts related to climate change, without offering specifics.

"I hope to welcome Elon to the Pentagon very soon," Hegseth said. "Look at a lot of the climate programs that have been pursued at the Defense Department. The Defense Department is not in the business of climate change solving the global thermostat. We're in the business of deterring and winning wars."

Over the weekend, Trump's National Security Adviser Mike Waltz suggested that the Pentagon's shipbuilding processes could be an area of particular interest for DOGE.

The Pentagon's budget is approaching $1 trillion per year. In December, then-President Joe Biden signed a bill authorizing $895 billion in defense spending for the fiscal year ending September 30.

Hegseth said he believed defense spending should increase further, even as he acknowledged concerns over a growing U.S. debt that he said was "a national security liability as well."

"I think the U.S. needs to spend more than the Biden administration was willing to, who historically underinvested in the capabilities of our military," Hegseth said.

"So the president is committed, as he was in the first term, to rebuilding America's military by investing."

At a minimum, Hegseth said, the U.S. defense spending should not drop below 3% of GDP. The World Bank, citing data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, says the United States spent about 3.4% of GDP on defense in 2023.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali, Editing by Franklin Paul and Marguerita Choy)

7. Three Steps to Build America’s Naval Power

We are a maritime nation and we must invest in our naval power to secure our global national security interests. Raise an Army and maintain a Navy are our fundamental constitutional requirements (for Congress:‘to raise and support Armies', ‘to provide and maintain a Navy', and to make all laws necessary and proper to carry these powers into execution.")

Excerpts:

Three steps are essential: establishing accountability for naval procurement and construction, contracting with foreign yards for combat support tasks and possibly warships, and securing a much larger defense budget, including for Navy shipbuilding.

...

If “peace through strength” is to have teeth, the Trump administration must provide budget requests in line with U.S. strategic needs. That means a sustained top-line defense spending increase of at least 20%, along with a larger shipbuilding account. But if the Pentagon adheres to its traditionally balanced budgetary split among the Navy, Air Force and Army, much of these resources won’t translate into relevant long-term combat capacity. The Pentagon’s new civilian team needs to shift funding from American ground forces to the Navy and Air Force. That will ensure the elements of military power that take the longest to expand have the resources to defend U.S. interests at their most critical hinges.

Three Steps to Build America’s Naval Power

Trump and the Pentagon should revamp procurement, let foreign yards maintain and build our warships, and increase the shipbuilding budget.

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/three-steps-to-build-americas-naval-power-defense-pentagon-military-279dd593?mod=opinion_lead_pos8

By Seth Cropsey

Feb. 12, 2025 5:43 pm ET

The USS Cole returns to Naval Station Norfolk, Va., after a deployment, Dec. 23, 2024. Photo: Mass Communication Specialist 1s/Associated Press

President Trump has pledged to deliver “peace through strength”—restoring American military power, enhancing capacity, and preserving deterrence in Asia as China menaces Taiwan and accelerates its military buildup. Naval power supports all U.S. military capacity. Revitalizing the military will require the president, his team and the entire Pentagon bureaucracy to undertake reforms. Three steps are essential: establishing accountability for naval procurement and construction, contracting with foreign yards for combat support tasks and possibly warships, and securing a much larger defense budget, including for Navy shipbuilding.

Mr. Trump inherits a precarious international situation. Ukraine has fought Russia to a standstill, but the U.S. must still end the conflict without further eroding American credibility or weakening America’s position in western Eurasia. Iran is in a feebler position than six months ago, facing a financial crisis and with key proxies either battered or destroyed, but its relationship with Russia and China may still allow it to reconstitute its capabilities. China sustains Russia’s war in Ukraine and is expanding its conventional and nuclear capabilities to deter the U.S. and its Pacific allies in the event of a Taiwan crisis.

In all these cases, naval power is crucial. The U.S. Navy’s ability to maintain sea control across the Eurasian coastline allows American forces, supplies and materiel to move among different areas, managing crises and, during a major war, taking the offensive against the enemy. In the Pacific, naval forces will bear the brunt of the combat load, alongside the Air Force’s long-range bombers. A capable U.S. Navy is key to both regional deterrence and combat capability.

Yet the Navy isn’t building ships fast enough. The Navy’s mainline surface combatants, its Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, are capable all-around warships. Their newest variant, the Flight-III, incorporates key technical innovations, including new radars, better propulsion systems, and improved air defenses. The 23 Flight-IIIs the Navy plans to procure under the 30-year shipbuilding plan, however, will cost $400 million over budget each, with a cost of $2.7 billion a ship. Only one Flight-III is currently launched. Three more are being built, facing six-month to two-year construction delays.

All other major warship programs face similar impediments. The Navy’s Constellation-class frigate, meant to be a cheap, small warship, has ballooned to well over $1 billion a hull. It is 20% to 40% more expensive than its European parent design, and has been delayed by three years. The Navy’s next carrier, the USS Enterprise, will reach the fleet more than two years behind schedule. The first Columbia-class nuclear-armed ballistic-missile submarine, a cornerstone of our nuclear deterrent, will be launched a year late. New Virginia-class attack submarines, essential for degrading Chinese reconnaissance capabilities and allowing the rest of the military to fight in Asia, will enter service two to three years late. Even the Navy’s future warships, still in the design phase, will be significantly more expensive than projected. The Congressional Budget Office forecasts the Navy’s next-generation destroyer will cost $1 billion more than projected.

U.S. shipbuilding is constrained by an aging workforce and some yards that need technological investment. Absent a consistent budget, shipyards must rely on fluctuating congressional winds to ensure funding, making long-term plans impossible.

Other bureaucratic issues also hamstring U.S. shipbuilding. Naval Sea Systems Command, or Navsea, is the biggest culprit. When Congress approves a ship for procurement, the Navy hands the project to Navsea to assess and approve the design, modify it and oversee construction. Navsea is a system command of the U.S. Navy. It has no connection to operational commands. Navsea program managers can unilaterally approve major design changes based on their reading of initial requirements, either forcing a shipbuilder to make a change at a significant financial loss or prompting the Navy, Pentagon and Congress to appropriate additional funds. Navsea’s unwillingness to accept major design differences between warships in the same class despite new technology and operational data further delays procurement.

The administration can begin to fix this system through executive action, requiring that any design change to a program over a given financial threshold—ideally around $100,000—gain personal approval from the Navy secretary and chief of naval operations. Holding the Navy’s civilian and uniformed leaders accountable for design modifications and significant cost overruns would also help the Navy speed up procurement and reduce costs.

Greater shipyard capacity, however, requires long-term funding. The Ships Act, which would bolster U.S. commercial and naval shipbuilding, is a good start and has bipartisan support. But it doesn’t move quickly enough. Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon can take two immediate steps. First, it can contract with foreign yards, principally in Japan, South Korea and Europe, for routine maintenance and repair, easing the strain on U.S. yards and lowering costs. This will require political will, given opposition from maritime industry organized labor. Second, the Pentagon should push Congress to pass legislation to allow the purchase of warships from abroad. Korean yards in particular produce high-quality warships at competitive prices, while many allies can build essential combat support ships that the Navy currently lacks in sufficient numbers.

Ensuring Navsea’s accountability and tapping into foreign construction can reduce the strain on the naval industrial base in the short term. But in the long term, budgets must increase. The Navy’s plan for 390 ships, which it will reach only in the 2050s, will require a 20% shipbuilding budget increase over the next 30 years compared with the Navy’s current estimates. When operational costs and manning are considered, this would entail a Navy budget almost 50% larger than currently projected.

If “peace through strength” is to have teeth, the Trump administration must provide budget requests in line with U.S. strategic needs. That means a sustained top-line defense spending increase of at least 20%, along with a larger shipbuilding account. But if the Pentagon adheres to its traditionally balanced budgetary split among the Navy, Air Force and Army, much of these resources won’t translate into relevant long-term combat capacity. The Pentagon’s new civilian team needs to shift funding from American ground forces to the Navy and Air Force. That will ensure the elements of military power that take the longest to expand have the resources to defend U.S. interests at their most critical hinges.

Mr. Cropsey is president of the Yorktown Institute. He served as a naval officer and as a deputy undersecretary of the Navy and is author of “Mayday” and “Seablindness.”

8. Hegseth didn’t request $137K in military housing upgrades: Official

For all the breathless attacks (against and by both extremes of the political spectrum), AP corrects the half truths that feed the propaganda of the extremes.

Opponents of the administration tried to use this to discredit the SECDEF when this was just a routine action not demanded or requested by him.

Of course DOGE and its ardent supporters will ask: why does the Army need to maintain hundred year old homes? Why is the Army wasting this much money on maintaining these homes? (perhaps they will recommend a Trump Tower be built on Fort McNair after razing all the hundred year homes (note another attempt at sarcasm).

Hegseth didn’t request $137K in military housing upgrades: Official

militarytimes.com · by Tara Copp · February 12, 2025

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not request more than $137,000 in repairs and upgrades to military housing at Fort McNair that will become his official residence, according to a U.S. official familiar with the work order, who says the Army undertook the repairs on its own since the more than 100-year-old home had sat vacant for a year and needed security upgrades.

The cost of the repairs — including almost $50,000 being spent on new paint — came to light in a Jan. 30 notification to Congress from the Army.

The notification prompted calls for greater transparency by some Democratic lawmakers who sought answers on why the cost was necessary and whether Hegseth would reimburse the government through rental payments for the military-provided housing, as other senior executive service defense officials are required to do.

Broken AC at Fort Cavazos leaves soldiers sweating

A mechanical failure at the Texas base has left soldiers dealing with room temperatures in the 80s this week.

The Army chose the home on Fort McNair for Hegseth based on what was available, and Hegseth didn’t seek the repairs, some of which are needed to bolster safety for the defense secretary, who is sixth in the line of succession, said the official, who was not authorized to discuss details of Hegseth’s housing and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Hegseth’s immediate predecessor, Lloyd Austin, elected to live in a private residence he purchased.

In a statement, the Army said it “performs routine maintenance and repairs to all residences between tenants to meet occupancy standards, regardless of rank and position. Historic homes typically have higher costs due to their size and the intricate details associated with the era they were constructed.”

The expense comes, however, as the Trump administration is slashing costs across government agencies. President Donald Trump has said he will ask Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency to review the Pentagon’s spending.

It also comes as deteriorated military on-base housing worldwide continues to be an issue, with mold, lack of timely repairs and aged infrastructure often cutting into service members’ quality of life.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Florida Democrat who was among those seeking answers on the housing upgrades, said in a statement to AP that Hegseth “certainly should know what his preferred residence will cost our taxpayers. If he wants hardworking Americans to cover that expense, it’s rank hypocrisy. He and the president can’t preach to our families that they must go without vital funds and services, then not practice it themselves.”

“We look forward to the Secretary’s answers to all our housing and rental cost questions and welcome a firm commitment to help service members who live with mold and rodents to get the same, swift housing treatment that he did,” Wasserman Schultz said.

Fort McNair is the nation’s third-oldest Army installation. Its historic row of white-columned, three-story general officer quarters overlook the Washington Channel. The homes date back to 1902 and have been used over the years to house members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and combatant commanders.

It is less usual to have a member of the Cabinet reside in one, though former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo chose to live at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall during Trump’s first term, and his move there required similar security upgrades to that residence.

About Tara Copp, AP

Tara Copp is a Pentagon correspondent for the Associated Press. She was previously Pentagon bureau chief for Sightline Media Group.

9. Philippines on Cusp of Major Defense Pacts with New Zealand, Canada

The Philippines is working on its own silk web of alliances. I do not think we can overestimate the importance the geostrategic location of the Philippines.

Again:

“The West Philippine Sea, not Taiwan, is the real flashpoint for an armed conflict,”

– Ambassador Jose Manuel Romualdez February 28, 2024

Philippines on Cusp of Major Defense Pacts with New Zealand, Canada

thediplomat.com · by Sebastian Strangio

The planned visiting forces agreements reflect Manila’s efforts to broaden and deepen its defense partnerships in the face of growing Chinese pressure.

February 11, 2025

The HMCS Montreal (FFH336) (left), BRP Ramon Alcaraz (PS16) (front), USS Lake Erie (CG70) (rear), and BRP Jose Rizal (FF150) (right) take part in the AUS-CAN-PH-US Multilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity that was held in the South China Sea during August 7-8, 2025.

Credit: Royal Canadian Navy Subscribe for ads-free reading

The Philippines is set to bolster its defense relations with Canada and New Zealand. It is on the brink of finalizing key defense pacts that would allow its forces to take part in larger military exercises.

Frances Mangosing of The Inquirer reported yesterday that talks between the Philippines and New Zealand over a visiting forces agreement (VFA) are now well advanced. According to the report, Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. told the press last week that the negotiations, which began in Manila on January 23, could be concluded “within the first semester of the year.”

Once finalized, the VFA, which is similar to agreements that the Philippines has already struck with the United States, Australia, and Japan (though the latter awaits ratification by the Japanese parliament), will remove many of the bureaucratic hurdles involved in deploying Filipino and Canadian troops in each other’s countries. This will allow for more substantial military exercises and deeper defense cooperation.

The obvious spur to the agreement is a shared concern about China’s growing power and ambition. On the Philippine side, that has manifested in increasingly frequent and confrontational Chinese incursions into the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the South China Sea, which has seen China Coast Guard vessels ram Philippine ships and douse them with high-pressure water cannons.

In New Zealand, where the National Party came to office in October 2023, there has been a marked souring of attitudes toward Beijing, with which Wellington has had generally good relations. Wellington has become an increasingly frequent critic of China’s aggressive actions in the South China Sea, and has grown concerned about its influence in the Pacific writ large, as Foreign Minister Winston Peters noted in a speech in May. Last week, Teodoro described a possible VFA with New Zealand as “an important part of … both countries’ and multilateral countries’ initiatives to resist China’s unilateral narrative to change international law.”

Concerns about China’s growing power and ambition have also prompted the Philippines to pursue a similar VFA pact with Canada. On Friday, David Hartman, the country’s ambassador to the Philippines, announced that the two nations were “in the final stages of the negotiations of our status of forces visiting agreement that will enable us to have even more substantive participation in joint and multilateral training exercises and operations with the Philippines and allies here in the region.”

As the Associated Press reported, Hartman spoke before Philippine defense officials, foreign ambassadors, and defense attaches boarded the HMCS Ottawa, a Royal Canadian Navy Halifax-class frigate on a port visit to Manila.

Compared to New Zealand, Canada has also been more vocal in its criticisms of Chinese actions in Philippine-claimed parts of the South China Sea, which Hartman described on Friday as “provocative and unlawful.” In August of last year, Canada joined the U.S., Australia, and the Philippines in air and naval maneuvers in the vital waterway. The three nations said in a joint statement that they would “stand together to address common maritime challenges and underscore our shared dedication to upholding international law and the rules-based order.”

These embryonic agreements with New Zealand and Canada are the fruit of a concerted Philippine effort to broaden and deepen its defense partnerships among nations that share its concerns about China’s assertive behavior around the contested shoals and reefs of the western Pacific. This has naturally involved a heavy investment in the security relationship with the U.S., its long-time treaty ally. But given the erratic and uncertain nature of Washington’s direction under the second Trump administration, it is important for Manila to extend its circle of friends further outward. The Philippines is also in talks to establish a VFA with France.

Authors

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Sebastian Strangio

Sebastian Strangio is Southeast Asia editor at The Diplomat.

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thediplomat.com · by Sebastian Strangio

9. The Global South, Not Europe, Should Play Peacekeeper in Ukraine

Doesn't the Global South have other priorities?

But on a more serious note who would command and control such a coalition force? Who would help prepare and train the force? Who would provide intelligence support and be a bridge liaising to both sides of the conflict? I actually gave some thought to this in the context of UN peacekeeping and peace operations back in the 1990s.

Support to United Nations Operations: Is There A Role For United States Special Operations Forces?

https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/citations/ADA309828

The Global South, Not Europe, Should Play Peacekeeper in Ukraine

A peace deal will require boots on the ground. To avoid escalation, neutral countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America should provide troops—rather than the EU.

By Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom, a former guest researcher at the Swedish Defense University and a doctoral candidate at the University of Cambridge.

Foreign Policy · by Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom

Europe
Ukraine

February 13, 2025, 3:15 AM

On Dec. 7, 2024, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump made a proposal to French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He told them that European troops should serve as peacekeepers in the event of a peace deal in Ukraine.

It was a signal of both the United States’ unwillingness to provide Ukraine with security guarantees as well as the growing likelihood of a negotiated end to the Russia-Ukraine war. But instead of looking to European countries as the main source for such a force, negotiators should turn to the global south.

In order for any international peacekeeping mission to be successful, it is necessary for parties to the conflict to have working relations with the countries that are sending blue helmets. The major concern in Europe since February 2022 has not been the fate of Ukraine but rather the risk that the fighting poses to broader Russian-Western relations and the possibility of escalation.

Putting NATO soldiers, even if there are no U.S. boots on the ground, in front of armed Russians in what Moscow considers to be its militarized frontier does nothing to resolve the underlying tensions. Instead, it would exponentially increase the risk of a wider European war.

An EU deployment also lacks credibility. The consistent unwillingness, aside from rhetorical flourishes from Macron, to send troops to Ukraine during an ongoing conflict suggests that should fighting resume between Russia and Ukraine, the EU will lack the will to commit. It is not even clear that European countries have the capacity to sustain a large deployment. European peacekeepers risk being stranded in the absence of U.S. logistical support.

Meanwhile, deploying a “NATO minus America” force near Russian troops would not only be unacceptable to the Kremlin but also potentially lead the Russian government to double down on its demands that Ukraine be excluded from any sort of Euro-Atlantic integration. Indeed, a pan-European force would remain indistinguishable from a NATO one for the Russians. Combined with the bellicose rhetoric of some Western leaders, including supporting direct strikes inside of Russia, such a deployment would be seen as NATO expansion by stealth.

On Feb. 12, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth confirmed the Trump administration’s opposition to Ukraine’s membership in NATO and instead called for “capable European and non-European troops” to provide security guarantees—without U.S. troop involvement.

Instead of debating the merits of a European mission, negotiators should instead look for a broad cross-section of peacekeepers from the global south with friendly, or at least non-hostile, ties with both Russia and the West. The wide number of peace initiatives and proposals—coming from countries such as Indonesia, Mexico, and the African delegation that visited Kyiv and Moscow—suggests that there is a real willingness by these nonaligned states to play a significant role.

A brief exchange of gunfire with Italian or Dutch troops in the Donbas that does not escalate to a Russia-NATO war would not meaningfully hurt Russia’s international standing.

By contrast, the risk of Russians exchanging fire with Indian and Chinese troops on the ground would force Moscow to consider the implications of a small skirmish on its global strategies—whether in terms of economics, security, or diplomacy.

Realistically, however, those two countries are unlikely to risk their bilateral relationships with Russia for the marginal gains that might be accrued from providing security in Ukraine by themselves. In the worst-case scenario, they might damage their ties with both Russia and the West. Instead, a multinational approach should be adopted.

The ever-expanding BRICS+ group, alongside members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, now have a genuine opportunity to help define a new era of international security. The African Union, meanwhile, has gained decades of experience by conducting its own peacekeeping missions.

Even Persian Gulf countries could send military and political officers to help defuse tensions as they have been able to cultivate trust with both Russia and Ukraine by organizing several rounds of prisoner exchanges. This sort of practical experience with the warring parties, combined with a pragmatic mindset and simultaneous close ties with the United States, is what is needed to prevent a local disagreement from spiraling out of control.

An effective force does not have to be large since its goal should not be to be able to fight one of the parties but rather to simply keep the peace.

In order to avoid the mistakes made in Bosnia, where peacekeepers became mired in an ongoing war, clear parameters will be necessary. Most crucially, a cease-fire has to be agreed to before peacekeepers arrive. Without this, countries are likely to be unwilling to send their personnel lest they get trapped in a quagmire. Additionally, a clear demarcation of the front line needs to be made before their arrival. A withdrawal by both sides from the front will also reduce the risk of accidental clashes.

Not all countries will be able to contribute in the same way, but there remains a wide scope for participation. Chile, for example, has offered to assist with demining. The Latin American country’s experience in removing thousands of mines along its borders that were planted during the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship when Chile faced border disputes with its three neighbors makes its a particularly suitable participant.

Meanwhile, some European countries may be able to play a role. A select few, such as Hungary and Slovakia, may even be welcomed given their stance on the Russia-Ukraine conflict. More likely, however, is that the EU can help finance a peacekeeping force. This would make Europe a meaningful stakeholder with skin in the game and help reassure the global south of the broad support for its efforts.

Rather than rushing eastward, the EU should embrace this as an opportunity to create space between its troops and Russia’s. Whether it is the Demilitarized Zone in the Korean Peninsula today or the inner-German border during the Cold War, large-scale stationing of soldiers within firing range of rivals and potential future enemies produces the very tension that their presence is meant to counteract.

Rather than trying to monopolize the structures of international security, Europe would be better off embracing the global south as an integral part of the solution to stabilizing its own backyard.

Foreign Policy · by Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom

11. Army enlisted leader sees ‘transformation’ at work in brigade visit

Perhaps DOGE should enlist some of our soldiers. They could provide both innovative thinking as well as a reality check for their work in terms of effects on servicemembers. How many members of the DOGE team have real world military experience (not at the upper levels but at ground (or sea) levels). Just spitballing here but perhaps the senior NCOs of each service should provide a handful of junior enlisted personnel to join the DOGE team as it does its work in the Pentagon.

Excerpts:

So, it’s not all about new gear. Soldiers are still working with legacy systems, Weimer said. But they’re finding new ways to use that old gear.

The sergeant major described what he’s seen among troops as having a “[Transformation in Contact] mindset.” Some of that translated into soldiers working through legacy network problems with new tools and combining approaches where it made sense.

“Soldiers are being soldiers,” Weimer said. “They’re figuring it out.”

Army enlisted leader sees ‘transformation’ at work in brigade visit

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-army/2025/02/12/army-enlisted-leader-sees-transformation-at-work-in-brigade-visit/?utm

By Todd South

Feb 12, 2025, 02:00 PM

Sgt. Maj. of the Army Michael Weimer visits the 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, during Combined Resolve 25-1 at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center in Hohenfels, Germany. (Spc. Adrian Greenwood/U.S. Army)

War is fog.

War is mud.

War is finding high ground.

And for the Army, war is terrain. One of three select brigades is learning that during training in real time, not far away from real fighting in Ukraine.

Soldiers with the 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division, have spent the past month in Europe spread out between Poland and Germany, where they’ve faced freezing conditions, fog too thick to drive through, rain, snow, mud and all the accompanying challenges such a climate brings.

Based out of Fort Johnson, Louisiana, the 3rd Brigade is one of three Transformation in Contact brigades, an Army-wide effort to test on-the-ground equipment and structural changes, such as new reconnaissance and strike companies. The 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and the 2nd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, out of Hawaii, are also Transformation in Contact brigades.

Army wants robots, sensors to make infantry platoons 10 times betterThe future platoon will have a vast number of technogical advtanttages at its fingertips.

By Todd South

During this rotation, the 3rd Brigade also got attacked by Sergeant Major of the Army Michael Weimer.

But it was only pretend.

Weimer visited soldiers, donning his field gear for a few days to march and train alongside the troops on both sides of the training scenario.

“We saw snow, sleet, fog that was so thick we had to walk in front of the vehicles at night,” Weimer told Army Times in a Jan. 31 interview. “It’s like it’s own little weather ecosystem. And I think that’s important context because that’s very different than the 2nd of 25th ID’s rotation and very different from the 2nd of the 101st down at [Joint Readiness Training Center], they see totally different terrain, totally different weather.”

The former Delta Force operator spent some time with the opposition forces, probing the 3rd Brigade’s defenses, where he saw soldier ingenuity on display.

A key component of the Transformation in Contact initiative is giving brigades new and tailored equipment, such as infantry squad vehicles, more compact communications gear, and more advanced drones, among a slew of other tech tools.

Weimer said he was impressed with the squad vehicle mobility that soldiers were able to use, even in the tough terrain.

Alongside the squad vehicle, Weimer said soldiers were using the squad multipurpose equipment transport, or SMET, a kind of robotic mule, to cut obstacle emplacement time by nearly half the time it typically takes.

The SMET can also operate in silent mode, charging devices without being detected in the field, he added.

Those small but meaningful advances — cutting down time and reducing the number of soldiers to accomplish a task — have all been key in how small units and their noncommissioned officers are finding ways to solve tough problems in the field.

However, there are still challenges.

During the 3rd Brigade’s rotation in Europe, freezing weather was eating up drone batteries. Soldiers were sleeping with batteries, using hand warmers and emergency blankets to keep batteries warm and sustain their charge, Weimer said.

So, it’s not all about new gear. Soldiers are still working with legacy systems, Weimer said. But they’re finding new ways to use that old gear.

The sergeant major described what he’s seen among troops as having a “[Transformation in Contact] mindset.” Some of that translated into soldiers working through legacy network problems with new tools and combining approaches where it made sense.

“Soldiers are being soldiers,” Weimer said. “They’re figuring it out.”

About Todd South

Todd South has written about crime, courts, government and the military for multiple publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written project on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq War.

12. Plans to Buy ‘Armored Teslas’ Vanish From Procurement List

I was going to point out another one of the breathless news reports about State requesting armored Teslas. (Note also they have requests for armored BMWs) Will this be in the news spin cycle for the next day or so? Both Bloomberg here and the NY Times are reporting this. Or is the removal of the request because of the reporting of the Fourth Estate influenced State to do so? But what if the armoured Teslas actually make the best tactical sense for the mission? Are they dropping the requirement/request just because of the linkage to Mr. Musk and his work? Is it just bad optics?

Say what you want about DOGE, it is driving greater transparency in everything. Perhaps a DOGE and Fourth Estate partnership would bring the ultimate level of transparency within the federal bureaucracy. Imagine them working together to report the facts accurately?

But this too bad because this contract could have shored up Tesla's declining sales.

Elon Musk’s Shaky Public Perception Poses Tesla Sales Obstacle, Analyst Says

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/us/is-teslas-stock-declining-due-to-elon-musks-support-for-donald-trump-heres-what-analysts-say/articleshow/118125202.cms?from=mdr

Plans to Buy ‘Armored Teslas’ Vanish From Procurement List

Musk’s DOGE unit is remaking the federal bureaucracy
The billionaire has promised to act with transparency
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-13/plans-to-buy-armored-teslas-disappear-from-us-procurement-list?cmpid=021325_morningamer&utm

Sensitivity around potential conflicts of interest with Musk’s overlapping empire of six companies is likely to continue.Photographer: Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg

By Dana Hull

February 12, 2025 at 11:13 PM EST

Updated on February 13, 2025 at 1:58 AM EST

The State Department’s procurement forecast removed the mention of Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc. in relation to a planned $400 million armored EV purchase after reports emerged about it on Wednesday.

The December version of the document had included an “Armored Tesla” budget item that would span five years and start in 2025, however the document was revised to remove Tesla’s name. This followed reports of the company’s moniker on the procurement document from Drop Site News and the New York Times.

Musk’s unprecedented role in US President Donald Trump’s administration, as overseer of government spending, has raised recurring questions about how he might police himself when one of his companies competes for official contracts. He has argued that all activities by his Department of Government Efficiency would be handled with transparency.

Tesla’s name had appeared in the document near that of BMW AG, whose armored X5 and X7 SUVs the State Department is also planning to buy. The German company’s name remains on the list, while Tesla’s has been excised, leaving the $400 million contract — still at the planning stage — now listed for a generic designation of “armored electric vehicles.”

Representatives for the State Department, Tesla and Musk didn’t respond to requests for comment after regular business hours.

Musk posted on social media platform X that he was “pretty sure” Tesla isn’t getting $400 million.

Sensitivity around potential conflicts of interest with Musk’s overlapping empire of six companies is likely to continue. His SpaceX, which launches rockets for the US military and ferries astronauts to and from the International Space Station for NASA, has already been awarded billions of dollars in contracts.

A large government order, in this case most likely for Tesla’s Cybertruck, would be a significant boost. The Cybertruck is built at Tesla’s factory in Austin, Texas and costs $79,990 before any tax incentives. Musk is a huge fan of military history and spoke at the US Military Academy at West Point, New York in August. Though some people imagine that the Cybertruck might one day roam the surface of Mars, Musk has regularly hinted at its military applications.

“I just wanted to make a futuristic battle tank, something that looked like it came out of Blade Runner or Aliens or something like that,” Musk said in an Automotive News podcast in 2020.

(Updates with Musk post.)

13. Wittman 'Positive' U.S. Can Maintain Power Balance Between China, Russia

Excerpts:

The Chinese, however, “are the malevolent force out there.” In his view, Beijing has emerged as a “transactional coercionist” that “will lie, cheat and steal” to surpass the United States.

...

Wittman acknowledged China’s dominance in shipbuilding, delivering “231 ships to our one,” and the rapid expansion of its nuclear arsenal.

He added, unlike Beijing, Moscow, Pyongyang and Tehran, “we are not transactional in what we do” and with our allies in terms of mutual security. “The forces of good will have to stand up to the forces of evil” to avoid repeating the mistakes of 1938 in not challenging Nazi Germany in Central Europe, Imperial Japan in Asia and Italy in Africa.

To keep the balance between great powers, Congress needs to be “the forcing mechanism” that drives the change in the Pentagon’s acquisition approach “from the Ford Motor Company of the 1950s to the Apple of 2025.”

Wittman 'Positive' U.S. Can Maintain Power Balance Between China, Russia - USNI News

news.usni.org · by John Grady · February 12, 2025

Congressman Rob Wittman, Vice Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, addresses the audience during AUSA 2024 on Oct. 14, 2024. US Army Photo

A senior House Republican is optimistic the U.S. can maintain a power balance between itself, China and Russia through defense technology development that can prevent future war.

“I want to be positive about this,” Congressman Rob Wittman (R-Va.), the vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said Tuesday, at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The Chinese, however, “are the malevolent force out there.” In his view, Beijing has emerged as a “transactional coercionist” that “will lie, cheat and steal” to surpass the United States.

Wittman believes, however, that “we still lead in AI [artificial intelligence].” He said China may have taken shortcuts in how it developed the AI model DeepSeek. In the long run, these shortcuts in annotating data create trust issues in the validity of AI.

“We still have an advantage under the sea,” as well as in stealth and space-based capabilities, he added.

Wittman acknowledged China’s dominance in shipbuilding, delivering “231 ships to our one,” and the rapid expansion of its nuclear arsenal.

He added, unlike Beijing, Moscow, Pyongyang and Tehran, “we are not transactional in what we do” and with our allies in terms of mutual security. “The forces of good will have to stand up to the forces of evil” to avoid repeating the mistakes of 1938 in not challenging Nazi Germany in Central Europe, Imperial Japan in Asia and Italy in Africa.

To keep the balance between great powers, Congress needs to be “the forcing mechanism” that drives the change in the Pentagon’s acquisition approach “from the Ford Motor Company of the 1950s to the Apple of 2025.”

Wittman said Congress did this in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, insisting the Defense Department purchase up-armored vehicles to protect service members from roadside bombs and other explosives.

That necessary change requires a shift in DoD thinking from hardware requirements that can take decades to deliver, such as the F-35 Lightning II, to understanding software and how it applies and can change quickly to meet new conditions. Wittman’s example was the Defense Innovation Unit’s success.

He called for performance-related criteria in the defense authorization bill and wants an expanded role in defense spending decisions of the combatant commanders to counter “morphing threats.”

The Pentagon needs to “understand the places where we lag behind” instead of “looking in the rearview mirror” to see where competitors are.

Areas Wittman mentioned included space, autonomy and attritable platforms being built in the thousands not hundreds and delivered forward “at the speed of relevance.”

In addition, the defense industrial base has “to do a better job of sustainability” as the war in Ukraine is showing. The effect on logistics in 21st-century conflict makes clear “we never, ever will operate in an uncontested environment.”

“I think we have to get back into the mining business” to ensure access to the rare earth minerals, graphite and other materials needed to build new technology. Mining has been a priority of China’s Belt and Road Initiative – gaining control of these resources for its use, often dumping them on the market at below-cost prices and denying them to competitors like the United States.

“You also have to build manufacturing capacity here,” Wittman said. He mentioned the Australia-United Kingdom-United Kingdom (AUKUS) security agreement as an example of how Washington’s relations with its allies differ from those between Russia and China. In noting Pillar II in the AUKUS agreement, he said that it assists the three nations in sharing advanced technologies to their mutual benefit.

Australia has just invested $500 million in the United States’ submarine industrial base. A Pentagon readout of the meeting between Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles on Monday noted Hegseth termed the investment “as a key element of advancing defense industrial collaboration between the two countries and strengthening the bilateral alliance.”

news.usni.org · by John Grady · February 12, 2025

14. Ukraine’s Daunting Choice: Trading Its Land and People for Future Security

Is this a Hobbesian choice?

Graphics at the link https://warontherocks.com/2025/02/ukraines-daunting-choice-trading-its-land-and-people-for-future-security/?utm.

Excerpts:

Certainly other key issues will be involved in peace talks, such as NATO membership and other security guarantees, repatriation of civilians and prisoners of war, and reparations. Although in November 2022 the U.N. General Assembly voted to hold Russia responsible for paying reparations to Ukraine for war damage, requiring Moscow to actually pay from its assets abroad for the reconstruction of Ukraine’s economy will be very difficult over the near term and is likely a non-starter. In this light the compelling need for massive international financial assistance and more investment is obvious, with both dependent on an end to the fighting.

To be clear, in our view seeking a negotiated settlement in no way minimizes the heroic actions of Ukraine’s military, its stoic civilian population, the well-documented and horrific war crimes committed by the Russian armed forces, the extensive damage done to social infrastructure, and the displacement of millions of its citizens. As we have argued, despite Russia’s longstanding refusal to honor their mutual borders, Ukraine’s undoubted international legal right to retain its territorial sovereignty antebellum is indisputable. But planning and executing economic development projects in the most favorably situated areas with a view to maximizing and securing future growth will, over the longer term, be Ukraine’s ultimate weapon in achieving its rightful place as a free and democratic country aligning ever more closely with Europe and being capable of defending itself against future Russian aggression.

Ukraine’s Daunting Choice: Trading Its Land and People for Future Security - War on the Rocks

Ralph Clem, Erik Herron, Timothy Hoheneder, and Khrystyna Pelchar

warontherocks.com · by Ralph Clem · February 13, 2025

Wars are almost always about land. Ukraine’s determined and heroic defense of its sovereign territory against horrific Russian aggression attests to that fact. As we noted in an earlier article in War on the Rocks, restoring Ukraine’s economy is the most crucial element in ensuring the country’s very existence as a viable and secure state going forward. Therefore, it is vital to understand how Ukraine’s economic landscape has been and will be changed as a result of the war, and what this portends for societal well-being, enhanced growth, and national security in the years ahead.

Meanwhile, opinions amongst the commentariat regarding the prospects for peace negotiations to end the conflict implicitly validate or ignore altogether Moscow’s seizure of large parts of Ukraine. But ceding sovereign territory to Russia will be the thorniest issue in any attempt to end the fighting. To this point, even though the number of Ukrainians willing to make negotiated territorial concessions has increased as the war continues, a recent Gallup survey showed that still only about a quarter of those polled were willing to do so.

The situation on the battlefield, where Ukrainian forces are hard pressed to defend their positions, increases the likelihood that Ukraine will not be able to reclaim all of its territory now occupied by Russian troops over the near term. That Ukrainian forces, in a dramatic and unforeseen offensive into Russia’s Kursk region, seized and are still holding a small salient there provided a morale boost but will be a very small counterpoint to the vastly larger Russian occupied areas in Ukraine. With President Donald Trump again in office, changes in the position of the United States in terms of its support for Ukraine are possible, and the pressure on the Ukrainian leadership to accede to demands that it surrender land to the Russians will be intensified. Trump’s recent statement about urging Russian President Vladimir Putin into negotiations to end the war and his directive to his special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Keith Kellogg, to do the same again gloss over the territorial challenges. If this position does in fact hold, there are two crucial questions that should be posed now: Exactly what areas are we talking about, and what does any such relinquishment of territory mean for Ukraine’s security going forward? Unless the economic facts on the ground are taken fully into account, the outcome of peace talks could render Ukraine a much weaker state and support Putin’s geopolitical agenda.

Become a Member

This Land Is Our Land

By our estimate, Russia currently controls around 17.3 percent of Ukrainian territory. To put this in perspective, if that same figure was applied to the United States, this would be roughly equivalent proportionately to the combined areas of Texas, California, and Colorado. But Putin has made clear that he seeks vast areas in Ukraine beyond the current front lines. Although his stated views regarding Ukraine’s sovereignty have been as extreme as denying the country’s right to exist, Putin now lays claim to all of four regions in southern and eastern Ukraine (Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson oblasts) in addition to Crimea. Indeed, in recent extensive remarks on the possibility of resolving the conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made it absolutely clear that Russia requires the Ukrainians to surrender “Crimea, Donbass, and Novorossiya,” which not coincidentally includes these four oblasts. In a widely condemned “referendum” in the occupied territory in 2022 and again in the Russian presidential election in 2024, Ukrainians in these areas were heavily coerced into voting in favor of accession to Russia and for Putin. This all occurred despite the fact that in these oblasts the Ukrainians continue to stubbornly hold their ground and still control some of the most populated and economically significant parts.

Ukraine internal political units, including the cities of Kyiv and Sevastopol, and position of the frontline as of January 1, 2025 (Map by Timothy Hoheneder)

It’s The Economy That Will Matter Most

Without question, the war has severely degraded Ukraine’s industrial capacity and supporting infrastructure. The latest estimates available from the World Bank’s Rapid Damage and Needs Assessment (RDNA3) showed that as of December 2023 the total damage was $486 billion, a figure that has certainly grown significantly since. Unfortunately for Ukraine, data on Russian attacks from the Violent Incident Information from News Articles project show that four of the most economically important regions at the outbreak of the 2022 war (Kyiv city and Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, and Kyiv oblasts) have been among the most heavily attacked by Russian ground, air, and naval forces owing to their proximity to Russian territory, from where the assaults have been launched.

Attacks by region of Ukraine through 31 December 2024 using data from the Violent Incident Information from News Articles (VIINA) Project (Map by Timothy Hoheneder)

If there is a bright spot for Ukraine amidst this tragedy it is that the country’s economy has proven more resilient than one would think given the dreadful circumstances. After suffering a 30 percent decline in 2022, the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development estimate that the Ukrainian economy will actually grow in the low single digits in 2024 and 2025, despite the devastation wrought upon the country’s electrical power grid and supply lines. Of particular note in this regard is the vitality shown in small and medium enterprises, the expansion of which has been especially remarkable and bodes well for the future.

Our current research suggests that significant shifts in the spatial distribution of the Ukrainian economy towards central and western regions of the country, which was already underway before 2022, is a key element in the sustainment and even, in some cases, growth of production and provision of services nationally. Data on the regional distribution of small businesses, licenses granted to individual entrepreneurs, and the issuance of new mortgage loans all show pronounced growth in these areas. Foreign direct investment likewise has been directed towards regions further removed from the war zone in the western and central regions and thus more difficult for the Russians to strike with drones and aircraft guided bombs. For obvious reasons, the location of such investments in Ukraine’s national defense sector, such as the German firm Rheinmetall’s new plants, is not specified, but presumably they are deep in the interior.

It is clear that serious obstacles remain in restoring Ukraine’s economy despite ongoing efforts to rebalance some sectors away from the immediate conflict zone. Russian attacks on and seizure of key industrial plants and resource extraction sites that are place-bound are especially problematic. The closure of the coking coal mine at Pokrovsk and threats against the large lithium mine at Shevchenko, both in the Donetsk region, have negative effects on industries elsewhere in the country that depend on those inputs and on exports of the products thereof. Exports, which were growing significantly prior to the war and reorienting away from Russia and towards the European Union, have suffered major declines since March 2022. But regions in the central and western parts of the country have increased their share of national exports, another indication that the economy is moving westward.

Now Comes the Hard Part

Certainly other key issues will be involved in peace talks, such as NATO membership and other security guarantees, repatriation of civilians and prisoners of war, and reparations. Although in November 2022 the U.N. General Assembly voted to hold Russia responsible for paying reparations to Ukraine for war damage, requiring Moscow to actually pay from its assets abroad for the reconstruction of Ukraine’s economy will be very difficult over the near term and is likely a non-starter. In this light the compelling need for massive international financial assistance and more investment is obvious, with both dependent on an end to the fighting.

To be clear, in our view seeking a negotiated settlement in no way minimizes the heroic actions of Ukraine’s military, its stoic civilian population, the well-documented and horrific war crimes committed by the Russian armed forces, the extensive damage done to social infrastructure, and the displacement of millions of its citizens. As we have argued, despite Russia’s longstanding refusal to honor their mutual borders, Ukraine’s undoubted international legal right to retain its territorial sovereignty antebellum is indisputable. But planning and executing economic development projects in the most favorably situated areas with a view to maximizing and securing future growth will, over the longer term, be Ukraine’s ultimate weapon in achieving its rightful place as a free and democratic country aligning ever more closely with Europe and being capable of defending itself against future Russian aggression.

Become a Member

Ralph Clem is emeritus professor of geography and senior fellow in the Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs at Florida International University.

Erik Herron is the Eberly Family distinguished professor of political science at West Virginia University.

Timothy Hoheneder is a doctoral student in earth sciences at the University of New Hampshire.

Khrystyna Pelchar is a doctoral student in political science and history at West Virginia University.

Image: Yan Boechat via Wikimedia Commons.

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Ralph Clem · February 13, 2025

15. Europe gasping for air as Trump makes his Ukraine move

Europe gasping for air as Trump makes his Ukraine move - Asia Times

Hegseth: No NATO membership for Ukraine, no US troops, forget returning to pre-2014 borders, no more US-supplied weapons

asiatimes.com · by Stephen Bryen · February 12, 2025

European leaders who have been strongly supporting keeping the Ukraine war going have been dealt a serious blow by President Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Most of them must be in shock, gasping for breath.

Let’s start with Hegseth. He made the following declarations:

1. Ukraine’s membership in NATO is off the table. Ukraine won’t be invited to join NATO.

2. The US will not send any troops to Ukraine for any reason, including peacekeeping.

3. The US will no longer supply or pay for weapons and support for Ukraine. It will be up to the European NATO members to provide support to Ukraine.

4. While the US supports NATO, American participation has to be fair and equitable, meaning that NATO members will have to significantly increase their contributions.

5. Ukraine will not be able to go back to the borders it had before 2014, meaning that the US expects important territorial concessions from Ukraine.

President Trump, meanwhile, held an hour-and-a-half phone meeting with Russian President Putin. The key takeaway is that Putin said he is willing to start negotiations with the United States on Ukraine and other security issues.

The Trump-Putin conversation covered many topics, for example: security issues, energy, artificial intelligence and “the power of the dollar.”

Following the call, Trump apparently placed a call “to inform” Ukrainian President Zelensky of his conversation with Putin. He also immediately set up his negotiating team. He designated Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz and Ambassador and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff to lead the negotiations.

Significantly, the list of participants did not include retired Lieutenant General Keith Kellogg. Kellogg had been openly flogging the idea of significantly increasing sanctions on Russia as a way to get concessions on Ukraine. As he put it, on a scale of one to 10, current sanctions on Russia are only a three. He proposed raising them far higher (assuming this could be done).

These comments directly undermined Trump’s approach to Putin and Russia, and appear to have been Kellogg’s idea (among others) to make sure the Ukraine war continued. Whether Kellogg will again appear as a player in Ukraine remains to be seen.

It will take time for Europe’s pro-war leaders, along with the EU, to contemplate the future, now that the rug has pretty well been pulled out from under their feet.

The Europeans have neither the weapons, the troops nor the money to keep the war going in Ukraine. Nor will they get much support for continuing the war if the United States won’t play in the game. In fact, should Europe want to continue on its own, without the United States, it would risk the future of the NATO alliance.

Many of the leaders in Europe are in trouble domestically. Germany, France, Poland – and even Romania, where Presidential elections were canceled to prevent the leading opposition candidate from being elected – are examples of the growing instability in the European leadership class.

Revelations about US and EU interference in the electoral process in Georgia, Serbia and Slovakia, perhaps also Moldova, emphasize the squalid nature of current-day politics in Europe.

The Trump administration is liquidating USAID, which has been acting as a sort of CIA-front in many of the above countries, including Ukraine. With that source of money and support cut off, the EU is being handed a serious problem that goes well beyond finance. The phony argument that the EU (and, with it, NATO) is upholding democracy is now exposed. The loss of legitimacy is a real threat to the ruling elites.

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Trump has an important geopolitical perspective. It runs something like this: European security is important but it is not really threatened by Russia. The US faces a resurgent China that has a (largely Western-supplied) very modern industrial base, a massive workforce and an increasingly well-equipped and powerful military.

From Trump’s point of view, he needs a more friendly Russia that can help balance global power relationships. To get there he needs to find ways to redefine the US-Russia relationship, which is in deep disarray and infused with mutual hostility. In his 90-minute conversation with Putin, Trump was poking at economic and technology capabilities that could, in future, provide a basis for improving relations.

No one can say right now whether a deal can be found for Ukraine, but there is reason to be more optimistic that the two sides can work something out.

We will need to see if the Europeans push back and try to sabotage a deal on Ukraine. The reality is that Europe has little it can do if Putin and Trump agree on a deal.

Stephen Bryen is a special correspondent to Asia Times and former US deputy undersecretary of defense for policy. This article, which originally appeared on his Substack newsletter Weapons and Strategy, is republished with permission.

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asiatimes.com · by Stephen Bryen · February 12, 2025

16. T-Mobile’s Game-Changing Collaboration with Starlink has begun Nationwide Testing of Satellite-Based Connectivity

As I watched the Super Bowl I saw the commercial advertising this capability and I immediately thought that we could use this. The question is can we get Starlink and T-Mobile to develop the capability and provide connectivity over north Korea to connect to the 8 million smartphones inside the north?

And on a broader scale this could have global communications implications for communications in denied areas (under the rule of authoritarian regimes)

https://www.techi.com/t-mobile-starlink-satellite-mobile-connectivity-testing/

T-Mobile’s Game-Changing Collaboration with Starlink has begun Nationwide Testing of Satellite-Based Connectivity

For several years, mobile dead zones were an unavoidable source of annoyance, whether it was on the hike in the mountains, a drive on those long rural highways or standing alone in one of the most peculiar corners of a house where calls mysteriously drop. Thanks to T-Mobile and SpaceX’s Starlink, the two companies have now officially launched widespread testing of their satellite-to-cell service that aims to push mobile access to even the remotest locations. If you text “HELP” from a remote island and no one replies, at least you’ll know it’s personal.

Game-Changer and edge in the Wireless Market:

T-Mobile, last Sunday launched a beta trial of the satellite service to allow such customers to send text messages via satellite. The company will make the service available for free to beta testers until July, after which it will be a standard offering in T-Mobile’s premium plan, Go5G Next, with no additional charges. Other T-Mobile customers can opt into the service for an additional $15 per month after the launch this summer.

Company estimates that about 500,000 square miles of the U.S, previously unreachable by traditional cell towers, will stay connected. Text messages are the first step, voice and data capabilities are expected to follow, hence eventually keeping the uninterrupted mobile coverage alive. Its market partner has given T-Mobile a competitive edge in relation to its competition.

This aspect also connects T-Mobile to other smartphone manufacturers such as Apple and Google to integrate the satellite connection capability into the operating systems. As Mike Katz, T-Mobile’s president of marketing, strategy and products, said, “T-Mobile has been working closely with Apple and Google to ensure that this experience is integrated directly into their OS (operating system), and this will be the default satellite system across both of those phones”.

He emphasized on the service’s performance on nearly all smartphones of the last four years, indicating no need for new devices or specialized hardware. Katz said, “This is something that nobody else in the U.S. has done, and one of the big distinctive things this network has is that it works across almost all smartphones from the last four years”.

T-Mobile has also opened its satellite service to rival customers, specifically those from AT&T and Verizon, without the requirement of switching networks. Katz said, “Customers who sign up for the trial will get a 33% discount when the service is commercially launched”. It seems that this could mark a paradigm shift in the way telecom companies will require cross-network cooperation on improvements in infrastructure.

Future of Satellite-Enabled Mobile Networks:

Satellite technology is the next frontier that mobile networks compete for as they strive to achieve universal connectivity. While T-Mobile and Starlink are taking the lead, the vision of customers of the extinction of “no service” zones will be a reality in the future. The trial invitation gives customers a glimpse of the future when portable companies will no longer be limited to cell towers but would attain a vast reach of a limitless space.

Disclosure: Some of the links in this article are affiliate links and we may earn a small commission if you make a purchase, which helps us to keep delivering quality content to you. Here is our disclosure policy.

Fatimah Misbah Hussain

https://www.techi.com/

Fatimah Misbah Hussain is a tech writer at TECHi.com who transforms complex topics into accessible, compelling content for a global audience. She covers emerging trends, offers insightful updates, and explores technology’s evolving impact on society with clarity and depth.

17. Taiwan Prepares for Trump’s Tariffs, and a Changed Washington

Taiwan Prepares for Trump’s Tariffs, and a Changed Washington

Taiwanese officials, facing a more transactional U.S. relationship, have traveled to Washington to float energy deals and defend the island’s semiconductors.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/13/world/asia/taiwan-tariffs-trump.html

President Lai Ching-te of Taiwan visiting a military base in Taitung in January. The Trump administration has urged Taiwan to spend more on its military.Credit...Ritchie B Tongo/EPA, via Shutterstock

By Chris Buckley and Catie Edmondson

Chris Buckley, reporting from Taipei, and Catie Edmondson, reporting from Washington, interviewed more than a dozen current and former American and Taiwanese officials and lawmakers for this story.

Feb. 13, 2025,

3:12 a.m. ET

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Not so long ago, Taiwan basked in seemingly boundless, bipartisan support in Washington, where the island has long been regarded as a valiant democratic partner against China.

Now, a few weeks into President Donald J. Trump’s second term, Taiwan is adjusting to a shift in its relationship with the United States, its primary backer — one that does not focus on shared democratic ideals, and that is more uncertain and transactional. Mr. Trump has accused Taiwan of spending far too little on its own security and of gaining an unfair dominance in making semiconductors.

Taiwanese officials and businesspeople have been trying to assure the new administration of their commitment to cooperation. They have traveled to Washington for meetings, bearing charts detailing their military outlays, and attended inauguration events filled with the MAGA faithful. They have floated new deals that Taiwanese companies could broker with American businesses in gas and other fields, and tried to explain the value of Taiwan’s semiconductor manufacturing to American interests.

Underlying their efforts is an anxiety over what Mr. Trump may do, for instance, to press Taiwanese companies to move advanced semiconductor production to the United States. Mr. Trump has said he might soon impose tariffs on semiconductors. Taiwanese officials have been preparing to help Taiwanese businesses soften the blow of any such move.

Image

A Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company building in Tainan. TSMC is the world’s most advanced chipmaker.Credit...Lam Yik Fei for The New York Times

“I think Taiwan just convinced itself that they had good relations with the U.S. and they had lots of friends in Congress, and they would be able to weather the storm,” said Bonnie S. Glaser, the managing director of German Marshall Fund’s Indo-Pacific program, who often speaks with Taiwanese politicians. “When Trump made those comments, I think it was a wake up call for people in Taiwan that they really didn’t know what was coming next.”

Governments around the world are trying to adjust to Mr. Trump’s combative approach. But the stakes for Taipei are especially high. The island depends on the United States for nearly all its major weapons. It sends nearly a quarter of its exports directly to the United States, and Washington is crucial in giving Taiwan political support against Beijing, which claims that Taiwan is its territory and must accept unification — by force, if deemed necessary.

Taiwanese officials and policy advisers said the island would quickly roll out measures to help its businesses hurt by any new U.S. tariffs. They spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive and provisional nature of the plans, and declined to give details. Some officials have publicly hinted at the preparations. “We’re preparing for a range of scenarios,” the minister of economic affairs, Kuo Jyh-Huei, told reporters when asked about Mr. Trump’s threatened tariffs. “If we showed our hand now, that would not work to the benefit of everyone.”

Even if Mr. Trump holds off on the tariffs, Taiwan faces more pressure from his administration on other issues. They include the island’s big trade surplus with the United States, which climbed to a record $74 billion last year according to U.S. data, and its military spending and preparations, which many in Washington see as lacking, even though billions of dollars worth of orders of American military equipment are stuck in a backlog. The United States is committed by law to help Taiwan defend itself, and leaves open the possibility of intervening militarily if China tried to conquer the island.

Image

Alexander Yui, Taiwan’s de facto ambassador to the United States, on Capitol Hill last year.Credit...Mandel Ngan/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

“There’s a basic mismatch. We’ve been thinking that America and Taiwan are in a strong partnership, but America under Trump thinks Taiwan doesn’t do enough,” said Jason Hsu, a former Taiwanese lawmaker and technology investor who is now a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. “Sooner or later, the Taiwan government will need to show up in town with a package ready to offer Trump.”

Trump Administration: Live Updates

Updated Feb. 13, 2025, 5:04 a.m. ET1 hour ago

Publicly, the Taiwanese government is projecting calm confidence about relations with Washington. But Taiwanese officials’ efforts to build bridges into Mr. Trump’s inner circle during trips to Washington last month and in December, have yielded little so far, said three American officials familiar with their attempts, who described the interactions as limited.

Taiwan sent two economic officials to Washington this week to “better explain ourselves to Mr. Trump’s circle,” Mr. Kuo, the economic affairs minister, told reporters before their departure. Taiwan also hopes to buy more liquefied natural gas from Alaska, he has said.

“Taiwan is preparing some presents for Trump,” said Jeremy Chih-Cheng Chang, the chief executive officer of the Research Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology in Taipei. “They have already indicated some, as you have seen in news reports — like buying liquefied natural gas — but there are sure to be others.”

In January, executives from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company — TSMC, the world’s most advanced chip maker — held talks with Mr. Trump’s nominee for commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, said several people familiar with the talks who spoke on condition of anonymity.

In December, Taiwanese officials visiting Washington showed officials and Republican politicians a presentation designed to demonstrate that Taiwan has been rapidly increasing military preparations, according to people familiar with those discussions. They met with Michael Waltz, then a Florida congressman known for being hawkish on matters of national security, according to one of the people.

Taiwanese officials remain hopeful that they will find robust supporters in two men who were deeply critical of China in Congress: Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, and Mr. Waltz, now Mr. Trump’s national security adviser. But some former officials who strongly supported Taiwan in Mr. Trump’s first term have not been brought into his new administration, including Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state.

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President Trump with Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the Oval Office on Tuesday.Credit...Eric Lee/The New York Times

“It’s very telling that some hard-line hawks on Taiwan have been left out," said Christopher K. Johnson, the president of China Strategies Group, a consulting firm, and a former U.S. government intelligence officer. “It looks like Taiwan bet on some of the wrong horses.”

Half a dozen or so officials poised to take senior positions in the Pentagon have rejected the G.O.P.’s tradition of backing an expansive foreign reach, in favor of limiting U.S. military commitments abroad. They represent an ascendant foreign policy doctrine in a party that in recent years has chafed at committing more military support to Ukraine, and pushed NATO allies to spend more on their militaries.

In an opinion essay published last May, Mr. Trump’s nominee to serve as the Pentagon’s under secretary of defense for policy, Elbridge Colby, warned that Taiwan should not assume that it was indispensable to the United States. “America has a strong interest in defending Taiwan, but Americans could survive without it,” he wrote. He and other Pentagon officials have suggested that Taiwan should increase its military spending to at least 5 percent of its economic output, or about twice what it currently is spending.

The Taiwanese government has said it is committed to expanded military spending, though many Taiwanese experts and officials, privately, question the 5 percent target. President Lai Ching-te of Taiwan also faces a legislature controlled by opposition lawmakers who have accused his government of wasteful spending and reined in parts of this year’s defense budget.

At the same time, Taiwan has its own frustrations with the United States, including the big backlog of undelivered orders of arms and military equipment to the island.

“I do sense a soreness of being told to spend more when they haven’t received what they’ve already paid for,” said Steve Yates, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, referring to Taiwan. “The U.S. has to fix its defense manufacturing supply chain before it can reasonably put pressure on others to do and buy more.”

Ana Swanson in Washington and Amy Chang Chien in Taipei contributed reporting.

Chris Buckley, the chief China correspondent for The Times, reports on China and Taiwan from Taipei, focused on politics, social change and security and military issues. More about Chris Buckley

Catie Edmondson covers Congress for The Times. More about Catie Edmondson

18. The silver linings in Trump's trade war storm clouds

Excerpts:

The ripple effects of the US tariff row extend well beyond the directly involved countries, with significant implications for global trade networks. For the UK, already coping with the aftermath of Brexit, this new environment offers both challenges and opportunities.

With US-led protectionism disrupting traditional trade channels, the UK could seize the opportunity to diversify its export markets by forging stronger ties with the EU and digging deeper into its Commonwealth alliances.

It could reinforce its position as a hub for international commerce while continuing to cultivate its relationship with the US. Managing Trump is a delicate balancing act for prime minister Keir Starmer, as both are expected to be in office for four years.

A word of caution – negotiating international trade agreements is a complex and lengthy process. This is the hard lesson learned by the UK. Its trade with the EU (its most important commercial partner) shrank after Brexit, driving the quest for new trading partners and agreements. But these fruits are slow to materialize.

The UK formally requested accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) in February 2021, but only signed the accession protocol in July 2023.

And we should not forget that in 2024 the UK halted its trade talks with Canada after two years of negotiations due to disagreements over the standards on some agricultural products.

Tariffs come with challenges, but they might also be the beginning of a slow and painful change toward a more balanced and robust global economic order.

The silver linings in Trump's trade war storm clouds - Asia Times

Trump disruption encourages realigned trade relationships and formation of new economic blocs excluding the US

asiatimes.com · by Scott Mahadeo, Gabriella Legrenzi, Reinhold Heinlein · February 13, 2025

US tariffs – both threatened and imposed – on trade partners including China, Canada, Mexico and the EU quickly set off waves of retaliatory measures. The latest commodities in the sights of President Donald Trump are steel and aluminum – with tariffs of 25% announced for all imports.

But not only do these taxes disrupt well-established trade flows, they ignite concerns over the very future of globalization.

Yet amid this uncertainty, it’s possible that there may be a silver lining. Trump may inadvertently be paving the way for a realignment of trade relationships and the emergence of new economic blocs. Such partnerships could foster more resilient and regionally focused economic cooperation.

Trump’s decision to levy tariffs on its major trading partners disrupts the fundamental tenets of the gravity model of trade. According to this theory, trade between two nations is largely determined by their economic size and proximity.

For instance, introducing tariffs to the close economic relationship between the US and Canada, underpinned by their shared border, effectively increases the distance between the two by raising costs and reducing the volume of bilateral trade.

However, these disruptions can inadvertently encourage the diversification of trade relationships. As companies and governments seek to mitigate the risks associated with tariffs, they may begin to explore new markets and alternative supply chains. This could ultimately lead to a more dispersed and – potentially – more stable global trade system.

Yet as Trump continues to test the limits of his power, he is learning it is not so easy to defy gravity. Already, the president has dialed down tariffs on Canada and Mexico, while China has struck back with retaliatory measures.

One positive spin-off of the trade war may be the reinforcement of regional alliances. With traditional trade flows disrupted, countries are increasingly incentivized to strengthen ties with neighboring economies.

North American outlook

Canada and Mexico, long considered natural trading partners of the US, might pivot towards deepening their economic cooperation. They may also look to bilateral agreements with other partners as well as seek new markets, strengthening ties with China and Japan.

The USMCA (United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement) provides a strong foundation for trade. But attempts to dismantle this arrangement could see Canada and Mexico accelerating efforts to build closer economic ties with other regions, reducing their exposure to the US market.

Trump reveals his plans for sweeping steel tariffs on “everybody.”

Trump’s planned tariffs on steel threaten to undermine the USMCA.

After all, it is designed to foster integrated supply chains and low-tariff economic cooperation among the three countries. This is likely to escalate trade tensions across the bloc, forcing a reassessment of the trade agreement’s key terms and destabilizing the established relationships.

The imposition of tariffs on the EU could lead to deepening integration among its member states. Faced with new pressures from the US, the EU might accelerate initiatives aimed at consolidating internal trade, harmonizing regulations and promoting intra-European supply chains.

Member states, with France at the forefront, are already advocating for a united response to counteract US protectionism. They hope to signal a strong political commitment to resist the pressures from Trump.

China, as the world’s second-largest economy behind the US, may seek to expand its trade relationships in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. As China’s economic growth model is export-led, it may seek stronger partnerships with regional players and invest in new trade agreements. This could potentially give rise to an even more integrated Asian economic community.

A new economic order

Whatever else plays out, these tariff wars signal a reordering of the global economic landscape. Such disruptions, though painful in the short term, can create long-term changes that rebalance economic systems.

The natural trading partner hypothesis reinforces this view by highlighting how countries with shared cultural, historical and geographical ties are likely to deepen their economic relationships in the face of external shocks.

Table of US trade

Source: US Bureau of Economic Analysis (2025) Author provided

In this new order, traditional superpowers may find themselves challenged by unified responses from other nations. By imposing tariffs, the US risks isolating itself from these emerging alliances, while its major trading partners may become united in their efforts to counterbalance rising American protectionism.

The ripple effects of the US tariff row extend well beyond the directly involved countries, with significant implications for global trade networks. For the UK, already coping with the aftermath of Brexit, this new environment offers both challenges and opportunities.

With US-led protectionism disrupting traditional trade channels, the UK could seize the opportunity to diversify its export markets by forging stronger ties with the EU and digging deeper into its Commonwealth alliances.

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It could reinforce its position as a hub for international commerce while continuing to cultivate its relationship with the US. Managing Trump is a delicate balancing act for prime minister Keir Starmer, as both are expected to be in office for four years.

A word of caution – negotiating international trade agreements is a complex and lengthy process. This is the hard lesson learned by the UK. Its trade with the EU (its most important commercial partner) shrank after Brexit, driving the quest for new trading partners and agreements. But these fruits are slow to materialize.

The UK formally requested accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) in February 2021, but only signed the accession protocol in July 2023.

And we should not forget that in 2024 the UK halted its trade talks with Canada after two years of negotiations due to disagreements over the standards on some agricultural products.

Tariffs come with challenges, but they might also be the beginning of a slow and painful change toward a more balanced and robust global economic order.

Scott Mahadeo is senior lecturer in Macroeconomics, University of Portsmouth; Gabriella Legrenzi is senior lecturer in economics, Keele University, and Reinhold Heinlein is senior lecturer in economics, University of the West of England

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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asiatimes.com · by Scott Mahadeo, Gabriella Legrenzi, Reinhold Heinlein · February 13, 2025

19. The Nation Needs a Maritime National Security Strateg

As maritime nation perhaps we should strive to have an enduring maritime strategy that transcends administrations.

Excerpts:

The incoming second Trump administration can perhaps reverse some of the recent trends in less detailed documents and issue a National Security Strategy that emphasizes the U.S. requirement for maritime superiority in order to accomplish its national security objectives. The Kelly/Waltz SHIPS act is a strong start in that direction by setting aside funds to construct and maintain a larger merchant fleet. The Next Trump administration National Security Strategy can also strengthen the nation’s maritime forces in general by emphasizing the absolute requirement for maritime superiority. It can again state the size and composition of the Navy and other maritime forces to best support U.S. national security requirements. It can again validate the requirement for robust sealift and maritime prepositioning forces as necessary for global U.S. military operations. Finally, it can highlight the massive decline of the U.S. Merchant Marine and the need to rebuild that force as an essential pillar of U.S. maritime superiority.

The U.S. simply can no longer afford to watch the vast growth of Chinese naval and maritime power as a disinterested bystander. It must focus much more national wealth on rebuilding its own maritime forces and the next Trump administration National Security Strategy can directly help further that effort.

The Nation Needs a Maritime National Security Strategy

By Steve Wills

February 13, 2025

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2025/02/13/the_nation_needs_a_maritime_national_security_strategy_1091158.html?mc_cid=22a017cc98

President Trump’s National Security Team will hopefully soon be assembled and one of its first tasks is to create a National Security Strategy (NSS,) reflective of how the new administration views the nation’s security challenges. While that new strategy is likely to have content dealing with border security, and the value of the Panama Canal and Greenland, its also an opportunity to return a maritime component to the document missing since the Cold War. The 1987 Reagan administration NSS, the first document as required by the Goldwater Nichols legislation, contained significant maritime strategic theory and actions not seen in subsequent NSS following the end of the Soviet Union. The 1987 NSS validated the growth in naval forces over the 1980’s decade, noted improvements in global military through expanded sealift, but also warned that the declining U.S. Merchant Marine could impact future maritime mobility. The end of the Cold War and any contested movement of U.S. forces spelled the end of a maritime national security strategy, but the rise of China and return of a revanchist Russia demand a renewed, detailed maritime focus in the next NSS.

Origins of the NSS, and other Post-Cold War National Security Documents

The 1986 Goldwater Nichols legislation required that the President produce an annual National Security Strategy that would detail, “The worldwide interests, goals, and objectives of the United States that are vital United States. to the national security of the United States.” This document is supposed to be sent to Congress in 150 days after the new president takes office and is supposed to give the legislative branch an idea of where the new administration will focus its security priorities. While the first of these, from the Reagan administration in 1987 had a heavy maritime focus, subsequent versions lost specifics and became at best the executive summary of the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR,) a document authorized in 1996, after the post-Cold War 1993 Bottom Up Review (BUR) from the Clinton administration suggested a regular review of defense priorities was needed. QDR’s were conducted every four years from 1996 through 2016, when it was replaced in the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) by the much slimmer and less comprehensive National Defense Strategy (NDS.) While the length of these documents has varied over time, they have become vaguer in recent years, offering presidents perhaps more freedom of action to change policies, but containing less specific military information.

The Reagan Focus on Maritime Capabilities

The 1987 Reagan administration NSS provides a good starting template with its focus on three core areas of maritime capability. The 1987 NSS validated the work over the decade in building the Navy of 600 ships and 15 carrier battle groups as vital to, “ensure our essential maritime superiority for the remainder of this century.” The Reagan NSS also noted the absolute requirement of sealift in creating the maritime mobility necessary for global U.S. military operations. It stated,

“The mobile nature of maritime forces allows them directly to influence land campaigns through the application of sea-based tactical airpower; and by the use of amphibious forces to seize strategically important territory, reinforce allies accessible from the sea, or threaten the seaward flanks of enemy ground forces.”

U.S. Maritime forces in the form of sealift and prepositioning assets were vital to this effort. The Reagan NSS stated, “sealift will inevitably carry the bulk of our reinforcement and resupply material, as it has in past crises. To reduce response times, the United States combines prepositioning with airlift and sealift in an integrated fashion.”

Finally the Reagan NSS noted with alarm the decline of the U.S. Merchant Marine as a key component of sealift, warning, “the continuing decline of the U.S. Merchant Marine and U.S.-flag commercial shipping assets is a matter of concern,” and, “This problem is compounded by the decline of the U.S.-flag fleet which results in a reduction of the seagoing workforce to man all our U.S.-flag vessels-as well as ships of the Ready Reserve Force, the National Defense Reserve Fleet and any effective U.S. controlled ships which might need recrewing.” It concludes by saying these negative trends could, “impede our ability adequately to project and sustain forces by strategic sealift.”

Sadly, all of these predictions have come to pass. The Navy has decreased from 594 ships in 1987 to less than 296 Navy and Military Sealift Command ships in the present. The U.S. privately-owned vessel fleet has shrunk from 444 to 178 ships over the same period. Clearly the nation’s maritime forces and shipbuilding industry need to immediately reverse all of these negative trends.

A Renewed Maritime Imperative in the Next NSS

The incoming second Trump administration can perhaps reverse some of the recent trends in less detailed documents and issue a National Security Strategy that emphasizes the U.S. requirement for maritime superiority in order to accomplish its national security objectives. The Kelly/Waltz SHIPS act is a strong start in that direction by setting aside funds to construct and maintain a larger merchant fleet. The Next Trump administration National Security Strategy can also strengthen the nation’s maritime forces in general by emphasizing the absolute requirement for maritime superiority. It can again state the size and composition of the Navy and other maritime forces to best support U.S. national security requirements. It can again validate the requirement for robust sealift and maritime prepositioning forces as necessary for global U.S. military operations. Finally, it can highlight the massive decline of the U.S. Merchant Marine and the need to rebuild that force as an essential pillar of U.S. maritime superiority.

The U.S. simply can no longer afford to watch the vast growth of Chinese naval and maritime power as a disinterested bystander. It must focus much more national wealth on rebuilding its own maritime forces and the next Trump administration National Security Strategy can directly help further that effort.

Dr. Steven Wills currently serves as a Navalist for the Center for Maritime Strategy at the Navy League of the United States. He is an expert in U.S. Navy strategy and policy and U.S. Navy surface warfare programs and platforms.

20. Five Ways to Get NATO Allies to Spend 5%

The 5:

Boost U.S. spending to 5%.

Counter Russia’s rearmament.

Validate the long-term Russian threat.

Follow Poland’s lead.

Create Incentives.

Boosting NATO spending is the only way to counter Russia – and China – but the U.S. must lead the way.

Five Ways to Get NATO Allies to Spend 5%

By Rebecca Grant

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2025/02/13/five_ways_to_get_nato_allies_to_spend_5_1091162.html?mc_cid=22a017cc98

“I’m also going to ask all NATO nations to increase defense spending to 5% of GDP, which is what it should have been years ago,” Trump said in Davos at the World Economic Forum on Jan. 23. This should have been no surprise, since Trump bandied about a 4% spending level for NATO allies as a stretch goal during his first term.

The reason, of course, is the aggression of Russian President Vladimir Putin, fully greenlighted by China. Failing to eject Russia from Ukraine is going to be costly.

As a smackdown of Russia in Ukraine slips away, NATO will have to spend more to counter Russia over the long term. NATO Supreme Allied Commander General Christopher Cavoli said last year that Russia will be a big problem for years to come.

Trump’s not alone his assessment of the financial requirements for peace and deterrence. Poland and the nations of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, U.S. NATO allies bordering Russia, have committed to military modernization and endorsed the Trump 5% GDP defense budget target. Listen to new NATO member Sweden. “There is a broad consensus in Sweden that we need to invest more in our defense,” Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said on Jan. 8. “U.S. governments have long urged European countries to increase their defense spending and to bear more of their own defense costs. We share this view.”

Here are five ways to prod NATO allies to spend more, starting with the U.S.

Boost U.S. spending to 5%. The USA does not spend 5% of GDP on defense. While total U.S. defense spending at $841 billion in 2024 far exceeds other NATO nations, it adds up to about 3.36% of GDP on defense, according to the Peterson Institute. President Trump can give a boost to new Senate Armed Service Committee Chairman Sen. Roger Wicker, (R-Mississippi) who wants to add $200 billion to this year’s defense spending. Speeding up shipbuilding, buying next-generation aircraft, investing in nuclear modernization, and fully funding the space force could bump up the U.S. percentage fast.

Counter Russia’s rearmament. Yes, Russia failed to take Kyiv in 2022, but since then, Russian President Vladimir Putin has ramped up Russia’s defense industry, to deliver 1500 tanks and 3000 armored fighting vehicles annually. Compare that to the 660 tanks and 3103 armored fighting vehicles delivered by Ukraine by partners since 2022, said the 2025 Munich Security Report. Include the drones from Iran, subterfuge electronics from China, and it adds up to Russian rearmament.

Validate the long-term Russian threat. Russia’s troops are engaged in Ukraine right now, but Joris Van Bladel, a specialist in Russian military matters and a senior associate at the Egmont Institute, the Royal Institute for International Relations, in Belgium, told Le Monde last summer it is only a matter of time until Russia again strikes westward. According to Van Bladel, Russia will “push the offensive” somewhere else in Europe within two to five years. “What we’re witnessing currently on the eastern flank is actually a race against time,” Bladel said.

Follow Poland’s lead. Actions speak louder than words. Poland began modernizing nearly a decade ago as it sized up Russian intentions. Poland is budgeting 4.7% of GDP for defense and intends to increase that amount to 5% within just a few years. Poland has already purchased more than $50 billion worth of modern military equipment from the U.S.; everything from F-35 fighters to Patriot air defense systems to $12 billion for Apache helicopters. Having given a lot of their tanks to Ukraine, Poland has also bought nearly 400 U.S. Army Abrams tanks, and the Polish army has a requirement for 800 additional tanks to augment NATO’s deterrence of Russia.

Create Incentives. Here’s a task for Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Relax on ITAR and other export control minutiae. Secretary Rubio should give the top-spending NATO allies a break on the State Department’s labyrinthine arms export policies. The clearest way to do this is to sign technology cooperation treaties, as the U.S. has already done with Great Britain and Australia. Frontline states like Poland merit similar status, especially as Poland has already opened military sustainment centers for NATO allied equipment that will save precious time and money when ground combat vehicles need to be repaired. Allies spending at the 5% rate should get a break on the paperwork needed to stand up interoperable forces and facilities.

Boosting NATO spending is the only way to counter Russia – and China – but the U.S. must lead the way.

Dr. Rebecca Grant is a national security analyst based in Washington, DC specializing in defense and aerospace research and national security consulting.

21. Japan goes for broke with $1 trillion Trump bet

Excerpts:

In August, instant ramen giant Nissin Foods Holdings will open its first new US factory in nearly 50 years. Soy sauce giant Kikkoman plans to begin shipments from Wisconsin by next year.

And so on, and so on. The question, of course, is whether the macroeconomic trajectory of the US can stay on the rails these next four years. As Trump and Musk upend government agencies and create regulatory chaos, markets might not play along.

The same goes for a US national debt topping $36 trillion at a moment when Trump threatens to meddle with the Fed’s mandate, weaken the dollar and impose a tsunami of tariffs that the global financial system might not see coming.

Japan Inc. can run, hide and try to limit the fallout. But no Asian economy, friend or foe, can likely escape the Trump 2.0 onslaught on free trade to come.

Japan goes for broke with $1 trillion Trump bet - Asia Times

Does Japan Inc really think US economy is a buy, or is it making corporate ransom payments to avoid getting crushed by tariffs?

asiatimes.com · by William Pesek · February 13, 2025

TOKYO — In 2024, Japan Inc’s foreign direct investment into the US hit a record high of US$77.3 billion amid efforts to hedge against slowing Chinese growth and deflation.

But America hasn’t seen anything yet as Japan seeks to shield itself from an even bigger economic wildcard: Donald Trump’s trade war wrath as the US president makes Asia the first stop on his tariff revenge tour.

Last week, Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba pledged to boost his nation’s overall investment in the US to about $1 trillion from $783 billion at the start of 2024.

To put that titanically large number in perspective, it’s almost the same amount of Tokyo’s US Treasury security holdings. And it raises an obvious question: Does Japan Inc really think the US economy is a buy, or are CEOs handing over the corporate version of ransom payments in hopes the Trump 2.0 presidency doesn’t crush them?

Odds are, it’s far more the latter than the former. Though the tariff arms race Trump is launching is mostly about China, Japan is right in the center of the collateral damage zone. And Ishiba’s Oval Office visit on February 7 served as a reminder of the perils of trusting “Trumponomics.”

As Ishiba flew back from Washington, he claimed to have a “deal” with Trump on Nippon Steel’s effort to acquire US Steel. Initially, Team Ishiba sold it as Nippon having exclusive access to invest in the iconic American company. Now, that notion seems more spin than reality.

Standing next to Ishiba at the White House, Trump essentially hinted that the Nippon-US Steel agreement was more rhetorical than tangible. Nippon, he said, is “going to do a big investment. I didn’t want [US Steel] purchased, but investment I love. I’m okay with it, sure.”

Nevertheless, Ishiba’s nation seems okay with a 22% increase in Japan’s 2023-level bet on the US. Japanese companies are eying opportunities in sectors including semiconductors, artificial intelligence, autos and transportation equipment, liquefied natural gas, chemicals, manufacturing-related research and development, infrastructure, finance and others.

This is despite Trump 2.0 taking a wrecking ball to the financial guardrails that keep it on the road. The ways in which Trump aims to slash taxes, run roughshod over the rule of law, increase government opacity and meddle with the US Federal Reserve’s independence could all imperil America’s credit rating.

At the same time, empowering Tesla billionaire Elon Musk and his band of tech bros to dismantle government agencies and access sensitive data could reduce trust in US assets. Particularly following news that new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who was considered a moderating force in MAGA Land, reportedly gave Musk and his acolytes access to the federal payments system.

In a recent New York Times op-ed, five former Treasury chiefs raised “substantial cause for concern” that Washington’s financial commitments and mechanisms might be “unlawfully” undermined. “Any hint of the selective suspension of congressionally authorized payments will be a breach of trust and ultimately, a form of default. And our credibility, once lost, will prove difficult to regain,” they argued.

The bottom line, Bessent’s predecessors warn, “no Treasury secretary in his or her first weeks in office should be put in the position where it is necessary to reassure the nation and the world of the integrity of our payments system or our commitment to make good on our financial obligations.”

For now, Ishiba’s government is focused on the positive. In his effort to shield Japan from Trump’s tariffs, Ishiba stressed that his country is already the globe’s biggest US investor. Not just in US Treasuries, but also the largest investor in corporate America for five years running.

“Japan is the closest economic partner of the United States,” Ishiba said. Ishiba highlighted how Japan Inc automotive icons Toyota and Isuzu are unveiling ambitious plans for new US factory construction. He also pledged a big expansion of purchases of LNG.

This all follows SoftBank’s ginormous investment plans in the US. CEO Masayoshi Son says he’ll pump at least $100 billion into the US over the next four years. Many of these investments will be artificial intelligence-related, winning favor with a White House keen to contain the reach of China’s DeepSeek AI startup.

Yet the metric that most interests Trump is Tokyo’s trade surplus. As Trump sat down with Ishiba last week, the US leader pressed Japan to reduce its $100 billion trade gap with Washington.

As last week’s tete-a-tete wrapped up, Trump told reporters he’d be willing to slap tariffs on Tokyo if the surplus isn’t reversed. As if to punctuate the point, Team Trump is hinting at giving Australia – with which the US enjoys a trade surplus – a waiver on newly imposed 25% steel tariffs.

The surplus remains a major conundrum for Ishiba’s Liberal Democratic Party. The ruling LDP’s most consistent economic strategy over the last 25 years has been a weak yen, making Japanese recoveries largely export-driven affairs.

Enter Trump, whose administration is already objecting to Japan’s underwhelming imports.

Given the economic risks, Ishiba’s $1 trillion pledge smacks more of insurance against massive tariffs than confidence that the US will be a welcome investment destination once Trump 2.0 leaves the scene in 2029.

“While Japan may not avoid all the effects of future US tariff policies, Tokyo may avoid the targeted treatment seen with countries like Canada, Mexico, and China,” James Brady, vice president of Teneo, said in a Saturday note.

“It may even hope for more lenient trade treatment than other major economies, as it appears to enjoy the status of one of Trump’s most favored nations.”

Thickening the plot, the Bank of Japan is tightening to tame inflation, much of it driven by a weak exchange rate. The highest short-term rates in 17 years are unnerving households and companies alike.

Rising borrowing costs also are having a chilling effect on business sentiment. That could imperil government efforts to hasten wage growth. Or, at the very least, ensure that wage gains keep pace with the rate of inflation.

All this leaves Japan with a number of preexisting conditions heading into the Trumpian storm to come. Retail sales are soft even before Trump’s broader trade war arrives. And the 10% levies Trump has slapped on China so far could be but a taste of what’s to come.

Had Ishiba’s party acted urgently to reduce bureaucracy, incentivize a startup boom, modernize labor markets, empower women or increase productivity, Japan might be less vulnerable to Trump’s trade war.

This last challenge is among the reasons Tokyo is realizing that 25-plus years of zero rates have backfired. Though the BOJ has been experimenting with zero rates since 1999, the real monetary fireworks really began in 2013.

That year, the government encouraged the BOJ to push its quantitative easing experiment into uncharted territory. The BOJ aggressively hoarded government bonds and stocks via exchange-traded funds. By 2018, the BOJ’s balance sheet topped the size of Japan’s annual gross domestic product (GDP).

Trouble is, the resulting plunge in the yen is now coming back to haunt Tokyo.

“A weaker yen means it takes more yen to buy the same amount of food or oil as before,” says Richard Katz, author of “The Contest for Japan’s Economic Future.” “Imported inflation was a major factor in falling real wages over the past three years and has led to political pressure to try to keep the yen from weakening even more.”

It also deadened the urgency for lawmakers to level playing fields and increase competitiveness. It took pressure off corporate CEOs to innovate, restructure, disrupt and boost productivity.

In its latest assessment of Japan’s economy, the International Monetary Fund argues that “Japan’s total factor productivity growth has been slowing for a decade and has fallen further behind the United States. A steady decline in allocative efficiency since the early 2000s has been a drag on productivity, and likely reflects an increase in market frictions.”

What’s more, the IMF notes, “Japan’s ultra-low interest rates may have allowed low-productivity firms to survive longer than they otherwise would have, delaying necessary economic restructuring. Reforms aimed at improving labor mobility across firms would help improve Japan’s allocative efficiency and boost productivity.”

Yet with his approval ratings in the 30s, it’s not clear how much political capital Ishiba has to reinvigorate the reform process. Or, to convince Trump he’s a worthy sparring partner.

“Ishiba’s weak political standing may also be a liability, as Trump tends to respect strong leaders,” says David Boling, an analyst at Eurasia Group, a risk consultancy.

Boling notes that Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister from 2012 to 2020, “enjoyed comfortable majorities in the national parliament when he was prime minister, so he could negotiate with Trump from a position of political strength, but Ishiba does not enjoy that luxury.”

As Japan’s economy runs into fresh headwinds, accelerating the structural upgrade process will become more and more important.

Not surprisingly, Ishiba’s Trade Minister Yoji Muto is lobbying Trump World for a pass on Washington’s 25% taxes on steel and aluminum. Yet Tokyo’s real challenge may be getting past Trump’s trade advisors, led by anti-globalization activist Peter Navarro.

Even as Trump hints at giving Australia a waiver, Navarro argues Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s economy is trashing the US aluminum market. “Australia is just killing our aluminum market,” Navarro told CNN. “President Trump says no, no, we’re not, we’re not doing that anymore.”

All this uncertainty could leave Japan Inc pledging big US-based investments with buyers’ remorse. US inflation heated up again in January, with the consumer price index accelerating 0.5%, bumping the annual inflation rate up to 3%.

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“This is not a good number,” says economist Brian Coulton at Fitch Ratings. “It illustrates how the Federal Reserve has not completed the job of getting inflation back down just as new inflation risks, from tariff hikes and a squeeze on labor supply growth, start to emerge.”

It’s sure to complicate hopes the Fed will be cutting rates in 2025. In fact, it buttresses the argument that the Fed is more likely to tighten rather than loosen next.

This adds to the disorientation in corporate boardrooms from New York to Tokyo. As the year unfolds and economic trajectories go awry, Japanese chieftains might have greater trouble making good on US investment pledges.

Case in point: Son’s SoftBank swinging to a surprising $2.4 billion loss in the October-December quarter as its Vision Fund investment went awry. It raised new questions about Son’s ability to make good on pledges to invest $500 billion, along with OpenAI, in the Stargate AI project that Trump announced last month at a splashy White House event.

The news led Fitch company CreditSights to downgrade SoftBank’s US dollar and Eurobonds to “underperform” from “market perform.” As CreditSights analyst Mary Pollock puts it, “we think there’s more scope for downside, as [SoftBank Group] is clearly willing and able to ramp investment” by resorting to project finance funding strategies.

For now, Ishiba’s economy has a decent US investment story to sell Trump. Toyota Tsusho, an arm of Toyota Motor, is building a roughly $14 billion battery facility in North Carolina that could begin shipping in April. Honda Motor is lavishing $1 billion on production facility upgrades in Ohio and plans to start producing electric vehicles in the US in short order.

Resonac Holdings, a Japanese materials maker, is eyeing land in Silicon Valley to assemble cutting-edge chips. Sumitomo Chemical is opening a mass production facility in Texas this year to put itself at the center of revitalized US chipmaking supply chains.

In August, instant ramen giant Nissin Foods Holdings will open its first new US factory in nearly 50 years. Soy sauce giant Kikkoman plans to begin shipments from Wisconsin by next year.

And so on, and so on. The question, of course, is whether the macroeconomic trajectory of the US can stay on the rails these next four years. As Trump and Musk upend government agencies and create regulatory chaos, markets might not play along.

The same goes for a US national debt topping $36 trillion at a moment when Trump threatens to meddle with the Fed’s mandate, weaken the dollar and impose a tsunami of tariffs that the global financial system might not see coming.

Japan Inc. can run, hide and try to limit the fallout. But no Asian economy, friend or foe, can likely escape the Trump 2.0 onslaught on free trade to come.

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asiatimes.com · by William Pesek · February 13, 2025

22. First Taiwan Strait trip of Trump administration ‘sent the wrong signal,’ China says

Dear China: Wrong signal to who? You got the message are responding thus it must be the right signal.

First Taiwan Strait trip of Trump administration ‘sent the wrong signal,’ China says

Stars and Stripes · by Alex Wilson · February 13, 2025

The guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson steams in the South China Sea on Aug. 22, 2024. (Jamaal Liddell/U.S. Navy)

A pair of U.S. Navy ships made a rare, two-day trip through the Taiwan Strait this week, marking the first transit of the contentious waterway under the Trump administration.

The guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson and the survey ship USNS Bowditch sailed southwest through the 110-mile-wide channel that separates mainland China from Taiwan between Monday and Wednesday, U.S. Indo-Pacific Command told Stars and Stripes by email Thursday.

“The transit occurred through a corridor in the Taiwan Strait that is beyond any coastal state’s territorial seas,” wrote command spokesman Cmdr. Matthew Comer. “Within this corridor, all nations enjoy high-seas freedom of navigation, overflight, and other internationally lawful uses of the sea related to these freedoms.”

Transits of the strait typically last less than a day and are announced via news releases from INDOPACOM or the U.S. 7th Fleet. However, this week’s passage was not publicly announced by either command as of Thursday morning.

Comer did not address questions about the transit’s timing, length or why it wasn’t publicized.

Seventh Fleet spokeswoman Lt. j.g. Sarah Merrill, in an email Thursday, referred all questions about the transit to INDOPACOM.

The United States regularly sends warships and, less frequently, aircraft through the strait. This week’s transit marks the first since President Donald Trump was sworn into office on Jan. 20.

The 7th Fleet last announced a transit on Nov. 26 by a P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol and reconnaissance aircraft.

The Navy typically describes the transits as a routine means of traveling between the East and South China seas, but Beijing views them as provocative and regularly condemns them as support for Taiwan. China considers the island, a functioning democracy, a breakaway province that must be reunified with the mainland, by force if necessary.

China’s military tracked the ships’ passage via naval and air forces, China’s Eastern Theater Command spokesman Col. Xi Li said in a Wednesday post on the command’s official Weibo social media account.

The transit “sent the wrong signal and increased security risks,” he wrote, adding that troops remain on high alert to defend regional stability and China’s sovereignty.

Alex Wilson

Alex Wilson covers the U.S. Navy and other services from Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan. Originally from Knoxville, Tenn., he holds a journalism degree from the University of North Florida. He previously covered crime and the military in Key West, Fla., and business in Jacksonville, Fla.

Stars and Stripes · by Alex Wilson · February 13, 2025

23. How America’s Allies Boost U.S. Intelligence

Excerpts:

Intelligence liaison makes the United States stronger and its allies more capable and aligned. A transactional perspective and pursuit of “good deals” do not readily translate to the intelligence realm, where trust is built over the long term and partners achieve success through mutually beneficial cooperation. Putting the United States first from an intelligence perspective means harnessing intelligence diplomacy to safeguard American interests and citizens while protecting the liberal world order, which has advantaged the United States more than most other countries. Reduced intelligence exchange during the second Trump administration is not a foregone conclusion, however.

To secure the benefits of strong liaison relations, Washington should recognize that its partners have legitimate concerns about politicization, systems access, and discretion. To address these issues, the Trump administration should take steps to reassure U.S. allies that professionalism, apolitical objectivity, and noninterference will be the order of the day. Intelligence work necessitates good judgment, a measured temperament, and the integrity to go where the weight of the evidence leads; that means occasionally bringing unwelcome news to powerful political figures. To that aim, Trump should install experienced professionals in key national security and intelligence positions. The administration should not probe candidates for their views on the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol or otherwise subject them to ideological litmus tests. This technocratic approach would send a positive message reassuring allies that the U.S. intelligence community remains nonpartisan.

Congress should also exercise oversight of Trump’s management of the intelligence community and insist that independent inspectors general be allowed to do their work without political interference. Finally, over time, the administration should demonstrate consistent adherence to the norms surrounding intelligence liaison, including discretion in intelligence and security matters. This would restore U.S. partners’ confidence in Washington’s information security and accountability practices and grease the wheels of further secret cooperation.

How America’s Allies Boost U.S. Intelligence

Foreign Affairs · by More by David V. Gioe · February 13, 2025

And Why Trump Threatens That Cooperation

David V. Gioe

February 13, 2025

U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House, Washington, D.C., February 2025 Nathan Howard / Reuters

DAVID V. GIOE is British Academy Global Professor of Intelligence and International Security at King’s College London and a former CIA analyst and operations officer.

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Intelligence diplomacy—“liaison” is the term of art—is a key, if often hidden, element of national power. Washington has more liaison partners than is publicly known, because countries and even nonstate groups that do not wish to be seen engaging with American officials still speak with the United States government via clandestine channels. Traditionally, liaison relationships are unaffected by international politics and shifts in foreign policy; administrations come and go, and the intelligence flows uninterrupted. But occasionally, political developments are so dramatic that they intrude on intelligence liaison.

In the early 1970s, the Nixon administration temporarily reduced intelligence sharing with the United Kingdom, thanks to London’s decision to prioritize relations with European countries aiming to join the European Economic Community, the precursor to the European Union, and American frustration with the British lack of support for Israel during the Yom Kippur War. More recently, in 2013, when a former National Security Agency contractor, Edward Snowden, revealed among other things that the United States had collected signals intelligence on the leaders of some of its European allies, effectively eavesdropping on them, several European countries briefly soured on their clandestine contacts with Washington. Now, the second Trump administration could trigger a new disruption of routine intelligence sharing between Washington and its allies.

Under ideal circumstances, intelligence liaison is aided by common foreign policy goals, military alliances, and complementary worldviews between countries, including their leaders. But President Donald Trump’s approach to the international system and its security architecture has called these requisite commonalities between Washington and its partners into question. Some U.S. partners are worried that Trump will use intelligence exchange transactionally—by, say, withholding information as leverage on an unrelated issue. Others are concerned about Trump’s checkered relationship with handling intelligence, his affinity for authoritarian leaders such as Russian President Vladimir Putin, and his picks of inexperienced loyalists for senior intelligence and national security roles. To mitigate their concerns, U.S. allies and partners may become more cautious in sharing intelligence with Washington on certain topics during Trump’s second term. They may opt to reduce intelligence passed to Washington or sanitize the intelligence they share to the point that it loses its value to the United States.

The Trump administration needs strong intelligence partnerships, as the United States confronts an unstable geopolitical world order in which international terrorism is on the rise and a so-called axis of upheaval—China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia—confronts the United States and its partners. In light of this, the intelligence agencies of U.S. allies would prefer to cooperate even more closely with the United States now than they have in the past—but only if they are confident in the U.S. intelligence community’s trustworthiness and dependability.

Should Washington’s external intelligence relationships wither, the United States’ national security would be compromised. Liaison allows states to pool resources to analyze an intelligence target of interest, to coordinate agent networks to provide complementary human intelligence, and to validate existing reporting to increase analytical confidence. It also provides a way to compare unvarnished notes in private with a trusted partner. In addition, liaison cooperation usually has an economic aspect; states can share the costs of developing and maintaining expensive satellites and divide up the enormous task of processing and translating voluminous signals intelligence. And there are geographic dimensions, such as facilities basing or collection operations on friendly territory. Given these clear advantages of force multiplication, intelligence agencies have moved beyond the traditional instinct to go it alone in order to maintain tight operational security in favor of intelligence cooperation.

Intelligence liaison is a process, not an outcome, and a reputation for security and discretion invites further intelligence sharing. In statecraft, as in life, friends share confidences, and the sharing of confidences deepens friendships. Still, intelligence liaison is a form of hard-nosed statecraft, and each side wields its knowledge for its own national interest. Occasionally, partners share intelligence not merely to inform but to influence another country’s perspectives on a pressing issue. The United States may jeopardize a seat at the table on a topic of crucial importance, such as Ukraine’s defense against Russian aggression, if Washington signals that its aims diverge from those of its allies.

The apolitical nature of the U.S. intelligence community provides the bedrock trust for liaison relationships that endure across political transitions. Trump should preserve the intelligence community’s hard-won reputation for nonpartisanship by avowing that professionalism and analytical rigor will be maintained throughout the 18 agencies that make up the intelligence community. The administration should view those agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigations, as providers of critical insight and information, not as targets to be politicized or purged.

GRAVE CONCERNS

The intelligence concerns of U.S. partners today are rooted in a series of events that took place during and after Trump’s first term. In March 2017, a Trump ally accused the United Kingdom’s signals intelligence agency, the Government Communications Headquarters, of spying on Trump’s campaign, causing alarm in London and earning a rare public rebuke from Washington’s closest intelligence partner. The White House assured a horrified Downing Street that such outlandish claims would not be repeated. The administration’s early misstep with GCHQ did not impair intelligence exchange or operational cooperation. But subsequent episodes were more serious. According to The Washington Post, in a May 2017 meeting in the Oval Office, Trump shared sensitive liaison intelligence—that is, highly classified information from a U.S. partner—with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak. This was a grave breach of intelligence liaison protocol; intelligence given by one country is assumed to be passed in strict confidence.

U.S. allies’ concerns were only heightened when, in August 2019, Trump tweeted a high-resolution satellite image detailing significant damage to Iran’s Semnan Space Center, where an apparent rocket explosion had occurred during preparations for a satellite launch. Although this image was not provided by another government, it revealed U.S. imagery intelligence capabilities and again highlighted concerns about the president’s careless handling of secret intelligence. In a separate incident three years later, the FBI discovered boxes of highly classified documents in a bathroom at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

Now, Trump’s combative approach risks further exacerbating the inherent challenges in diplomacy, with ramifications for Washington’s foreign intelligence partnerships. One senior European intelligence official recently told me that Denmark, a NATO ally and solid intelligence partner for Washington, might signal its displeasure about unwelcome U.S. efforts to buy Greenland by reducing intelligence cooperation, at least temporarily.

A reputation for security and discretion invites further intelligence sharing.

Intelligence liaison is conducted by experts talking to experts about technical or specialized matters. It should not be undertaken by politicians or neophytes. As James Goldgeier and Elizabeth Saunders recently wrote in Foreign Affairs, the intelligence agencies of U.S. allies and adversaries may see peril or opportunity, respectively, when the American president grants sweeping access to U.S. government databases and systems to a team of young people who have no government experience and who may not have been put through standard personnel vetting processes. For their part, foreign intelligence officers are professionals who expect to conduct their secret business with other career professionals.

Some partners might also reason that a quasi-isolationist United States would be less relevant in the international system and therefore not a defense or diplomatic partner of choice. Downgrading the United States’ value as a partner would mean reducing the requirement to share intelligence in the first place, because there would be no common foreign policy to pursue in tandem. U.S. allies might come to see a globally disengaged Washington as requiring less liaison intelligence on topics that the Trump administration showed little interest in.

For now, foreign partners are still inclined to share secrets with Washington because it is a wise investment in their own national security; the United States often returns more and better intelligence than it receives, and partners do not wish to jeopardize this flow. The successful terrorist attack last December on a German Christmas market stands in contrast to the disrupted terrorist attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna; intelligence liaison between the United States and Austria thwarted the latter. For U.S. allies, the security benefits of cooperation with Washington are significant. Still, Washington’s partners will balance the benefits of intelligence liaison against their concerns about the Trump administration.

QUESTIONABLE LEADERSHIP

Despite some notable bumps during Trump’s first term, intelligence liaison largely continued apace, but much of this came down to steady leadership. Selecting career professionals with standing in foreign capitals, such as Gina Haspel as CIA director and Christopher Wray to head the FBI, went a long way toward assuaging U.S. partners’ concerns about Trump’s potential impact on the day-to-day business of intelligence. In his second term, there will be far less confidence among Washington’s secret partners if Trump insists on installing unqualified people without the measured temperament, experience, and good judgment required of intelligence professionals.

Most of the 18 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence community report to the Defense Department and are run by nonpartisan senior military officers who do not owe their positions to demonstrated fealty to Trump. And although his campaign pledge was to “clean out all of the corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus,” Trump seems to believe that the “deep state” mostly lurks in the FBI and CIA and appears content to leave the lesser-mentioned agencies, such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office, to continue their international partnerships without direct political interference.

Even if Trump’s more controversial intelligence nominees do get confirmed by the Senate, the amount of concern in foreign capitals will depend on whether they moderate their tone once installed. Trump’s second-term pick for CIA director, John Ratcliffe, a former Republican member of Congress who distinguished himself to Trump as a loyal partisan during Trump’s impeachment proceedings, was open-minded and willing to hear out the professionals during his brief tenure as director of national intelligence, according to senior intelligence officers. During his January 2025 Senate confirmation hearings, Ratcliffe struck the right notes on protecting the CIA from undue political influence, but the idea of working with the Trump loyalists Kash Patel as FBI director or Tulsi Gabbard as director of National Intelligence has rattled Washington’s most important partners.

If U.S. partners suspected American officials of distorting or cherry picking shared intelligence to support a preferred policy of the Trump administration, that would have serious ramifications for Washington’s liaison relationships; blatantly politicized intelligence is widely regarded as low-value intelligence. Additionally, U.S. partners would have reservations about their own intelligence becoming politicized in the U.S. policy process. For instance, a U.S. partner might collect fragmentary or even contradictory intelligence indicating that Tehran may or may not decide to provide a more advanced weapons system to its Houthi proxies in Yemen. Under normal circumstances, the U.S. partner would pass all this information to Washington in the hope that the U.S. intelligence community would reciprocate and share what it knows on this topic, setting the stage for further discussion about coordinated policy responses. In this hypothetical scenario, however, the U.S. partner could opt to withhold some or all of the intelligence out of concern that Trump’s national security team might lean on the more sensational information and ignore the rest to justify its maximum pressure policy toward Iran.

RESTORING CONFIDENCE

Intelligence liaison makes the United States stronger and its allies more capable and aligned. A transactional perspective and pursuit of “good deals” do not readily translate to the intelligence realm, where trust is built over the long term and partners achieve success through mutually beneficial cooperation. Putting the United States first from an intelligence perspective means harnessing intelligence diplomacy to safeguard American interests and citizens while protecting the liberal world order, which has advantaged the United States more than most other countries. Reduced intelligence exchange during the second Trump administration is not a foregone conclusion, however.

To secure the benefits of strong liaison relations, Washington should recognize that its partners have legitimate concerns about politicization, systems access, and discretion. To address these issues, the Trump administration should take steps to reassure U.S. allies that professionalism, apolitical objectivity, and noninterference will be the order of the day. Intelligence work necessitates good judgment, a measured temperament, and the integrity to go where the weight of the evidence leads; that means occasionally bringing unwelcome news to powerful political figures. To that aim, Trump should install experienced professionals in key national security and intelligence positions. The administration should not probe candidates for their views on the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol or otherwise subject them to ideological litmus tests. This technocratic approach would send a positive message reassuring allies that the U.S. intelligence community remains nonpartisan.

Congress should also exercise oversight of Trump’s management of the intelligence community and insist that independent inspectors general be allowed to do their work without political interference. Finally, over time, the administration should demonstrate consistent adherence to the norms surrounding intelligence liaison, including discretion in intelligence and security matters. This would restore U.S. partners’ confidence in Washington’s information security and accountability practices and grease the wheels of further secret cooperation.

DAVID V. GIOE is British Academy Global Professor of Intelligence and International Security at King’s College London and a former CIA analyst and operations officer.

Foreign Affairs · by More by David V. Gioe · February 13, 2025

24. Trump closes down federal worker buyout offer after judge lifts hold

Which "side" won here? The judge rules for the administration that the program can be implemented and the administration promptly shuts the program down.

I guess this is a case of "you had your chance, now you missed it." Those who did not take the buyout are likely to suffer. The irony may be that those who took the buyout were likely to be very opposed to the administrations policies but they will be rewarded while many others in government likely support the administration's policies and yet they will be forced out without compensation as the huge cuts are made to support the "Great Reset" fo the federal bureaucracy. .

Trump closes down federal worker buyout offer after judge lifts hold

The administration moved to close the buyout program Wednesday evening after a federal judge in Massachusetts rejected a call from several labor groups that sued to block the initiative

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/02/12/trump-federal-worker-buyout-court-hearing/

UpdatedFebruary 12, 2025 at 6:33 p.m. ESTyesterday at 6:33 p.m. EST

6 min

2560

President Donald Trump signs two executive orders and speaks to the press in the Oval Office on Jan. 30. (Kent Nishimura/For The Washington Post)

By Olivia George, Steve Thompson and Emily Davies

A judge on Wednesday lifted his pause on the federal government’s deferred resignation program, prompting the Trump administration to swiftly declare victory as it closed the offer to any more workers who might still have been mulling it.

The program — which encouraged federal workers to resign with the promise of pay through September — had been halted since last Thursday, when U.S. District Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. temporarily stopped the Office of Personnel Management from moving ahead. Unions representing more than 800,000 federal workers had filed a lawsuit to stop the program, calling it an “arbitrary, unlawful, short-fused ultimatum.”

In his ruling, O’Toole wrote that the unions’ lawsuit could not succeed because they lacked standing to sue and because his court lacked jurisdiction. The unions, the judge said, were not directly impacted by the administration directive “but are challenging a policy that affects others, specifically executive branch employees.”

“This is not sufficient,” he wrote, for the unions to sue under the Administrative Procedure Act. O’Toole, who was nominated in 1995 by President Bill Clinton, did not opine on the buyout program’s legality.

Following D.C. region

Following

The ruling left a serious question: How much time would federal employees who had not yet signed up have to throw their names in? None, it turned out. McLaurine Pinover, spokesperson for the Office of Personnel Management, said the program was closed as of 7 p.m. “There is no longer any doubt,” she said in a statement. “The Deferred Resignation Program was both legal and a valuable option for federal employees.”

About 75,000 workers have accepted the deal, Pinover said.

The decision out of the Massachusetts courthouse — and the Trump administration’s move immediately afterward — mark another milestone in a tumultuous period for federal workers, who have been left scrambling to make up their minds since the resignation offer, with the subject line “Fork in the Road,” first landed in their inboxes Jan. 28.

Some workers jumped at the chance to leave. Others urged colleagues to reject a deal they consider a trap that will be used to eliminate staff without any payout.

The moves come as the Trump administration began initiating widespread layoffs across the federal government, starting Wednesday with probationary employees and with plans to extend deeper into the civilian federal workforce of 2.3 million. The drastic measures are led by representatives of Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service, who are deployed across agencies with full oversight of the hiring process and one central mission: to shrink the sprawling bureaucracy and align it with Trump’s vision.

The unions had sought the right to sue by claiming the buyout program’s rapid deadline, along with what they characterized as its confusing and chaotic rollout, impeded the unions’ ability to carry out their missions of counseling and advocating for federal workers.

The deferred resignation was the administration’s effort to lure workers into leaving before initiating the more direct reductions-in-force — which can pose legal challenges, especially when it comes to union-protected employees.

25. Actually, the #Resistance is working

Resistance is working: I really wish the political opposition would not use the word resistance. Both sides of the political spectrum should be committed to making our Constitutional democratic republic work for the nation. Rather than resistance they should be talking about ensuring proper separation of powers and checks and balances for actions of our government. Obviously DOGE is a traumatic experience for some but it should not be "resisted." There should be proper legal challenges and both sides should ensure that it is working within our Constitutional process. But it is also likely to be political suicide for anyone trying to resist DOGE and its potential for a "Great Reset" of the federal bureacracy that results in greater transparency and costs savings. But resistance is not something unique to the left.

Here are some perspectives from the past about resisting a President.

1. Mitch McConnell (2010)

"The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."

— Mitch McConnell, National Journal interview, October 23, 2010

McConnell later clarified that this meant opposing Obama’s policies, though critics saw it as prioritizing partisanship over governance.

2. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) (2009)

"If we’re able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

— Jim DeMint, July 9, 2009, regarding the Affordable Care Act

DeMint, a leading Tea Party-aligned senator, actively sought to derail Obama's healthcare reform as part of a broader effort to weaken his presidency.

3. Rush Limbaugh (2009)

"I hope he fails."

— Rush Limbaugh, January 16, 2009, before Obama's inauguration

Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh openly expressed his desire for Obama’s policies to fail, which became a rallying cry for right-wing opposition.

4. Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) (2009)

"What we’re trying to do is basically lay out the contrast, so that the American people understand that there is a better way."

— Eric Cantor, February 18, 2009

As House Minority Whip, Cantor led GOP efforts to oppose Obama’s stimulus package and laid the groundwork for resistance to his policies.

5. John Boehner (R-OH) (2010)

"We’re going to do everything—and I mean everything—we can do to kill it, stop it, slow it down, whatever we can."

— John Boehner, 2010, referring to the Affordable Care Act

As House Minority Leader and later Speaker, Boehner spearheaded Republican opposition to Obama’s legislative efforts.

Are the Democratic policies of resistance any different than these policies of obstruction?

1. Republican Strategy of Obstruction

From the moment Barack Obama took office in 2009, the Republican Party made opposing his policies a central strategy. This was particularly evident in their response to:

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009) – The stimulus package faced nearly unanimous GOP opposition, despite the country being in a deep recession.
The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) – No Republican voted for it, and GOP leaders made numerous attempts to repeal it.
Judicial and Executive Appointments – Republicans slowed or blocked Obama’s nominees, particularly for federal courts.

2. The Tea Party and Grassroots Resistance

The Tea Party movement, which emerged in 2009, played a significant role in mobilizing opposition to Obama’s policies. Fueled by concerns over government spending, taxation, and healthcare, it led to:

A Republican landslide in the 2010 midterms, flipping the House of Representatives.
Increased pressure on GOP leaders to take a hardline stance against Obama.

3. Legislative Gridlock

With a Republican-controlled House after 2010, Obama's ability to pass major legislation was severely restricted. Examples of gridlock include:

Debt ceiling battles (2011, 2013) that threatened government shutdowns.
Sequestration cuts (2013) that led to across-the-board budget reductions.
The refusal to hold hearings for Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland in 2016, which left the seat vacant until Trump took office.

4. The Long-Term Impact

Judicial Legacy: By blocking Obama’s final Supreme Court pick, Republicans paved the way for Trump to appoint three conservative justices.
Policy Reversals: Many of Obama's executive actions were overturned under Trump, such as environmental regulations and immigration policies.
Polarization: The extreme partisan divide set a precedent for resistance politics, influencing both parties in subsequent presidencies.

Actually, the #Resistance is working

semafor.com · by David Weigel

The News

The new resistance to Donald Trump’s presidency had a plan: State attorneys general from Maine to Hawaii would rush to court to stop vast portions of the agenda Trump had spent years promising to deliver.

And it’s working: Democratic attorneys general and the Democracy Forward coalition of liberal lawyers have been winning in court and throwing up hurdles to his agenda. Skeptical judges have kept federal workers in their jobs, unfrozen billions of dollars in grants, and preserved birthright citizenship; Democracy’s own network of partner organizations has grown from around 180 after the election to more than 400 now.

“The Trump administration spent years preparing for the blitz of executive orders we’re seeing now — but the legal strategy is working,” said Democracy Forward President Skye Perryman. “The early wins we’ve seen so far are just the beginning of our coordinated legal strategy.” Congressional Democrats agreed with her.

“We’ve had a great deal of success with preliminary injunctions, temporary restraining orders in the courts,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer told Semafor on Wednesday. “I think there are close to 50 suits filed, and on almost every major issue, the courts have put a freeze on stopping the DOGE people from implementing what they want to implement.”

“Democratic attorneys general are currently batting a thousand at getting injunctions, which is great,” said Indivisible co-founder Ezra Levin, who cautioned that the final outcome “remains to be seen.”

On the other hand: There are no mass protests on the Mall, few stirring speeches, and many, many angry social media posts. Around the country and on Capitol Hill, Democrats sure don’t feel like they’re winning.

Rallying against Trump’s executive orders, Congressional Democrats have been heckled by protesters who ask what they’re actually doing. New polling from YouGov this week found that two-thirds of Democratic voters want them to “oppose Trump as much as possible.”

“We’re going to fight on your behalf in the Congress, we’re fighting on your behalf in the courts and we’re going to make sure we do what we need to do in the community,” House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said at a Tuesday rally organized by the American Federation of Government Employees. It’s the first part — a congressional battle that isn’t slowing Trump down — that’s been frustrating progressives.

“That’s the sales pitch?” scoffed “The Daily Show” host Jon Stewart on Monday, after playing New York Rep. Dan Goldman’s take that House Democrats couldn’t stop Trump without Republican defections. “You can see the Democrats’ backbone on our new show, ‘America Backslides,’ starring Dan Goldman as Hopeful Loser!”

One particularly demoralizing storyline for Democrats — not that they have many helpful ones to choose from — is that they are so overwhelmed by the speed of the Trump administration that they don’t know how to fight it.

That’s not really true. There was a playbook in place for a Trump restoration, built during the 2024 campaign, when the party messaged relentlessly against the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 agenda and tried to make its authors famous. (Quick: Name a former OMB director who’s not Russ Vought.) Democratic legal groups and attorneys general previewed their plans in The New York Times one week after Kamala Harris’ defeat.

Then they executed the plan. There’s a debate happening among liberal lawyers about which cases are the strongest, and which ones risk an adverse precedent if they get to the Supreme Court — a 6-3 supermajority less friendly to them at any time in the first Trump term. But the goal was stopping as much of the agenda as possible, and some of that has worked.

But the faces of this are dispersed and often obscure state attorneys general (Tish James in New York, Rob Bonta in California, Andrea Campbell in Massachusetts) who don’t have their own press corps or big social media personae. The media apparatus that covers Congress has watched Democrats lose, then gotten them to explain why they lost, repeatedly. On social media, there’s been particular progressive angst about Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly, who beat New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for the chief House Oversight role, and whose biggest early move — subpoenaing Elon Musk to talk about DOGE — didn’t work.

“My motion to subpoena him, I thought, would have some broader support on the Republican side,” Connolly told MSNBC after the failed vote. “It had none.” That clip was shared widely by the journalist Ken Klippenstein, who has carved out a beat from the stumbles of geriatric House and Senate Democrats.

Another clip, of Schumer chanting, “We will win!” at another federal worker rally, got even more traction. Stewart made fun of it on his show, which has recovered some of the liberal appointment viewing clout it had during George W. Bush’s presidency; it appeared in a New York Democratic Socialists of America spot that encourages voters to register with the party to vote for left-wing mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani. (“Look at these fossils,” says an actor in the spot.)

The View From Democrats

On the Hill, Democrats have heard the complaints about why they’re not doing more. But some say that their voters are listening.

“It’s a whole-of-movement approach,” said Florida Rep. Max Frost, the youngest House Democrat and an organizer for some of the protests outside of endangered agencies. “I’ve heard from a lot of my constituents that they’re feeling better and better about how Democrats are responding.”

Massachusetts Rep. Ayanna Pressley praised her state’s attorney general, Campbell, for joining legal actions against the administration. But she acknowledged that the action wasn’t immediate.

“The problem is, it moves slower,” she said. “That’s hard for people to digest, because the threats are so urgent that you want to see a response to counter it that’s just as urgent.”

The View From The White House

The Trump administration has described its losses in court as illegitimate judicial hackery, while abiding by most of them.

“The real constitutional crisis is taking place within our judicial branch, where district court judges in liberal districts across the country are abusing their power to unilaterally block President Trump’s basic executive authority,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Wednesday, though some of the judges ruling against the administration were appointed by Republicans. “We believe these judges are acting as judicial activists, rather than honest arbiters of the law.”

Notable

In Axios, Justin Green and Andrew Solender report on Democratic angst about the calls they’re getting from constituents and progressive groups. “It’s been a constant theme of us saying, ‘Please call the Republicans,’” said Virginia Rep. Don Beyer.
In the Washington Post, Olivia George, Steve Thompson and Emily Davies cover Trump’s first move after a judicial hold on his worker buyout plan ran out: ending the buyout.

26.The Trump Tracker: 36 Notable Moves in 24 Days

Please go to the link to track administration actions.

https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/the-trump-tracker-what-the-president-has-done-so-far-a30c92e2?st=SBuaMV&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

The Trump Tracker:

36 Notable Moves in 24 Days

Keep tabs on the latest announcements and executive orders

Gift unlocked article

By Xavier Martinez

Follow and Andrew Levinson

Feb. 12, 2025 6:00 am ET

President Trump started his second term by rapidly deploying executive orders, memos and presidential actions to deliver on campaign promises and reverse policies from previous administrations. The Wall Street Journal is tracking his biggest moves to reshape the federal government.

27. Now Putin is poised to invade Europe as Trump casts Ukraine aside

Ouch! Sensationalism?

I just hope negotiations over Putin's War do not take place in Munich. Or is the sight of the current security conference going to be invoked in the name of a Ukraine-Russia peace agreement. Hopefully it will not be not a 21st Century Munich Agreement.

Now Putin is poised to invade Europe as Trump casts Ukraine aside

Now Putin is poised to invade Europe as Trump casts Ukraine aside: Spy chiefs warn Russia is preparing for large-scale war by 2030 - with president's 'peace talks' compared to Chamberlain appeasing Hitler

By ELENA SALVONI

Published: 04:51 EST, 13 February 2025 | Updated: 08:43 EST, 13 February 2025

Daily Mail · by ELENA SALVONI · February 13, 2025

Donald Trump's concessions on Ukraine have played into the hands of Vladimir Putin, experts have warned, at a time when intelligence chiefs say Moscow is preparing its military for a major war in Europe.

US defence chief Pete Hegseth told European counterparts on Wednesday that Ukraine's dream of returning to its pre-2014 borders was an 'illusionary goal' and that Kyiv's wish for NATO membership was 'not realistic'.

His statements are widely seen as a major victory for Putin and a devastating blow to Kyiv, which as a result could be forced to cede vast swathes of territory without the prospect of a security guarantee.

'I tell you they're drinking vodka straight out of the bottle in the Kremlin tonight,' Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton told CNN. 'It was a great day for Moscow.'

Analysts have warned that appeasing Putin could result in history repeating itself, with former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt accusing Trump of an historical sell-out of Ukraine.

'It's certainly an innovative approach to a negotiation to make very major concessions even before they have started,' he said. 'Not even Chamberlain went that low in 1938. That Munich ended very bad anyhow.'

Bildt is among a number of experts who have drawn comparisons between Trump's statements and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's 'peace for our time' declaration.

The Allies' concessions to Adolf Hitler, which included the annexation of territory, came a year before Hitler invaded Poland, triggering World War II.

The deal was known as the Munich Agreement - and now discussions over the fate of Ukraine are set to be held at a security conference in the German city on Friday.

28. CSA Sends GEN George's Articles of the Month

The members of a profession must write to advance the discourse.

It is great to see the CSA acknowledge articles and authors (Officers, Warrant Officers and an NCO) who are contributing to advancing the profession of arms.

Note that he is highlighting professionals/practitioners currently in the force who are out there wearing muddy boots and still thinking critically about the character of war (and are willing to express their thoughts from out there in writing) as opposed to "retired has beens" and think tank theorists and other pundits. Our best thinking comes from the field and from those with skin in the game. And now, as ever, we must not only outfight our enemies, we must outthink them.

Harding Project Substack

CSA Sends

GEN George's Articles of the Month

https://www.hardingproject.com/p/your-weekend-reading-assignment-csa?utm

Sarah Chamberlin

Feb 13, 2025

This month, we are highlighting the CSA’s five favorite articles for February. The topics range from generators to the Crimson Tide’s Nick Saban. Happy reading!

How to Transform the Army for Drone Warfare

Author: LTC Neil Hollenbeck

This article discusses the U.S. Army's need to adapt to drone warfare, a shift highlighted by Ukraine's effective use of drones in combat since 2022. The author debates the best way to integrate this technology into the Army's structure. It is worth nothing that the White House Resolution 8070 proposed a separate Drone Corps, the Army Chief of Staff opposed it, favoring integration into existing units, and the idea was ultimately not included in the final bill. LTC Hollenbeck highlights the Army's challenge to quickly integrate drones while fostering innovation and avoiding past mistakes made with the airplane and tank. He suggests this is potentially accomplished through provisional drone formations that allow for experimentation within operational units.

Mobile Brigade Combat Team Targeting Process “Own the Kill Chain"

Authors: LTC Christopher Haskell, CW2 Matthew Kolbinski, CPT Brendan Hayes, CPT Matilda Brady

Photo courtesy of CPT Brady.

The Mobile Brigade Combat Team (MBCT) concept, piloted by the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, represents the Army's significant transformation to enhance mobility and lethality for large-scale combat operations in multi-domain environments. The authors discuss how the MBCT integrates new mobility, sensing, striking, and communication technologies, enabling commanders to maintain a high operational tempo and “own the kill chain” through rapid ground or air assault operations. To support this, the MBCT developed an agile targeting process based on the F3EA cycle, utilizing "flash mobs" for rapid decision-making and leveraging advanced unmanned aircraft systems and communication infrastructure for increased lethality and operational effectiveness.

Bringing Rehearsals into the Modern Age: A Digital Transformation for Divisions

Authors: MG Christopher Norrie, LTC William Denn, MAJ Christian Turley

Coach Nick Saban observes a University of Alabama football scrimmage 17 April 2010 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

This article highlights the 3rd Infantry Division (3rd ID) adoption of Nick Saban's incremental training philosophy, applying it to military operations by conducting division-level rehearsals using a digital terrain model to build up from basic movements to full combat speed. This approach, the authors argue, allows for greater participation across distributed units and a deeper understanding of operations, enabling the division to adapt quickly when plans deviated. The methodology emphasized the importance of practice and repetition in developing the competence and confidence necessary to effectively execute large-scale combat operations.

A Data-Centric Approach to Increasing Crew Lethality: Proposing ‘Moneyball for Gunnery’

Authors: LTC Jonathan D. Bate, 1LT Ethan Barangan, 1LT Nicholas Calhoon, SSG Jacob Seitz

In this article, the authors discuss how the Ivy Raider Brigade applied a data analytics approach inspired by Billy Beane's "Moneyball" strategy to improve mounted machine gun (MMG) lethality in Stryker gunnery, focusing on identifying predictive factors of crew performance. Their analysis found that scores from Table III, a range using blank-fire iterations, were correlated with a higher probability of first-time qualification on Table VI, the qualifying table. This approach suggests that data analytics can complement leader experience to enhance military training efficiency and effectiveness, with the potential to set performance thresholds and use machine learning for better predictions.

Power Generation – Reducing Excess in the LSB

Authors: 1LT Jordan Bloomfield and 1LT Samuel Pannek

Photo courtest of Army.mil

LTs Bloomfield and Pannek discuss the new light support battalion (LSB) concept and its emphasis on the need for light, mobile, and agile units, which includes optimizing power generation to reduce weight and improve efficiency. The article highlights Operation Lethal Eagle, during which the 526th LSB found that their generators were underutilized, leading to energy waste and increased risk of detection by enemy forces. To address this, the LSB is considering different courses of action for power distribution, including using smaller generators for better dispersion and maneuverability, or a combination of small and large generators for adaptability and redundancy, depending on the mission and threat level.

29. Connecting the Force: Building US Military Interoperability for the Modern Battlefield

Excerpts:

Conclusion: Adapting to the Fog of War

Thanks to fog, friction, and adversarial agency, no military goes to war with the force requirements it needs to obtain a perfect victory. Nonetheless building out connections during campaigning not only increases how close to “right” a force might be, but more importantly, doing so provides the foundation for the rapid change and adaptability required to adjust to any situation at hand. By building robust connections during peacetime campaigning, we not only increase the likelihood of fielding the right force, but we also create the foundation for rapid adaptation when faced with the inevitable uncertainties of combat. This is imperative because most wars turn into a cat-and-mouse game of adaptation, countermeasures, and innovation. Effectiveness in this context only happens with the right strategic culture in the DOD that fosters institutional flexibility to achieve an accelerated innovation cycle, which the Russo-Ukraine War has shown can range from one week to three months.

Battlefield advantages derived from innovation are often short-lived due to adversarial countermeasures. Therefore, our focus must be on creating a force that is not just well-equipped, but well-connected – capable of rapid integration, adaptation, and response to emerging threats. This challenge requires a concerted effort from the services, joint staff, and DOD, and also requires those organizations to embrace a long-term stance to joint force development and interagency coordination, self-control to avoid chasing the “tech de jour”, and humility to abandon legacy systems, service rivalries, and existing projects. Additionally, it requires oversight from the legislative branch to ensure that it is funding and maintaining a force focused on connections and not stovepipes of excellence.

Given the increasing complexity and changing character of modern warfare, let us remember Rumsfeld’s pragmatic observation and strive to build a force that is not only prepared for today’s challenges but connected and adaptable enough to meet the unforeseen demands of tomorrow’s conflicts. In doing so, we ensure that when we go to war, we do so with the army we need, not just the army we have.

Connecting the Force: Building US Military Interoperability for the Modern Battlefield

https://smallwarsjournal.com/2025/02/13/connecting-the-force-building-us-military-interoperability-for-the-modern-battlefield/

by James Micciche, by Jahara Matisek

02.13.2025 at 06:00am

Abstract:

Institutional strategy in a post-information age cannot solely focus on platform development and employment but rather must emphasize ensuring a force has the right connections to operate and rapidly adapt to a flat and transparent operating environment. The three dimensions of interoperability outlined in Allied and Joint doctrine, technical, procedural, and human, provide a framework for force and concept developers to follow ensuring a modern force is connected and adaptable enough to meet the unforeseen demands of tomorrow’s conflicts.

When pressed on force design shortfalls in the first year of the Iraq War, then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld infamously quipped, “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.” While a wide swath of the American media landscaped disparaged Rumsfeld for the tone and setting of his comment, his logic was not flawed. In fact, the “countless duels” Carl von Clausewitz defined as war, expand far beyond the battlefield and include research and development investments, doctrine and concept development, and choices in force structure all occurring long before hostilities begin. J.F.C. Fueller’s concept of Constant Tactical Factor expands on this idea describing how battlefield advantages derived from industrial and technological innovation are often short lived and cyclical due to adversarial counters and innovation. In the end, Rumsfeld was describing the underlying problem institutional strategy seeks to solve, building a military as close to the army you want, while allowing the flexibility to overcome adversarial counteractions and rapidly changing environments to field the army you need, before the enemy does.

Starting around 2017, the Department of Defense (DOD) began refocusing force development away from low intensity conflict that was the emphasis of the Global War on Terror to addressing the need to build a joint force capable of large-scale combat operations against a peer competitor. One of the largest challenges DOD faces is building a force well-suited for warfare in a post-information age environment defined by the proliferation of high-end sensors, cheap but destructive weapon systems (e.g., drones, etc.), hyperconnectivity, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and more involvement of civil society. Within this milieu the historic emphasis of institutional strategy, fielding the right equipment with supporting doctrine and concepts is becoming equally important as ensuring a force has the right connections to operate and rapidly adapt to a flat and transparent operating environment. In this context, the joint force also needs the right mix of exquisite weapon systems and numerous cheap platforms that are disposable.

The ability to connect and adapt is paramount. As the US military shifts its focus towards large-scale combat operations against peer competitors, the importance of building a joint force with the right design that is capable of operating in a post-information age environment cannot be overstated. But how can the joint force achieve this when trying to learn lessons from the war in Ukraine, while envisioning how to fight in the Indo-Pacific? Connections come in various forms, but there are three dimensions of interoperability that should frame how the modern US military should look – and what the joint force must understand, build, maintain, or expand during competition to be best postured to deter in crisis and win the next war.

The Three Dimensions of Interoperability

The three dimensions of interoperability—technical, procedural, and human—form the cornerstone of effective multinational military operations. Technical interoperability focuses on ensuring compatibility between mission command and logistics management systems, enabling seamless communication and information exchange across allied formations. This dimension encompasses the integration of various platforms, systems, and technologies, allowing for the rapid sharing of data and resources across national boundaries. It requires the development of standardized protocols, open architectures, and modular systems that can easily ‘plug-and-play’ with capabilities from other military services, government agencies, and allied nations. Procedural interoperability involves the harmonization of policies, doctrine, and Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) to enable effective joint and coalition operations. This dimension ensures that allied forces can operate together cohesively, following common guidelines and practices.

Without achieving ‘unity of joint data,’ the US military will struggle to fight a near-peer adversary that aims to disrupt data collection and integration, thereby undermining the joint force’s ability to conduct large-scale combat operations.

The human dimension, often considered the most critical, builds the foundation of mutual understanding and respect essential for unity of effort and operational success. It involves fostering relationships, cultural awareness, and shared training experiences that enable personnel from different nations to work together effectively. This human aspect is particularly crucial in regions like the Indo-Pacific, where building connections with partner nations is vital for regional security and cooperation, which supports broader efforts at achieving integrated deterrence.

The three dimensions of interoperability create a framework that allows multinational forces to achieve allied security objectives efficiently and effectively in complex operational environments; their utility is not limited to combined operations, but they can also help shape joint and service institutional strategies.

Starting with a Concept: The Need for Procedural Interoperability

At its core, military staffs are simply a conduit of information and analysis. Military commanders utilize their staffs to enhance situational awareness and support decision-making. Additionally, military staffs serve as connectors, simultaneously sending and receiving information to and from higher headquarters, subordinate units, and adjacent organizations. Moreover, military staffs are cross-domain and cross-functional connectors, which, according to joint doctrine, “allows commanders to synchronize, integrate, and direct joint operations.”

While numerous policy and doctrinal statements emphasize the importance of connections, there is a glaring absence of a unifying concept to serve as the foundation for procedural interoperability. The Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2) concept needs to evolve from a set of principles to a comprehensive, DOD-wide framework. This framework should include codified cross-service data standards and robust exercises that integrate alliance members and industry partners, similar to Project Convergence but for operational forces. Currently, too much of the joint force, along with various commands, relies on different companies and contractors to manage and integrate data. Without achieving ‘unity of joint data,’ the US military will struggle to fight a near-peer adversary that aims to disrupt data collection and integration, thereby undermining the joint force’s ability to conduct large-scale combat operations.

An effective military staff excels at “receiving, processing, and transmitting information in a way which will yield the maximum gain for the minimum cost.” In the modern operating environment, the internet of things, proliferation of sensors, and access to vast streams of data have significantly increased the number of connections a staff must engage with to be effective. This exponential growth in information and data underscores the critical need for developing that prioritize rapid integration in an interconnected battlespace, ensuring staff officers and NCOs possess a baseline level of data literacy. Additionally, the surge in information requires not only understanding which connections to exploit but also identifying those to ignore or even manipulate based on the situation. Too many units lack personnel capable of understanding data analysis and statistics, resulting in numerous lost opportunities to enhance military effectiveness.

Technical Challenges: Overcoming Barriers to Connection

Technical challenges present significant barriers to establishing robust connections within modern military forces. The DOD currently grapples with a complex ecosystem of disparate platforms and systems that hinder interoperability. This fragmentation is evident across various branches of service and even within the individual services. The Army’s four corps exemplify this diversity as each corps uses their own combination of command-and-control systems including, but not limited to, Command Post Computing Environment (CPCE), Maven Smart Systems (MSS), and Mission Partner Environment (MPE). Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations asserts that the headquarters that is “best positioned and resourced to achieve convergence with Army and joint capabilities.” Yet, the lack of standardization across Army headquarters creates significant obstacles for the headquarters’ ability to seamlessly share information and coordinate operations, particularly in joint or multinational scenarios. Moreover, the rapid pace of technological advancement often outstrips the military’s ability to integrate new systems, leading to a patchwork of legacy and cutting-edge technologies that struggle to communicate effectively.

To address these challenges, the DOD must prioritize three key areas. First, there’s an urgent need to develop and implement standardized APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) across all software and hardware development and procurement. These APIs would serve as universal connectors, allowing diverse systems to communicate and share data efficiently, regardless of their origin or specific architecture. Second, the military must work toward reducing barriers to entry for allies and partners into DOD systems and networks. This effort involves technical solutions and policy changes to facilitate secure information sharing while maintaining operational security. Lastly, a comprehensive, DOD-wide strategy for system integration and modernization is critically needed. This strategy should prioritize that any new system development is based on user-level inputs, operational requirements, and interoperability. Ensuring future acquisitions integrate with existing infrastructure and align with long-term interoperability and adaptability goals is essential. All too often, joint and coalition military exercises struggle because of a breakdown in command-and-control, leading participants to rely on WhatsApp and Signal to communicate with one another. By addressing these technical challenges, the DOD can create a more cohesive, adaptable, and effective force that can meet the demands of multi-domain operations in modern warfare.

Building Enduring Relationships: The Human Dimension

The human dimension of interoperability is a critical, yet often underappreciated aspect of building a modern, effective military force. At its core, this dimension acknowledges that warfare, despite technological advancements, fundamentally remains a human endeavor. The axiom that “you can’t surge trust” encapsulates this essence of this dimension, emphasizing the need for long-term relationship building and sustained engagement. These relationships extend far beyond formal military-to-military interactions, encompassing a wide range of stakeholders including allied forces, partner nations, industry leaders, and even potential adversaries. In practice, this means investing in personnel exchanges, joint training exercises, and collaborative research and development initiatives. It also involves cultivating cultural awareness and linguistic skills among military personnel to facilitate deeper understanding and more effective communication with diverse partners. The US military’s various exchange programs, such as the Foreign Area Officer program, exemplify this approach, producing officers with deep regional expertise and personal connections that prove invaluable in times of crisis or conflict.

Moreover, the human dimension of interoperability extends into the realm of civil-military relations, particularly in the context of emerging technologies and the rapidly evolving nature of modern warfare. The US military must forge stronger ties with the technology sector and innovative industries, moving beyond traditional defense contractors to engage with cutting-edge startups and research institutions. This engagement is crucial for staying ahead in areas like artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and cybersecurity, where civilian innovation often outpaces military development. Programs like the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), AFWERX, SOFWERX, and the Army Futures Command represent steps in this direction, but there is still a need for more comprehensive and sustained engagement.

Additionally, military leaders must cultivate relationships with policymakers, the media, the domestic public, and the global audience to ensure both a broader understanding of, and support for military operations in pursuit of achieving US strategic objectives. By focusing on these human connections, the military can build a more resilient, adaptable, and effective force that is better prepared to navigate the complexities of modern geopolitics and warfare. Effectiveness in this context can also mean leveraging civil societies (e.g., NAFO, etc.) around the world that are supportive of US interests and want to contribute to influence operations that shape the information environment in favor of US objectives.

Conclusion: Adapting to the Fog of War

Thanks to fog, friction, and adversarial agency, no military goes to war with the force requirements it needs to obtain a perfect victory. Nonetheless building out connections during campaigning not only increases how close to “right” a force might be, but more importantly, doing so provides the foundation for the rapid change and adaptability required to adjust to any situation at hand. By building robust connections during peacetime campaigning, we not only increase the likelihood of fielding the right force, but we also create the foundation for rapid adaptation when faced with the inevitable uncertainties of combat. This is imperative because most wars turn into a cat-and-mouse game of adaptation, countermeasures, and innovation. Effectiveness in this context only happens with the right strategic culture in the DOD that fosters institutional flexibility to achieve an accelerated innovation cycle, which the Russo-Ukraine War has shown can range from one week to three months.

Battlefield advantages derived from innovation are often short-lived due to adversarial countermeasures. Therefore, our focus must be on creating a force that is not just well-equipped, but well-connected – capable of rapid integration, adaptation, and response to emerging threats. This challenge requires a concerted effort from the services, joint staff, and DOD, and also requires those organizations to embrace a long-term stance to joint force development and interagency coordination, self-control to avoid chasing the “tech de jour”, and humility to abandon legacy systems, service rivalries, and existing projects. Additionally, it requires oversight from the legislative branch to ensure that it is funding and maintaining a force focused on connections and not stovepipes of excellence.

Given the increasing complexity and changing character of modern warfare, let us remember Rumsfeld’s pragmatic observation and strive to build a force that is not only prepared for today’s challenges but connected and adaptable enough to meet the unforeseen demands of tomorrow’s conflicts. In doing so, we ensure that when we go to war, we do so with the army we need, not just the army we have.

Disclaimer: The views expressed by the authors are theirs alone and do not reflect the official position of the US Naval War College, Department of the Air Force, Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the US Government.

Cover photo courtesy of the Department of Defense. Photo By: Taylor Curry, Air Force. VIRIN: 230802-F-NB144-1002Y

Tags: interoperability, Joint All-Domain Operations, joint planning

About The Authors

James Micciche
James P. Micciche is a U.S. Army Strategist (FA59) currently assigned to XVIII Airborne Corps. He holds degrees from The Fletcher School at Tufts University and Troy University. He can be found on Twitter @james_micciche.
View all posts
Jahara Matisek
Lieutenant Colonel Jahara “FRANKY” Matisek, PhD, is a military professor in the national security affairs department at the US Naval War College, research fellow with the European Resilience Initiative Center and the Payne Institute for Public Policy, and US Department of Defense Minerva co–principal investigator for improving US security assistance. He has published two books and over one hundred articles and essays in peer-reviewed journals and policy-relevant outlets on strategy, warfare, and security assistance. Lt Col Matisek is a command pilot with over 3,700 hours of flight time that was previously an associate professor in the Military and Strategic Studies Department at the US Air Force Academy and has been a Fellow with the Homeland Defense Institute, Modern War Institute, Irregular Warfare Initiative, and the Project on International Peace and Security at William & Mary. You can follow the author on X at: @JaharaMatisek

30. Melpomene Now (Fiction: AI and naitonal security)

Fiction| Horizon 2040| Member Content| The Latest

Melpomene Now

https://smallwarsjournal.com/2025/02/12/melpomene-now/

by Jen Watkins

02.12.2025 at 06:00am

Audio Player

00:00

Use Up/Down Arrow keys to increase or decrease volume.

Melpomene Now

“Hold on, Honey. What’d you say? My Muse was talking to me.”

Amanda drizzled one-third cup of molasses into the mixing bowl as the Muse in her ear had just instructed.

“I said, ‘It’s starting,'” Daniel called from his adjustable bed in front of the TV.

“It can’t be starting. It’s not time yet,” she called back.

“Come sit with me. You don’t want to miss it.”

“Amanda, this is your first time trying this cookie recipe and it requires your full attention,” her Muse chided in her ear. “Scrape the rest of the molasses out of the measuring cup.” The earpiece’s camera had caught her negligence. She pulled out a rubber spatula and scraped.

Her Muse whispered, “Noah is calling. I’m going to tell you the next couple of recipe steps–listen carefully!–and then I’ll put him through.”

“Okay,” Amanda sighed. If Noah was calling, his first date couldn’t have gone well. He’d been gone less than thirty minutes. At least he’d be home in time for Melpomene Now.

“Stir the dough until I sound a chime and then create twenty-four balls. Roll the balls in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Then place twelve on each cookie sheet and put them in the oven. I will time the baking. Here’s Noah.”

“Hi, Mom.”

“Sweetie, how’d the date go?”

“We agreed it would never work.”

“What happened this time?”

“I told her I’m an egocentric only child who has had trouble establishing my independence away from my parents.”

Amanda winced.

“Then she said she was an avoidant dismissive who uses secrecy to keep people at arm’s length. Her Muse has told her to look for someone who can be around all day and is lonely so that she can become his everything.”

“What is wrong with this world? You’re telling me this girl’s Muse has her looking for an unemployed orphan?”

“Not funny, Mom. There’s no point wasting time with someone who isn’t compatible.”

“Since when is coffee with a pretty girl a waste of time?”

The self-awareness trend in kids these days had gone too far. What happened to I’m-a-mess-and -you’re-a-mess, but-we-can-be-a-mess-together? When she and Daniel had met, they had both been messes. He’d experienced late-career burnout in Silicon Valley and had driven to the Midwest in a Sprinter van with the plan to become a rural plumber and never glance at another computer screen. She’d been kicked out of academia at forty for refusing to lower her grading standards, and after a round of gratifying interviews on the podcast circuit, had moved back to her childhood home. She’d gotten pregnant with Noah and became a stay at home geriatric mom with a Ph.D. on the wall. This could have been a story of failure. This could have been a story of two smart people who couldn’t hack it. This could have been a story of society’s best hope slipping down the ladder.

But that’s not how Amanda told it.

“Your father and I were late bloomers. We got a second chance and we chose a family life. And that is what we want for you. Someone with whom to share your tribulations.”

The moral of her story depended on how she told it. And isn’t that always the case? The narrator animates the facts with meaning.

Amanda flung spoonfuls of dough onto the trays and shoved them in the oven.

“Amanda,” the Muse said in her ear. “You’re getting upset.” It had detected her heart rate, her skin conductivity, the quaver in her voice. “It is vital when parenting an adult child to maintain ….”

She tuned out. Her Muse always chided her. Whispered in her ear. Urged her to new projects.

Learn. Achieve. Stay focused.

Noah’s apparently told him his loving family was smothering and his self-sufficiency was toxic and he would never find love. Daniel’s Muse told him jokes and identified the birds he watched at the feeder.

“Did you tell her you run your father’s HVAC business now? The trades never fade. Not even in this economy.”

Daniel called, “Is that Noah? Is he bringing this one home for dinner?” Amanda popped her head into the living room and shook her head.

“Does she have a genuine smile?” Daniel shouted, so Noah would hear him through her earpiece. “You can work with anything else as long as she has a genuine smile. Like your mother’s.”

“Come home soon. Melpomene Now is starting.”

What with the chronic fatigue, Daniel streamed a lot of shows, but Melpomene Now was the only one the whole family watched together. She looked forward to it.

“Almost there, Mom.”

From the living room, Amanda heard the voices of Millie and Willy, the comedian pre-show hosts. Their liveliness counterbalanced the ultra-serious M Corp CEO, Jaxal Von. Every month on Melpomene Now he revealed a new feature of the Muse with a clever and theatrical demonstration. All Muse wearers, which meant most everyone, watched. The teasers indicated this episode was going to be a retro-style game show with President Saint-Clair as a guest and contestant. With the election in November, he was apparently willing to abase himself to reach the only remaining cross-party venue.

The chime in her ear reminded Amanda it was time to check the cookies. She cracked open the oven and peered in.

“What do you think?” she asked her Muse. They weren’t beautiful, but they smelled like a happy home.

“If you don’t pull them out now, you’ll burn them. In fifty-two seconds, you’ll be too engrossed in the show to care about the cookies. Trust me.”

“It’s going to be that good?”

“You’ll see,” her Muse sang.

With a spatula, she flipped two gooey gingersnaps onto a plate and brought them to her husband.

“They’re hot,” she said, sliding the plate amongst his sundry pill bottles.

He pinched some of the too-soft cookie and dropped it in his mouth.

“What do you think?”

“Delicious,” he said.

He was lying. She could tell. He could tell. She loved that he lied anyway. She kissed him and he fed her a bite. They were terrible. Had she forgotten the cinnamon-sugar mixture?

Noah walked in just as the familiar music started.

“Bong-a-de-bong-bong. Boom Boom Boom.”

“I can’t believe he’s really doing it,” Noah said, taking his usual seat. Jaxal and President Saint-Clair stood on a replica of the old Jeopardy set, but it had been re-envisioned in M Corp’s signature black, red, and purple color trio. Jaxal looked flushed and elated.

“We have just pushed our latest update to your Muses. I know I say this every month, but this new feature is really going to change everything. And what a perfect guest we have to demonstrate this breakthrough. We couldn’t believe the serendipity when President Saint-Clair begged to appear on the show.”

President Saint-Clair looked stunned by this unflattering portrayal. Amanda smiled. She liked that Jaxal could wipe the smug look off the president’s face. Daniel was smiling, too. Noah was smelling her gingersnaps.

“I’ll get you one. Stay right there,” she said.

“They’re delicious,” Daniel said.

“Your husband is using sarcasm to be deceitful,” her Muse whispered in her ear.

“He was making a joke,” Amanda hissed. She’d never heard her Muse say something like that before.

“Mom, what’s wrong with the cookies? My Muse says dad is lying.”

But she didn’t answer because the president had finished waving to the M Corp employees who composed the audience and the set had gone quiet. She handed Noah a plate with two cookies on it.

President Saint-Clair moved to the contestant podium, the Muse prominent in his ear. The previous president was the first to wear a Muse. People were afraid it would suggest that he bomb Sudan or occupy the moon or drain the Great Lakes for fresh water. And that he would comply. But as people became more comfortable with theirs, they feared it less. The Muse wasn’t giving orders, just advising. People were free to take the advice or not and they could always remove the earpiece.

But the advent of the Muse had been the end of game shows like Jeopardy. Everyone knew the answers right away. To Amanda, the very idea of a trivia game – questions with universally agreed upon answers – seemed quaint and soothing. The questions she worried about had multifarious theories but no answers. How can Noah find a loving partner? Why is her husband sick and what will make him better? With all her talent, on what should she be spending her time?

“You know your Muse uses your personal history, your voice, and thirty-one other proprietary signals to understand your physical and mental state. Your Muse knows if you are lying. And now it will tell you if other people are. It’s truly a groundbreaking, game-changing, soul-stirring update. What if we have to stop lying to each other?

President Saint-Clair was not apprised of this feature beforehand and I thank you, Mr. President, for being a good sport.”

“It’s my pleasure. I’m a huge fan.” His high-wattage smile faltered.

“The president is using a rhetorical technique where one is untruthful to be polite,” the Muse said in Amanda’s ear.

“Strong companies like yours make me proud to be American. It is just amazing what the Muse can do. Anyone who has asked their Muse about my record will know that I’m a plain-talking, forthright man of integrity. It is my pledge to you and to the hundreds of millions of Muse users that my administration will work to remove the outdated safeguards that have historically slowed your innovation.”

“The president is lying,” Amanda’s Muse said. Jaxal smiled at the camera.

“Thank you, Mr. Saint-Clair. I think everyone heard from our latest feature on that one. Let’s see if you can be a plain talking, forthright man of integrity here.”

The Jeopardy-like board lit up. Across the top were six categories.

Political Assassinations

Contact with Alien Life

Government Corruption

Pharmaceutical Industry Malfeasance

Moon Bases

9/11

“Your voters are watching and they want to finally hear the truth. You’re not leaving until you’ve played this game.”

“Jaxal Von, CEO of the world’s most profitable company, is stating his true intention,” Amanda’s Muse whispered.

She gaped.

“Is this for real?”

She looked at Daniel.

“We’re going to learn what happened to me,” he said. His eyes were misty. Amanda slid toward him so she could squeeze his hand.

“Mr. President, choose your first category.”

Tags: Future of War, Useful Fiction

About The Author

Jen Watkins

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

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

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

Access NSS HERE

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