Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

"Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom."

-Bertrand Russell

"Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids.”

- John Steinbeck

From the Joint Concept for Competing (https://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/joint-concept-competing). This appears to be a modern description of Political Warfare:

"Strategic competitions generally consist of complex interactions over cultural, economic, geographic, and political ideology rivalries, often played out over decades. Winning battles, or even wars, may not be decisive. This indefinite nature of strategic competition contrasts sharply with the more finite nature of armed conflict. Armed conflicts are normally bounded in time and space. They end when one actor wins and the other actor accepts defeat, or when the adversaries arrive at a political settlement of their disagreement. World War II ended when the Germans and Japanese surrendered and the Allied Powers occupied their countries for years. The Cold War ended when the Soviet Union collapsed under political, economic, ideological, and military pressure from the United States and its allies. In both cases, however, a follow-on strategic competition arose out of the previous one."

1. Change your mind with these gateway drugs to intellectual humility

2.S.O.S for the U.S. Electric Grid

3. U.S. And Taiwan Set To Exchange Hundreds Of Troops For Training

4. Report from Geneva: The WHO CA+ Treaty Falls Short

5. Vladimir Putin will be killed by his own inner circle, Zelensky predicts

6. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, FEBRUARY 26, 2023

7. Desperate for Babies, China Races to Undo an Era of Birth Limits. Is It Too Late?

8. Iraqi president says country now peaceful, life is returning

9. From McDonald’s to Ralph Lauren, U.S. Companies Are Planning China Expansions

10. How ChatGPT’s AI Will Become Useful

11. The War Will Grind On: Reflecting on A Year of War in Ukraine

12. NATO on the precipice

13. China’s coal plant approvals highest in seven years, research finds

14. CIA director Bill Burns: China has doubts whether it could accomplish invasion of Taiwan

15. Why Russia's war is causing blackouts in Asia

16. Special Operations News - February 27, 2023 | SOF News

17. We must treat cyber wars the same as we treat conventional military encounters

18. The making of a quagmire in Ukraine

19. Elite Russian Forces Said to Suffer Losses in Ukraine

20, Generative AI could be an authoritarian breakthrough in brainwashing

21. Zelensky fires top Ukrainian military commander

22. The Army doesn’t know why junior officers are leaving

23. The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years (P3 Orion)

24. America Must Become the Arsenal of Democracy Again

25. Without Evidence, Iran Denies Reports It Enriched Uranium to Near Weapons-Grade

26. UN General Assembly votes 141-7 for Russian Forces to Withdraw from Ukraine

1. Change your mind with these gateway drugs to intellectual humility

A public service article :-)

A provocative title, yes. But I promise no real drugs are recommended. This is an article on critical thinking and unlike one I have ever read. I also ordered the author's book, I highly recommend this article.

I could apply this to so much of our national security thinking and decision making - from a commander having to select a course of action for a tactical operation to those conducting influence operations (especially those) to making the strategic decision to go to war.

Excerpts:

A few years ago the great science writer Will Storr shared with me a powerful thinking exercise, one I’ve been passing forward ever since. I’d like to share it with you now. It’s very simple, just two questions.

...

I am forever grateful to Will for those two questions — Are you right about everything? If not, then what are you wrong about? — because not only are they a great way to introduce the concept of intellectual humility without misquoting any famous scientists, but answering them encourages the very virtue they introduce.

...

Questions like the ones Will’s thought experiment encourages are the gateway drugs to true intellectual humility. That’s the term psychologists use to describe the degree to which you recognize, accept, and willingly admit to the limitations of your cognitive abilities. To be intellectually humble is to embrace the likelihood that on any topic, big or small, you might be wrong about some, or all, the things you believe, feel, and assume thanks to an assortment of biases, fallacies, and heuristics that sometimes serve to maintain your misconceptions.

And intellectual humility requires an understanding that the word “wrong” can mean many things. Acknowledging the possibility of your wrongness could describe admitting the beliefs you hold in high certainty could be false, or the attitudes you currently hold might be founded on poor or incomplete evidence, or the opinions you routinely share could be biased and very well might change if someone were to present you with good arguments to their contrary.

Change your mind with these gateway drugs to intellectual humility

Intellectual humility demands that we examine our motivations for holding certain beliefs.

https://bigthink.com/the-well/change-your-mind-intellectual-humility/

Credit: Vincent Romero, Jorm Sangsorn / Adobe Stock

KEY TAKEAWAYS

There are more than 180 cognitive biases that affect our judgments and beliefs, one of the most pernicious being the notion that we understand a topic better than we actually do. We cannot escape our cognitive biases through education. In fact, the more intelligent you are and the more education you gain, the better you become at rationalizing and justifying your existing beliefs — even if they're wrong. If you want to change your mind about all the things you are wrong about, you must first consider what might be motivating you to remain blissfully unaware of your wrongness.

Big Think · by David McRaney

While working on my most recent book, How Minds Change, I learned a lot of things that required me to unlearn a lot of other things before I could add the new things I learned to the collection of things I thought I knew for sure.

For instance, one thing I learned was that the 1938 radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds never led to any sort of mass panic. Rumors of such a panic had spread via newspaper think pieces about how getting news from anywhere other than newspapers was a bad idea. I also learned you can’t boil a live frog by slowly and gradually raising the temperature of the water. Turns out they jump right out once they become uncomfortable. Oh, and lemmings don’t sometimes march off cliffs because they blindly follow each other while walking in a single file. That one has been a nugget of popular, but untrue, folklore since the 1800s, long before both the 1990s video game that perpetuated the myth with its whimsical gameplay and the 1950s Disney documentary that did the same by tossing an unsettling number of real lemmings off a cliff.

In each case, right up until the moment I received evidence to the contrary, all this misinformation, these supposed facts, felt true to me. I had believed them for decades, and I had accepted them, in part, because they seemed to confirm all sorts of other ideas and opinions floating around in my mind (plus they would have been great ways to illustrate complicated concepts if not for the pesky fact that they were, in fact, not facts).

That’s one of the reasons why common misconceptions and false beliefs like these spread from conversation to conversation and survive from generation to generation to become anecdotal currency in our marketplace of ideas. They confirm our assumptions and validate our opinions and thus raise few skeptical alarms. They make sense, and they help us make sense of other things, and as Carl Jung once wrote, “The pendulum of the mind oscillates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong.”

Well, I used to believe he once wrote that. I’ve certainly shared that bit of wisdom many times thinking he had. But, while writing this paragraph I discovered he, in fact, did not. It turns out I was wrong about that as well. Which brings me to the topic at hand.

The gateway drugs to intellectual humility

A few years ago the great science writer Will Storr shared with me a powerful thinking exercise, one I’ve been passing forward ever since. I’d like to share it with you now. It’s very simple, just two questions.

First, ask yourself: Do you think you are right about everything?

If your answer is “yes,” then perhaps you should consider a career in politics, but if your answer is “no,” now ask yourself this second, more crucial question: If you aren’t right about everything, then what, exactly, are you wrong about?

This second question should produce a nice, long, “Um, well…” pause followed by a lengthy and uncomfortable shrug. Consider the vast network of neurons in your skull devoted to topics like the Revolutionary War, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Rembrandt, rhinoceroses, red velvet cake — if you plunged into a nice, long, internet deep dive on any of one of them, what do you suppose the odds are that you’d discover at least a few of your beliefs, a smattering of your certainties, a tincture of the truths you’ve harbored for years, were, in fact, not facts?

I am forever grateful to Will for those two questions — Are you right about everything? If not, then what are you wrong about? — because not only are they a great way to introduce the concept of intellectual humility without misquoting any famous scientists, but answering them encourages the very virtue they introduce.

If you sit with the icky feeling of not knowing what you are wrong about, a series of serious questions should begin to bubble up. Things like: What’s keeping all that misinformation in your head alive? How much does being right matter to you? If it matters more than “not at all,” then what are you doing, or not doing, that’s preventing you from discovering your wrongness? And in the areas where being wrong matters the most — like your health, the health of your planet, your relationships, your income, and your vote — what should you be doing, or not doing, to open your mind to change?

Sideswiped from our blind spots

Questions like the ones Will’s thought experiment encourages are the gateway drugs to true intellectual humility. That’s the term psychologists use to describe the degree to which you recognize, accept, and willingly admit to the limitations of your cognitive abilities. To be intellectually humble is to embrace the likelihood that on any topic, big or small, you might be wrong about some, or all, the things you believe, feel, and assume thanks to an assortment of biases, fallacies, and heuristics that sometimes serve to maintain your misconceptions.

And intellectual humility requires an understanding that the word “wrong” can mean many things. Acknowledging the possibility of your wrongness could describe admitting the beliefs you hold in high certainty could be false, or the attitudes you currently hold might be founded on poor or incomplete evidence, or the opinions you routinely share could be biased and very well might change if someone were to present you with good arguments to their contrary.

Complicating matters is the fact that we often feel like we are well aware of all this, that we know the limitations of our knowledge and fallibility of our comprehension, but the research into intellectual humility reveals we are usually wrong about that as well. Though we may think of ourselves as open to new ideas and perspectives and conscious of our individual levels of ignorance from subject to subject, we tend to approach most situations with an undeserved overconfidence in our understanding.

For instance, in a study by Leonid Rozenblit and Frank Keil, researchers asked subjects to rate how well they understood the mechanics of everyday things like zippers, toilets, and locks. People usually rated themselves as having a pretty good grasp of how such things worked, but when asked to provide detailed, step-by-step explanations, most couldn’t, and that fact came as a surprise.

Psychologists call this the illusion of explanatory depth, the belief you understand something better than you truly do. It’s a cognitive bias, one of more than 180, each reliably skewing your perceptions and affecting your judgments from moment to moment. This one in particular leaves you overconfident in your understanding of most things and thus unmotivated to truly understand them — until one day the toilet won’t flush or your zipper won’t zip.

Later studies have revealed the illusion extends well beyond bicycles and helicopters and coffee makers. For instance, when researchers asked for people’s opinions on topics like healthcare reform or carbon taxes, they tended to produce strong, emotionally charged positions. But when asked to explain those issues in detail, most realized they had only a basic grasp, and as a result, their certainty dipped and their opinions became less extreme.

Studies like these reveal we have a rather complicated relationship with our own understanding. We tend to discover our incomprehension by surprise, sideswiped from our blind spots because we were unaware those blind spots existed. For the most part, that’s because we rarely go looking for evidence of our ignorance unless motivated to do so, especially when we feel like we have a pretty good grasp of what is and isn’t so.

The backrooms of our minds

Ok, so you want to be less wrong. You want to change your own mind. How, exactly, does one go about doing that?

I’d love to tell you that you should just go read a bunch of books and watch a lot of documentaries and earn a few degrees, but there’s no escaping your biases, fallacies, and heuristics. The research is pretty clear on this: The more intelligent you are and the more education you gain, the better you become at rationalizing and justifying your existing beliefs and attitudes regardless of their accuracy or harmfulness.

A great example of this comes from the work of psychologist Dan Kahan. He once brought together more than 1,000 subjects, asked them about their political dispositions, tested their math skills, and then presented them with a fake study into the effectiveness of a new rash-reducing skin cream. Their challenge? Determine if the cream worked after two weeks of use.

Subjects looked at a table full of numbers showing who got better and who got worse. The top row showed patients who used the cream, the bottom those who didn’t. The catch was that more people had used the cream than did not, so the number of people who got better after two weeks was higher in that group simply because there were more of them to count. They had made it easy to get the wrong answer if you just looked at the numbers and made a snap judgment. But if you knew how to calculate percentages, and took a moment to work out the math, you’d find that 75% of the cream group got better while 84% of the no cream group did. So, not only did the cream not work, it may have made the rash worse.

Unsurprisingly, the better people were at math, regardless of their political dispositions, the more likely they would take the extra step to calculate the percentages instead of going with their guts. If they took that step, it was less likely they would walk away with an incorrect belief. Kahan’s team then repeated the study so that the numbers showed the cream worked, and once again, the better people were at math, the more likely they arrived at the correct answer.

But here’s the twist. When researchers relabeled the exact same numbers as the results of a study into the effectiveness of gun control, the better some people were at math, the more likely they made mathematical mistakes. If the results showed gun control was effective, the more likely a conservative with good math skills would get the wrong answer; if the results showed gun control was ineffective, the more likely a liberal with good math skills would get the wrong answer.

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Why? Because people didn’t take the extra step when they intuited taking that step meant they would arrive at evidence that challenged their beliefs.

However, when the numbers were reversed so the results showed conservative subjects that gun control was ineffective and liberal subjects that it was effective, math skills snapped back into place and determined subjects’ performance the same as when those numbers revealed the effectiveness of a skin cream.

Kahan had found that the better you are with numbers, the better you are at manipulating them to protect your beliefs, even if those numbers suggest those beliefs are false.

And here’s the kicker: None of the subjects had any idea they were doing this. In psychology, this is called motivated reasoning, and Kahan’s study is a single pebble on an enormous mountain of evidence not just for how powerful a force it can be, but how it can operate in secret within the backrooms of our minds.

Thinking about thinking about thinking

The big takeaway here is that if you want to embrace intellectual humility, if you want to change your mind about all the things you are wrong about, you must first consider what might be motivating you to remain blissfully unaware of your wrongness.

While writing How Minds Change, I traveled all over the world to meet experts and activists who had developed various persuasion techniques for changing other people’s minds. Some were being studied by scientists, some were being used by therapists, others were being used out on the streets to change laws by knocking on doors and having conversations.

I discovered the people who had developed the best persuasion techniques — approaches like deep canvassing, street epistemology, and motivated reasoning — had all learned to avoid fact-based arguing and rhetorical attempts to defeat their opponents through debate. Instead, they each used something I like to call guided metacognition. They avoided focusing on a person’s conclusions and instead focused on the processes that person was using to arrive at those conclusions — their logic, their motivations, their justifications, and so on.

The good news is that if you want to change your own mind you can direct that kind of focus inward as well.

How? Make your claims, state your opinions, express your attitudes — but then ask yourself just how certain, how confident, and how strongly you feel. Put a number on that certainty. One to ten, zero to 100. Now ask yourself: Why that number? Why not higher? Why not lower? And most importantly, ask yourself what reasons you are using to justify that level of confidence. Do they seem like good reasons? How would you know if they weren’t? And if you discovered they weren’t good reasons, would that change anything?

Once you start thinking about your own thinking and begin to recognize what contributes to your certainty or lack thereof, it’s difficult not to change your mind.

Remember, the research suggests all judgment, decision-making, information processing, and memory encoding is motivated by something, some drive or goal. Intellectual humility requires we stay vigilant for when that motivation might be to reach some desired conclusion, one that avoids a threat to our beliefs, our well-being, our identity, or all three. In other words, recognize that you can always find a justification to eat the cake when you ought to eat an apple. And you can always find a rationalization for your mistakes when you ought to apologize instead.

None of this is to say you shouldn’t pursue as much education and edification as possible; it’s just that intellectual humility demands you pair those pursuits with an awareness of your propensity for motivated reasoning. Before you can truly embark on a journey of self-discovery, you’ll need to know what parts of yourself you currently consider off-limits to change. As John Steinbeck once wrote, (and I checked this one, he really did), “Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids.”

Big Think · by David McRaney

2. S.O.S for the U.S. Electric Grid

Alarming. Everyone on both sides of the climate issues should read this article (here: https://bigthink.com/the-well/change-your-mind-intellectual-humility/) and reevaluate what they are sure they know is right.

Excerpt:

Government officials have been raising alarms about the risks of cyber and physical attacks on the grid. But what about the accelerating danger from climate policy?

S.O.S for the U.S. Electric Grid

PJM Interconnection sounds the latest alarm that fossil-fuel plants are shutting down without adequate replacement power. The political class yawns.

By The Editorial BoardFollow

Feb. 26, 2023 4:47 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/s-o-s-for-the-u-s-electric-grid-pjm-interconnection-blackout-supply-renewables-subsidy-report-fossil-fuel-4cbdd56e?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

The warnings keep coming that the force-fed energy transition to renewable fuels is destabilizing the U.S. electric grid, but is anyone in government paying attention? Another S.O.S. came Friday in an ominous report from PJM Interconnection, one of the nation’s largest grid operators.

The PJM report forecasts power supply and demand through 2030 across the 13 eastern states in its territory covering 65 million people. Its top-line conclusion: Fossil-fuel power plants are retiring much faster than renewable sources are getting developed, which could lead to energy “imbalances.” That’s a delicate way of saying that you can expect shortages and blackouts.

PJM typically generates a surplus of power owing to its large fossil-fuel fleet, which it exports to neighboring grids in the Midwest and Northeast. When wind power plunged in the Midwest and central states late last week, PJM helped fill the gap between supply and demand and kept the lights on.

That’s why it’s especially worrisome that PJM is predicting a large decline in its power reserves as coal and natural-gas plants retire. The report forecasts that 40,000 megawatts (MW) of power generation—enough to light up 30 million households—are at risk of retiring by 2030, representing about 21% of PJM’s current generation capacity.

Most projected power-plant retirements are “policy-driven,” the report says. For example, the steep costs of complying with Environmental Protection Agency regulations, including a proposed “good neighbor rule” that is expected to be finalized next month, will force about 10,500 MW of fossil-fuel generation to shut down.

At the same time, utility-company ESG (environmental, social and governance) commitments are driving coal plants to close, the report notes. Illinois and New Jersey climate policies could reduce generation by 8,900 MW. Do these states plan to rely on their good neighbors for power?

Many states have established ambitious renewable goals, and the Inflation Reduction Act lavishes enormous subsidies on wind, solar and batteries. But the report says the “historical rate of completion for renewable projects has been approximately 5%,” in part because of permitting challenges. In an optimistic case, the report estimates 21,000 MW of wind, solar and battery storage capacity will be added to the grid by 2030—about half as much as the expected fossil-fuel retirements.

There’s another problem: Demand for electric power will increase amid the growth in data centers and the government’s push for the electrification of vehicles, heating and everything else. Loudoun County, Va., boasts “the largest concentration of data centers in the world,” the report notes.

The report doesn’t say this, no doubt owing to political reticence, but the conclusion is clear. The left’s green-energy transition is incompatible with a growing economy and improving living standards. Renewables don’t provide reliable power 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and the progressive campaign to shut down coal and gas plants that do will invariably result in outages.

During an arctic air blast this past December, PJM ordered some businesses to curtail power usage and urged households to do the same. PJM narrowly avoided rolling blackouts as some generators switched to burning oil. But what will happen when those power plants shut down? A power shortage at PJM has the potential to cascade across much of the U.S.

Government officials have been raising alarms about the risks of cyber and physical attacks on the grid. But what about the accelerating danger from climate policy?

Journal Editorial Report: Tim Scott gives an impressive speech in Iowa. Vivek Ramaswamy is in. Images: AP/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock Composite: Mark Kelly

Appeared in the February 27, 2023, print edition as 'S.O.S for the U.S. Electric Grid'.

3. U.S. And Taiwan Set To Exchange Hundreds Of Troops For Training

Some circular reporting from the original Wall Street Journal article that "broke" this news.

U.S. And Taiwan Set To Exchange Hundreds Of Troops For Training

The training deployments would be among the largest ever between the U.S. and Taiwan and are driven by concerns over a Chinese invasion.

EMMA HELFRICH

PUBLISHED FEB 25, 2023 4:39 PM

thedrive.com · by Emma Helfrich · February 25, 2023

A new report says the U.S. military is gearing up to more than quadruple the number of troops it has deployed to Taiwan in the coming months. At the same time, Taiwan is reportedly aiming to send around 500 of its own soldiers to the U.S. later this year, which would be a significant increase over its previous rotations. Both deployments would be focused on bolstering the training of Taiwan’s military and come at a time of increased friction between the U.S. and China.

A Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article revealed that the U.S. military in the coming months will be significantly increasing the number of troops it currently has stationed in Taiwan, which in the past has included special operations forces, like the Green Berets, and Marines. The WSJ states that the amount of American personnel currently planned to be deployed to Taiwan will be between 100 and 200.

A screen capture from an official U.S. Army video that emerged last year showing Green Berets training with Taiwanese special operators. The video was subsequently taken down. Credit: U.S. Army capture

The article went on to explain that the increase in U.S. troops will expand upon an ongoing training program for the ROC Armed Forces that the Pentagon has tried to keep under wraps to avoid provoking Beijing. “The planned increase would be the largest deployment of forces in decades by the U.S. on Taiwan, as the two draw closer to counter China’s growing military power,” the article stated.

The additional U.S. troops will help train the ROC Armed Forces on American weapon systems as well as familiarize them with U.S. military tactics and maneuvers. The officials speaking to WSJ didn’t provide many details beyond that, like where exactly in Taiwan the exercises will occur or whether personnel are going to be permanently deployed or sent solely for the duration of the training program.

If the U.S. troops are going to be deployed to Taiwan permanently, it would be a notable increase over the 39 American personnel stationed there as of September last year. The U.S. Defense Manpower Data Center detailed that this number included 23 active duty troops from all four branches of the military.

On the other side of the exchange, Taiwan’s Central News Agency (CNA), citing unnamed military experts and sources familiar with the matter, reported that the country’s Republic of China (ROC) Armed Forces are planning to send a combined arms battalion to the U.S. for training in the second half of this year.

“This marks the first time troops at battalion level, typically consisting of around 500 soldiers, will travel to the U.S. for training rather than platoon (25-60 troops) or company (80-150) level as in the past,” the CNA article read.

Also referred to as a joint battalion, the unit will reportedly be comprised of soldiers from the ROC Army’s 333rd Mechanized Infantry Brigade and 542nd Armor Brigade. While troops from these brigades will comprise the majority of the battalion, CNA explained that the teams will also consist of liaison officers from infantry, armor, Navy, Air Force, and Army aviation units along with special operators. In 2019, Taiwan began the process of restructuring its combined arms battalions in an effort to operate more independently in a fight, purportedly at the advisement of the U.S.

The ROC Army's 333rd Mechanized Infantry Brigade conducts combat reconnaissance and patrol training. Credit: ROC Armed Forces

Even though the ROC Army neglected to confirm or deny the details of the reported deployment to the U.S. to CNA, the service did tell the outlet that “all military exchange programs with foreign countries are handled according to pre-determined plans.”

Specifically where in the U.S. the Taiwanese troops would train is also unclear. As WSJ notes, the Michigan National Guard is currently training a detachment of the ROC Armed Forces at Camp Grayling in the state’s northern region. Luke Air Force Base in Arizona is also known to host a training squadron of F-16 fighters from Taiwan.

A line-up of upgraded ROC Air Force F-16s. Credit: Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense

Regardless of location, the training exchange comes as top U.S. military officials are becoming increasingly open about how China, which sees Taiwan as a rogue extension of the country, could potentially invade the island in the relatively near future. These predictions have additionally come with pushes to begin better preparing for this possibility through a number of means, be it increasing military training or ramping up weapons production.

Nikkei Asia, a financial news outlet based in Japan, last October reported that talks of joint weapons production between the two countries had begun, with the goal of either providing Taiwan with the technology needed to produce more arms locally or manufacturing the weapons in the U.S. using Taiwanese parts.

Taiwan is already a customer of U.S.-produced weapons systems like High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), guided M30 rockets, Stinger man-portable air-defense systems (MANPADS), and Javelin anti-armor missiles. However, the military aid that the U.S. has been funneling into the war effort in Ukraine has slowed or outright halted delivery timelines of these weapons to Taiwan, prompting the proposed joint weapons production.

Two Taiwan soldiers demonstrate U.S.-made Stinger Dual Mounted System. Credit: SAM YEH/AFP via Getty Images

Much of the growing collaboration between the U.S. and Taiwan stems from the Taiwan Policy Act, which was overwhelmingly approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last September and seeks to encourage diplomatic relations between the two countries. The bill would allocate $6.5 million in foreign military assistance to Taiwan and supports the establishment of joint task forces and joint training programs with the U.S. to more comprehensively address the instability in the Indo-Pacific.

The legislation echoes calls for increasing open cooperation with Taiwan in an effort to better determine how the U.S. could best support the island's military. Historically, the U.S. government has had a somewhat ambiguous public policy in this respect, with the general understanding being that Washington still adheres to the ‘one China’ policy.

“To this day, the U.S. ‘one China’ position stands: the United States recognizes the [People’s Republic of China] as the sole legal government of China but only acknowledges the Chinese position that Taiwan is part of China,” read an article published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Thus, the United States maintains formal relations with the PRC and has unofficial relations with Taiwan.”

Debates on this stance have burgeoned in recent years, especially following multiple comments made by U.S. President Joe Biden insisting that Washington would get involved in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. White House members later walked his comments back, saying that the U.S. continues to stand behind the one China policy and won’t move away from it unless an official policy change is implemented.

Despite these contradictions, the sending of an increased number of U.S. troops to Taiwan would at the very least be an outward display of cooperation between the countries, which in itself is significant. While this could certainly draw the ire of China, achieving this level of diplomacy and military support is something that even Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen herself has vowed to do.

Relations between Taipei, Beijing, and Washington have been especially tense as of late due to a number of contributing factors. Whether it be territory disputes over Taiwan and the South China Sea, balloon incursions, or China’s own rapid fielding and heavy investment in high-end military technologies and weapon systems, the Pentagon says it is taking the necessary measures to avoid inflaming the situation further while ensuring Taiwan is capable of defending itself.

A U.S. Air Force pilot looked down at the suspected Chinese surveillance balloon as it hovered over the Central Continental United States February 3, 2023. Credit: DOD

“One of the difficult things to determine is what really is objectionable to China,” a U.S. official told WSJ. “We don’t think at the levels that we’re engaged in and are likely to remain engaged in the near future that we are anywhere close to a tipping point for China, but that’s a question that is constantly being evaluated and looked at specifically with every decision involving support to Taiwan.”

An increased U.S. presence in Taiwan, paired with Taiwan’s own reportedly record-breaking deployment of its troops in exchange, underscores the expanding strategic partnership between the countries. How it may be interpreted by China remains to be seen, but it is clear that the U.S. intends to increase its military support of the island nation.

Contact the author: Emma@thewarzone.com

thedrive.com · by Emma Helfrich · February 25, 2023

4. Report from Geneva: The WHO CA+ Treaty Falls Short

Here is the problem with China and international organizations. Why should China be considered a developing country if it has the second largest economy in the world?

Excerpts:

A central pillar of the treaty is to facilitate the transfer of technology to “developing” countries and provide resources to shore up their health systems. Guess what? Despite having the second largest economy in the world, the U.N. considers China a developing country. This means that China will likely be a beneficiary of these transfers. China already steals intellectual property; the treaty would legalize it.

...

As a cherry on top, the treaty encourages national governments to crack down on “misinformation or disinformation” – a clear invitation to suppress free speech. Is this really the path to take given mounting evidence that government claims governing mask effectiveness, vaccines versus natural immunity, and school closures were unsound? Can an unreformed WHO, which echoed Chinese propaganda in January 2020 that there was “no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission” of COVID-19, be trusted to judge misinformation?

It is unclear to what extent the Biden administration supports the above-mentioned provisions of the draft treaty. However, in the treaty negotiations starting today the Administration should demand that these provisions be excised.

Report from Geneva: The WHO CA+ Treaty Falls Short

19fortyfive.com · by Brett D. Schaefer and Steven Groves · February 26, 2023

Feb. 27, 2023—GENEVA. Negotiations open here today on the “zero draft” of the World Health Organization’s new pandemic treaty. Known as “WHO CA+,” the treaty is already drawing criticism from some U.S. senators who remember how President Obama bypassed the Senate in 2015 and unilaterally joined the Paris Agreement on climate change. They have drafted a resolution demanding that the treaty be submitted to the Senate for advice and consent pursuant to the U.S. Constitution.

Senate approval is not only appropriate, but essential. Many provisions hinted at in earlier outlines and drafts led conservatives to raise objections. Those concerns remain active.

The COVID-19 pandemic was devastating. The WHO reports over 6.85 million COVID-related deaths, more than 1.1 million in the U.S. alone. Globally, the economic costs ran into the trillions of dollars. It makes sense for the WHO and the world’s governments to seek to prevent or minimize the impact of another pandemic.

However, “doing something” is not sufficient. The question that must be asked is what were the problems that led to the previous pandemic and what can be done to fix them. This is the lens through which the pandemic treaty must be viewed. Unfortunately, the draft treaty clearly falls short.

When COVID struck, the existing framework for detecting, preventing, and addressing pandemics was the International Health Regulations (IHRs). The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the weaknesses of that framework. The voluntary nature of the IHRs allowed China, without repercussion, to conceal the outbreak, fail to share critical information, and impede visits by WHO expert teams to determine the origin of the outbreak. Although the draft WHO CA+ makes transparency and cooperation mandatory (using the term “shall” when referencing facilitating access and sharing of research and genomic data), it provides no consequences for non-compliance. Thus, there is little reason to believe that China would live up to its obligations any better than it did under the voluntary IHRs.

In fact, the treaty fails entirely to address China’s central role in exacerbating the COVID pandemic and shamefully emulates the WHO’s quiet abandonment of its investigation into the origins of COVID-19.

Nor does the treaty reform the WHO, which performed terribly in the initial stages of the pandemic. Though fully aware of Beijing’s obstructionism and opacity, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus dutifully echoed Chinese misrepresentations of the nature of the threat from COVID-19. The WHO downplayed Beijing’s unwillingness to allow a WHO technical team to visit Wuhan and its refusal to share critical genomic data and virus samples. Meekly yielding to political pressure, the Director-General instead praised China repeatedly.

Rather than propose meaningful reforms for the WHO, the draft treaty rewards the organization by further empowering it. The treaty would expand the WHO’s authority to declare a pandemic—and that declaration would trigger treaty provisions that override intellectual property rights and charged the WHO with overseeing the “equitable” allocation of pandemic related resources that the U.S. and other “developed” nations are expected to provide.

In fact, the bulk of WHO CA+ focuses not on addressing the weaknesses in prevention and detection revealed during the COVID-19 pandemic, but on establishing a system to mandate expenditures by the treaty parties, require regulatory and policy changes relating to pandemic related products and intellectual property, and “equitably” redistribute knowledge, technology, and other resources.

For instance, if the U.S. joins the treaty, it would “commit to prioritize and increase or maintain … domestic funding by allocating in its annual budgets not lower than 5% of its current health expenditure to pandemic prevention, preparedness, response and health systems recovery.” Additionally, the U.S. would be on the hook to provide an undetermined percentage of its gross domestic product to “international cooperation and assistance on pandemic prevention, preparedness, response and health systems recovery, particularly for developing countries.” This will involve billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.

A central pillar of the treaty is to facilitate the transfer of technology to “developing” countries and provide resources to shore up their health systems. Guess what? Despite having the second largest economy in the world, the U.N. considers China a developing country. This means that China will likely be a beneficiary of these transfers. China already steals intellectual property; the treaty would legalize it.

Additionally, the treaty outlines commitments for governments to waive intellectual property rights for pandemic related vaccines, medicines, and other products. This sounds like a prudent move during a pandemic, but it creates massive disincentives for private research and development of these products by calling on treaty signatories to support waiving patent rights and sharing proprietary technology and knowledge. Requirements that trample intellectual property rights inevitably chill scientific investment and progress.

As a cherry on top, the treaty encourages national governments to crack down on “misinformation or disinformation” – a clear invitation to suppress free speech. Is this really the path to take given mounting evidence that government claims governing mask effectiveness, vaccines versus natural immunity, and school closures were unsound? Can an unreformed WHO, which echoed Chinese propaganda in January 2020 that there was “no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission” of COVID-19, be trusted to judge misinformation?

It is unclear to what extent the Biden administration supports the above-mentioned provisions of the draft treaty. However, in the treaty negotiations starting today the Administration should demand that these provisions be excised.

Brett D. Schaefer is The Heritage Foundation’s Jay Kingham Senior Research Fellow in International Regulatory Affairs. Steven Groves is the think tank’s Margaret Thatcher Fellow, concentrating on issues that threaten to undermine American sovereignty, self-governance, and independence.

19fortyfive.com · by Brett D. Schaefer and Steven Groves · February 26, 2023

5. Vladimir Putin will be killed by his own inner circle, Zelensky predicts

Wishful thinking. But are we thinking about what comes next if it does happen?

Vladimir Putin will be killed by his own inner circle, Zelensky predicts

Newsweek · by Thomas Kika · February 25, 2023

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky believes that Russian President Vladimir Putin will eventually be killed by his own inner circle of close allies.

Zelensky's comments originated from the documentary, Year, that was produced by journalist Dmytro Komarov and released on Friday to coincide with the one year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The Ukrainian president predicted that a time of "fragility" in Putin's leadership will eventually come, prompting his allies to act against him.

"There will certainly be a moment when the fragility of Putin's regime is felt in Russia," Zelensky said. "Then carnivores will eat the carnivore. It is very important, and they will need a reason to justify this. They will recall the words of Komarov, of Zelenskyy...They will remember. They will find a reason to kill the killer. Will it work? Yes. When? I don't know."

Reports of supposed frustrations among Putin's inner circle have been frequent in recent months, as the war in Ukraine has continued to drag on with the Russian army suffering historically catastrophic losses and a definitive victory for either side nowhere in sight. In December, The Washington Post reported that the Russian president's closest allies were growing increasingly frustrated with him, speculating that has no idea what he is doing and no solid plan moving forward in Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is seen. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently predicted that Putin will be done in by his own allies during a time of weakness. Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images

Particular frustrations mentioned in the report centered on Putin's decision to cancel his annual New Year's Eve State of the State address, with the report finding speculation that the tradition was called off due to the fact that he would have no positive news to give about Ukraine and no plans to share. The address is typically a long and thorough affair, with a speech before the Russian Federal Assembly followed by an hours-long meeting with the press.

Speculation from intelligence experts has often highlighted the likelihood that Putin will be ousted by his inner circle. Speaking with the Daily Beast over the summer, former CIA official Daniel Hoffman said that Putin's ousting by his allies would be an abrupt and covert move.

"These guys that are going to do it are going to be so secret about it, so that Putin doesn't find them and kill them first," Hoffman explained. "It'll happen all of a sudden. And he'll be dead."

The Kremlin has never addressed the persistent rumors of discontent among Putin's close allies, though it has maintained a positive outlook on its invasion of Ukraine.

Newsweek reached out to Russian officials for comment.

Newsweek · by Thomas Kika · February 25, 2023

6. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, FEBRUARY 26, 2023

Maps/graphics: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-february-26-2023

Key inflections in ongoing military operations on February 26:

Deputy Head of the Ukrainian Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) Vadym Skibitsky stated that Ukrainian forces will be ready for a counteroffensive this upcoming spring and that one of Ukraine’s strategic goals will be to drive a wedge into the Russian front in southern Ukraine between Crimea and the Russian mainland.[43]

Russian President Vladimir Putin falsely stated that the West is trying to break up the Russian Federation and suggested that Western security assistance to Ukraine makes the West a participant in the war.[44] Putin leaned on a longstanding rhetorical line of effort for raising domestic support for the war by falsely claiming that the West is threatening the survival of the Russian people as a unified ethnic group.[45]

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu stated that the types of systems that the West provides to Ukraine will determine how far Russian forces need to push threats away from Russia’s borders, likely in support of an ongoing Russian information operation aimed at discouraging the Western provision of specific systems to Ukraine.[46]

US Central Intelligence Director William Burns stated on February 25 that the CIA is confident that Chinese leadership is considering the provision of lethal equipment to Russia but has not made a final decision.[47]

Russian forces continued to conduct unsuccessful operations northwest of Svatove and near Kreminna.[48]

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, FEBRUARY 26, 2023

Feb 26, 2023 - Press ISW

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, February 26, 2023

Kateryna Stepanenko and Frederick W. Kagan

February 26, 9:15 pm ET

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

ISW is publishing an abbreviated campaign update today, February 26. This report focuses on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attempt to avoid ordering involuntary mobilization by launching a series of irregular volunteer force generation campaigns since late May 2022 and the consequences of that attempt. Putin sought to satisfy the requirement for replacements following Russian defeats around Kyiv by conducting a voluntary recruitment campaign building on the existing campaigns already being conducted by quasi-official ultranationalist groups such as the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR) or the Wagner Group. Putin unsuccessfully attempted to establish new all-volunteer formations over the summer that competed with other existing quasi-official formations. Putin eventually abandoned his volunteer recruitment campaign after Ukrainian forces liberated much of Kharkiv Oblast between September 6 and September 11, ordering partial reserve mobilization on September 21.

Russia likely began to run out of combat-ready forces by late May 2022, forcing Russian President Vladimir Putin to decide between launching a volunteer recruitment campaign or ordering an unpopular involuntary reserve call-up. ISW observed several indicators that suggested that the Russian military command had begun to suffer significant manpower shortages in May 2022. Russian forces began withdrawing from their positions immediately around Kharkiv City in mid-May, and ISW assessed that Russian forces had abandoned their offensive on the Izyum-Slovyansk line in favor of concentrating forces for the seizure of Severodonetsk-Lysychansk.[1] The inability of Russian forces to pursue offensives on both Severodonetsk-Lysychansk and Slovyansk simultaneously reflected serious limitations in Russian combat power. Russian veteran communities apparently came to the same conclusion and called on Putin and the Russian MoD to immediately declare partial mobilization while improving the mobilization call-up system for subsequent mobilization waves in May 2022.[2] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) had likely advised Putin that he needed to declare mobilization as soon as possible to ensure that Russia had sufficient combat power to continue offensive operations past the capture of the Severodonetsk-Lysychansk line.

Putin likely rejected the Russian military’s advice to order an involuntary reserve call-up because of the unpopularity of the move, the fact that he had not set informational conditions for it, and possibly also because of his growing distrust of the Russian MoD, which had overseen such spectacular failures in the war to date.[3] Putin decided instead to double down on existing volunteer recruitment efforts already being conducted by ultranationalist groups and ordered the formation of new volunteer formations. Putin signaled this decision by removing the upper age limits for contract service on May 28, 2022, which would expand the pool of volunteers (although not in a way that would generate many volunteers suitable for frontline combat).[4] Putin also removed the planners and the executors of his invasion plan – Chief of Russian General Staff Valery Gerasimov and Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu – from the public eye, prompting many to speculate that both had been fired or demoted.[5] Putin began to interact directly with the Russian ultranationalist milblogger community that was spearheading the voluntary recruitment campaign – even holding an official meeting with milbloggers on June 17.[6] Milbloggers had been increasingly criticizing the Russian MoD for failing to achieve significant victories while taking heavy losses and for their repeated military failures, likely voicing similar complaints to Putin.[7] Putin and his mouthpieces continued to push a narrative that the Russian “special military operation” in Ukraine was a limited campaign that would not affect the general Russian public, setting informational conditions to preclude rather than facilitate involuntary mobilization.[8]

The Kremlin had consistently outsourced voluntary recruitment efforts to support its operations abroad and during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine to ultranationalist groups and likely allowed ultranationalist networks to expand their force generation campaigns over the summer. The New America Foundation found that the Kremlin has been relying on Russian ultranationalist networks – such as Task Force Rusich and the Russian Imperial Movement (RIM) -- to recruit active reservists, veterans, and contract servicemen for Russia’s covert operations abroad for years.[9] These ultranationalist movements are interconnected both in the real world and online, with Rusich and RIM facilitating recruitment for the Wagner Group’s commanders.[10] New America also observed that these ultranationalist groups have been using online platforms such as VK and Telegram to facilitate recruitment, crowdfund, and disperse propaganda.[11] Recruitment for the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR), select regional volunteer formations such as the Alania Battalion in North Ossetia, Chechen units, and Cossack paramilitary groups among other formations have similar online recruitment campaigns.[12] These campaigns continue to target Russian nationalists via financial incentives and by appealing to their ideological convictions.[13]

The Kremlin likely turned to these existing networks in hopes that they would immediately attract volunteers who ideologically support his war. ISW repeatedly observed and reported on numerous instances of Russian pro-war, nationalist milbloggers (military bloggers and war correspondents) promoting recruitment and crowdfunding campaigns.[14] These quasi-official ultranationalist groups began to increasingly recruit from the general public, reaching beyond reservists who had completed their mandatory conscript service, veterans, and contract servicemen. Certain groups expanded eligibility for service to men ages 18 to 50 or 60 regardless of whether they had prior military experience.[15] ISW reported numerous instances of DNR officials spamming Mariupol residents with recruitment text messages and even observed Wagner Group‘s “Orkestr W” billboard in Yekaterinburg, among other examples.[16] The Kremlin had also allowed Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin to begin recruiting prisoners around July 2022 – a campaign Prigozhin would not have been able to execute without the permission of the Russian government.[17]

ISW also observed that Putin had been increasingly tolerating ultranationalist milbloggers who have become mainstream sources of frontline information since May 2022 despite their harsh criticism of the Russian military command and the progress of the war.[18] Putin likely valued the milbloggers’ ability to recruit volunteers above maintaining the Russian MoD’s propaganda efforts or saving the reputations of Shoigu, Gerasimov, and other failed military commanders.[19] The Kremlin, for example, tolerated and continues to tolerate former Russian officer Igor Girkin who directly criticizes Putin and his administration, likely due to Girkin’s connections to DNR and LNR volunteer formations that have generated additional volunteers for the war. Russian milbloggers have accused the Russian MoD of attempting to censor them, but none of these censorship attempts were successful, likely because Putin did not permit them to proceed.

Putin likely ordered the Russian MoD to form its own regional volunteer battalions to replicate the recruitment processes of the ultranationalist groups rather than ordering the involuntary reserve call-up the MoD likely recommended. ISW observed a widespread campaign among Russian federal subjects (provinces and similar regional governments) recruiting volunteers without prior military experience into regional volunteer battalions between late May and early September.[20] The timelines for most of these battalions are complicated, with local Russian outlets regularly publishing conflicting dates of these units' announced formation and completion. Perm Oblast, the Republic of Bashkortostan, and Chechnya were among the first to form volunteer units, which started recruiting in late May 2022.[21] ISW assessed that at least 47 federal subjects had generated volunteer units as of September 15.[22] The Russian MoD was responsible for equipping and paying salaries to volunteers, while Russian federal subjects provided one-time enlistment payments to local volunteers. Russian military recruitment centers, which are subordinated to the Russian MoD, were responsible for advertising the recruitment alongside regional government heads. The Russian MoD, however, appeared to largely delegate support for the volunteer recruitment effort to regional authorities by reportedly failing to properly equip and train volunteers, and withholding payments.[23] The Russian MoD likely did not put significant effort into this volunteer campaign because it preferred to push for a reserve call-up. This MoD volunteer recruitment campaign essentially drew from the same pool of potential volunteers as the ultranationalist groups, which further complicated relations between the Russian MoD and the ultranationalist formations who were competing for the same people.

The Russian MoD has historically struggled to generate volunteer forces and has instead remained reliant on conscription. The Russian MoD first attempted to form a voluntary full-scale military reserve force in February 2018 by offering individuals who had left active duty to sign military contracts.[24] Although it is unclear how many forces this campaign generated, the Russian MoD’s August 2021 failed efforts to form the Russian Combat Army Reserve (BARS-2021) - which sought to recruit 100,000 volunteer reservists for three-year contract service – suggests that the Russian MoD had likely already failed at incentivizing former servicemen to join their ranks.[25] Ukrainian officials reported that the Russian military command brought only around 7,000 BARS servicemen into combat, which likely indicates that the Russian MoD could not recruit the desired number of reservists before the war.[26] The Russian MoD largely advertised BARS recruitment on its official website and websites of regional military recruitment centers, an effort that was clearly far less effective than advertisements disseminated by the ultranationalist online communities and milbloggers who were competing for the same human resources. The Russian MoD and military recruitment centers also suffer from poor reputations. The recruitment centers advertising for volunteers were the same as those executing the semi-annual conscription call-up, and the Russian MoD had not covered itself with glory in combat during the war's opening months. The Russian MoD, thus, likely largely relied on incentivizing or coercing its current conscripts as the primary recruitment base for contract service.

The Russian MoD, in fact, appears to have abandoned the effort to recruit into the BARS system itself, delegating that undertaking to the ultranationalist community. Ukrainian intelligence indicated in March 2022 that the Kremlin used BARS to covertly recruit prisoners.[27] The Russian MoD likely transferred the wartime recruitment for the BARS program to the Russian-based quasi-official network “Union of Donbas Volunteers,” which recruited men with little or no military training to serve on the Izyum frontline.[28] Russian independent outlet Novaya Gazeta also noted that the BARS structure included Rusich and Imperskiy Legion which participated in Russian operations in Donbas in 2014-2015.[29] BARS formations are technically still subordinated under the Russian MoD while also operating as irregular armed groups under proxy commanders. Russian and Ukrainian sources reported that BARS servicemen did not officially sign contracts with the Russian MoD and often find themselves in a bureaucratic limbo where they are not perceived as being formally part of the Russian Armed Forces.[30]

Ukraine’s sweeping counteroffensive in Kharkiv Oblast between September 6 and September 11 likely shocked Putin into realizing that he needed to order an involuntary reserve call-up. Putin declared partial mobilization shortly after the Ukrainian counteroffensives on September 21. He likely realized that irregular volunteer formations were not sufficient to defend Russian positions or conduct successful offensive operations. BARS units, for example, were responsible for holding the new Kreminna frontline after losing ground in Izyum, and the Kremlin immediately reinforced those positions with newly mobilized personnel.[31] Bloomberg reported that Putin even consulted Kremlin-affiliated milbloggers regarding the situation on the ground, and it is also possible that the latter expressed concern over the ability of the volunteer forces to hold the frontline.[32]

Putin likely recognized that the involuntary reserve call-up could not close the gap between Russian force requirements and available manpower in a timely fashion, however, and so gave the Wagner Group room to expand its recruitment of prisoners and its operations on the frontline until the mobilized personnel could arrive en masse. Putin continued to tolerate the Russian ultranationalist community, which only expanded in its influence in society against the backdrop of Russian military failures in Ukraine.[33] Putin even reportedly listened to Prigozhin’s criticism of the Russian military command, which likely resulted in the appointment of Army General Sergei Surovikin (who is linked with Wagner) as the theater commander in Ukraine on October 8.[34] Wagner was allowed to retain responsibility for offensive operations in the Bakhmut direction, and the Russian MoD did not attempt to integrate the DNR and LNR 1st and 2nd army corps at this time. Putin delayed allowing the Russian MoD to reassert control over all Russian forces in Ukraine until December likely in an effort to retain favor with the only effective forces he had available.[35]

Once the bulk of the 300,000 mobilized reservists had arrived with units in Ukraine Putin began allowing the Russian MoD to reassert its primacy over all Russian forces. Putin named Gerasimov overall theater commander on January 11, subordinating Surovikin to him.[36] The Russian MoD began actively integrating the 1st and 2nd (DNR and LNR) army corps into the conventional Russian military and is reportedly removing proxy commanders, measures that are generating backlash within the ultranationalist community.[37] The Russian MoD is also attempting to restrict Wagner from receiving state ammunition and stopped Wagner’s prisoner recruitment in favor of its own prisoner recruitment efforts.[38] Gerasimov stripped Wagner of responsibility for Bakhmut, began introducing Russian conventional military reinforcements into the area, and ordered official Russian channels to use a euphemism for Wagner forces without using the Wagner name.[39] The Russian MoD is reportedly entertaining ideas to restrict milbloggers’ operations on the frontlines and is introducing new operational security and discipline regulations.[40] These controversial measures are all part of the Russian MoD’s rushed attempts to unwind and resolve the aftermath of Putin’s refusal to order involuntary mobilization in May 2022.

Putin’s clear efforts to prepare the Russian people for a protracted and painful war suggest that he has realized that only the Russian MoD can actually sustain the large mechanized forces he needs to have any hope of achieving his ambitions in Ukraine. Putin has apparently still hesitated to order the additional reserve call-up that Russian officials were reportedly preparing at the start of 2023.[41] He has not turned back to voluntary recruitment and is unlikely to do so, but he seems to remain nervous about how much sacrifice he can impose on his people.

Putin’s need for the ultranationalist community has changed but has not vanished. Putin no longer needs that community to draw volunteers to allow him to avoid involuntary mobilization at this time, but he still needs it to serve as the most reliable pro-Kremlin voice sustaining support for the war effort. He is unlikely, therefore, to allow the MoD fully to censor or shut it down, but he may allow Gerasimov to sideline or remove entirely some milbloggers who have been too strident in their criticisms now that their services as active recruiters are no longer necessary.

Putin may find himself facing another dilemma after another wave or two of reserve call-ups, as the pool of reservists appropriate for front-line fighting is finite. The Russian conscription system generates roughly 260,000 new soldiers each year, drawn in two semi-annual call-ups. The combination of the pre-war reserve call-up, the recruitment efforts that drew partly on reservists, and the partial reserve call-up of September have likely made significant inroads into the available reserve manpower in the age groups and with the experience appropriate to replace losses in front-line combat units. Putin may need to consider expanding conscript service itself, drawing a higher proportion of young Russian men against their will into military service each year. But demographics do not favor such an approach. Roughly 800,000 young men turn 18 each year in Russia.[42] Expanding conscription much beyond the 260,000 of those already forced into military service risks not only taking young men with physical conditions unsuitable for war but also beginning to pull too many young men out of the Russian economy, which Putin is simultaneously attempting to put on a war footing.

The specter of limitless Russian manpower is a myth. Putin has already been forced to make difficult and suboptimal choices to offset the terrible losses his war has inflicted on the Russian military, and he will face similarly difficult choices in 2023 if he persists in his determination to use military force to impose his will on Ukraine and the West. Russia can mobilize more manpower, and Putin will likely do so rather than give up. But the costs to Putin and Russia of the measures he will likely need to take at this point will begin to mount rapidly.

Key inflections in ongoing military operations on February 26:

Deputy Head of the Ukrainian Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) Vadym Skibitsky stated that Ukrainian forces will be ready for a counteroffensive this upcoming spring and that one of Ukraine’s strategic goals will be to drive a wedge into the Russian front in southern Ukraine between Crimea and the Russian mainland.[43]

Russian President Vladimir Putin falsely stated that the West is trying to break up the Russian Federation and suggested that Western security assistance to Ukraine makes the West a participant in the war.[44] Putin leaned on a longstanding rhetorical line of effort for raising domestic support for the war by falsely claiming that the West is threatening the survival of the Russian people as a unified ethnic group.[45]

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu stated that the types of systems that the West provides to Ukraine will determine how far Russian forces need to push threats away from Russia’s borders, likely in support of an ongoing Russian information operation aimed at discouraging the Western provision of specific systems to Ukraine.[46]

US Central Intelligence Director William Burns stated on February 25 that the CIA is confident that Chinese leadership is considering the provision of lethal equipment to Russia but has not made a final decision.[47]

Russian forces continued to conduct unsuccessful operations northwest of Svatove and near Kreminna.[48]

Russian forces continued offensive operations around Bakhmut, and a prominent Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces made further advances north of the city.[49]

Russian forces continued offensive operations along the western outskirts of Donetsk City and in western Donetsk Oblast.[50]

Representative of the Ukrainian Tavriisk operational direction Oleksiy Dmytrashkivyskyi reported that Russian forces are accumulating a large amount of Russian personnel and equipment near Vasylivka and Hulyaipole in Zaporizhia Oblast.[51]

Head of the Ukrainian Joint Coordination Press Center of the Southern Forces Nataliya Humenyuk stated that Russian forces are continuing to construct defensive fortifications in Crimea.[52] Humenyuk also reported that Russian forces conducted failed attempts to mine islands in the Dnipro River delta and are mining the east (left) bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast.[53]

A Ukrainian military officer reported that Russian forces are replacing Battalion Tactical Groups (BTGs) with a new unit called the “Assault Unit” or “Assault Detachment” due to failures with their current assault tactics.[54] The Ukrainian military officer stated that Russian forces are transitioning from larger structures to smaller, more agile assault units that rely heavily on artillery support that are customizable to specific mission requirements.[55]

Russian military personnel from the 1439th Regiment from Irkutsk Oblast released a video complaining about being subordinated under DNR commanders in Ukraine, further indicating that the Russian Ministry of Defense may be continuing to integrate DNR formations into the Russian Armed Forces through the subordination of mobilized personnel to these formations.[56]

Independent Russian outlet Dozhd reported that it identified communication between the Russian Ministry of Education and regional guardianship authorities revealing that Russian officials forcibly deported 400 Ukrainian children to Russian territory in August 2022.[57] Dozhd reported that 36 children had been placed into foster care by mid-January 2023 and that boarding schools received instructions not to place the children with families with Russian citizenship.[58] Dozhd also stated that Russian officials are subjecting the children to Russian patriotic-military education programs.[59]

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

[1] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[2] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[3] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[4] http://pravo dot gov.ru/proxy/ips/?searchres=&bpas=cd00000&a3=102000505&a3type=1&a3value=&a6=&a6type=1&a6value=&a15=&a15type=1&a15value=&a7type=1&a7from=&a7to=&a7date=28.05.2022&a8=147-%D4%C7&a8type=1&a1=&a0=&a16=&a16type=1&a16value=&a17=&a17type=1&a17value=&a4=&a4type=1&a4value=&a23=&a23type=1&a23value=&textpres=&sort=7&x=56&y=5

[5] https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-ass... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[6] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[7] https://www.vkpress dot ru/life/putin-vstretilsya-s-voenkorami-sladkovym-i-poddubnym-govorili-o-spetsoperatsii/?id=148986

[8] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[9] https://www.newamerica.org/future-frontlines/reports/putin-mobilization-...

[10]https://www.newamerica.org/future-frontlines/reports/putin-mobilization-...

[11] https://www.newamerica.org/future-frontlines/reports/putin-mobilization-...

[12] https://www.refworld.org/docid/5b728ceda.html; https://ru.bellingcat.co...

[13] https://www.newamerica.org/future-frontlines/reports/putin-mobilization-...

[14] https://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Russian%20Operation... https://t.me/grey_zone/17041

https://t.me/epoddubny/14621 ; https://t.me/tsunamiART/3; https://t.me/grey_zone/16735; https://t.me/epoddubny/14626 ; https://t.me/notes_veterans/7552 ; https://t.me/boris_rozhin/74734

[15] https://novayagazeta dot eu/articles/2022/08/10/pekhota-pushche-nevoli; https://vk.com/uniondonbass?w=wall-106609049_83512

[16] https://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Russian%20Operation...

[17] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-ass...

[18] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[19] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[20] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-volunteer-units-an...

[21] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[22] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[23] https://novayagazeta dot eu/articles/2022/08/10/pekhota-pushche-nevoli; https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[24] https://iz dot ru/706732/bogdan-stepovoi-aleksei-ramm-evgenii-andreev/v-rezerv-po-kontraktu

[25] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/explainer-russian-conscrip...

[26] https://armyinform dot com.ua/2022/06/16/u-vijni-proty-ukrayiny-berut-uchast-blyzko-330-tysyach-vijskovyh-zs-rf-oleksij-gromov/

[27] https://gur.gov dot ua/content/zlochyntsi-ta-boiovyi-rezerv-na-rosii-tryvaie-prykhovana-mobilizatsiia.html

[28] https://novayagazeta dot eu/articles/2022/08/10/pekhota-pushche-nevoli; https://vk.com/uniondonbass?w=wall-106609049_83512

[29] https://novayagazeta dot eu/articles/2022/08/10/pekhota-pushche-nevoli

[30] https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-ass...

[31] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[32] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-10-06/kremlin-lets-state-me...

[33] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[34] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[35] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[36] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[37] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[38] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[39] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[40] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[41] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[42] https://population.un.org/dataportal/data/indicators/47/locations/643/st...

[43] https://www.dw dot com/uk/ukraina-bude-gotova-do-kontrnastupu-navesni-gur/a-64823447; https://gur.gov dot ua/content/odniieiu-zi-stratehichnykh-tsilei-ukrainskoho-kontrnastupu-bude-sproba-vbyty-klyn-u-rosiiskyi-front-na-pivdni.html

[44] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/putin-says-russia-cannot-ignore-nat... com/politics/1581683 ; https://tass dot com/politics/1581691 ; https://tass dot com/politics/1581695 ; https://tass dot ru/politika/17143665

[45] https://tass dot ru/politika/17143665

[46] https://tass dot ru/armiya-i-opk/17144481 ; https://t.me/zarubinreporter/629

[47] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cia-director-bill-burns-china-russia-lethal...

[48] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid02U7x61aivr8tPRLZr9e...

[49] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid06vga4oxzPVYszXAMNL5...

[50] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid06vga4oxzPVYszXAMNL5...

[51] https://armyinform.com dot ua/2023/02/26/shansy-voroga-pity-v-nastup-na-zaporizhzhi-mizerni-oleksij-dmytrashkivskyj/

[52] https://armyinform.com dot ua/2023/02/26/na-hersonshhyni-u-voroga-zbilshuyetsya-kilkist-dezertyriv/;

[53] https://armyinform.com dot ua/2023/02/26/za-nich-na-livoberezhzhi-hersonshhyny-zsu-vrazyly-blyzko-piv-sotni-okupantiv/ ;

[54] https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1629722073487613953

[55] https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1629722073487613953

[56] https://twitter.com/666_mancer/status/1629747521365966850; https://t.me...

[57] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5DmFRhQmic

[58] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5DmFRhQmic

[59] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5DmFRhQmic

Desperate for Babies, China Races to Undo an Era of Birth Limits. Is It Too Late?

By Nicole Hong and Zixu Wang

Feb. 26, 2023

The New York Times · by Zixu Wang · February 26, 2023

A number of new incentives encouraging people to have children highlight the challenges China faces in trying to boost its declining birthrate.

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A woman and her child on a street in Shanghai.Credit...Qilai Shen for The New York Times

By Nicole Hong and

Feb. 26, 2023

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In China, a country that limits most couples to three children, one province is making a bold pitch to try to get its citizens to procreate: have as many babies as you want, even if you are unmarried.

The initiative, which came into effect this month, points to the renewed urgency of China’s efforts to spark a baby boom after its population shrank last year for the first time since a national famine in the 1960s. Other efforts are underway — officials in several cities have urged college students to donate sperm to help spur population growth, and there are plans to expand national insurance coverage for fertility treatments, including I.V.F.

But the measures have been met with a wave of public skepticism, ridicule and debate, highlighting the challenges China faces as it seeks to stave off a shrinking work force that could imperil economic growth.

Many young Chinese adults, who themselves were born during China’s draconian one-child policy, are pushing back on the government’s inducements to have babies in a country that is among the most expensive in the world to raise a child. To them, such incentives do little to address anxieties about supporting their aging parents and managing the rising costs of education, housing and health care.

“The fundamental problem is not that people cannot have children, but that they cannot afford it,” said Lu Yi, a 26-year-old nurse in Sichuan, the province that recently lifted birth limits. She added that she would need to earn at least double her current monthly salary of 8,000 yuan, or about $1,200, to even consider having children.

Many countries around the world — from Japan to Russia to Sweden — have confronted the same demographic challenge, and their attempts to incentivize new babies with subsidies and other tactics have had a limited impact. But China has aged faster than other countries. The often harshly enforced one-child policy, which was aimed at slowing population growth, precipitated the steep decline in births and led to a generational shift in attitudes around family sizes.

Efforts by the ruling Communist Party to raise fertility rates — by permitting all couples to have two children in 2016, then three in 2021 — have struggled to gain traction. The new policy in Sichuan drew widespread attention because it essentially disregards birth limits altogether, showing how the demographic crisis is nudging the party to slowly relinquish its iron grip over the reproductive rights of its citizens.

“The two-child policy failed. The three-child policy failed,” said Yi Fuxian, a researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has studied Chinese population trends. “This is the natural next step.”

Children playing at a park in Shanghai.Credit...Qilai Shen for The New York Times

Sichuan, the country’s fifth-largest province with 84 million people, lifted all limits on the number of children that residents can register with the local government, a process that qualifies parents for paid parental leave and reimbursed hospital bills. In an unusual move, it also included parents who are unmarried. Previously only married couples were allowed to register children (and only up to three).

The new policy touched a nerve in a country where single mothers have long faced discrimination. In online forums, some commenters praised it as a long-overdue step to protect unmarried mothers. Others bemoaned that it would incentivize men to have babies with their mistresses, criticizing the policy for bringing “illegitimate children” out of the shadows.

More on China

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Covid Deaths: While a precise accounting is impossible, rough estimates suggest that between 1 and 1.5 million people died of Covid during China’s wave — far more than the official count.

In most parts of China, single mothers are denied the government benefits offered to married couples. Until recently, some provinces had even imposed fines on unmarried women who gave birth. But the baby shortage has prompted provinces like Sichuan to start legally recognizing children born to single mothers, part of a Communist Party push toward more “inclusive” population policies.

Women’s rights advocates have celebrated this trend as a win for unmarried mothers. Still, Zhang Meng, 47, a single mother in Shanghai, said China has been too slow in expanding the rights of nontraditional families.

Ms. Zhang found out she was pregnant in 2016, soon after breaking up with her boyfriend. She was 40 years old at the time and decided to keep the baby, worried that it might be her only opportunity to have one.

After her son was born, her application for paid maternity leave and medical bill reimbursement — which are provided to married couples — was rejected.

She sued local agencies for the money. Years later, in 2021, she finally received 70,000 yuan, about $10,200, from the government. But the obstacles for women like her go far beyond compensation, she said.

“What many women, especially single mothers, lack is not money, but the protection of their rights and the respect of society,” Ms. Zhang said.

Zhang Meng, 47, a single mother and advocate for unmarried mothers, at a riverside park in Shanghai where she and her son used to play when he was a toddler.Credit...Qilai Shen for The New York Times

Women’s rights advocates have argued that the government’s effort to raise fertility rates risks reinforcing discrimination against women. Already, job listings sometimes explicitly seek only men or women who already have children; when China began allowing couples to have three children, women worried that employers reluctant to pay for maternity leave would be even less willing to hire them.

“Until China fundamentally transforms its social institutions and has more gender equality, women can vote with their wombs,” said Wang Feng, a professor at the University of California at Irvine who specializes in China’s demographics.

Gender inequality looms over the demographic crisis in other ways.

In recent months, as a growing number of cities in China have announced payments for sperm donations, people left comments online joking that men were finally bearing a fraction of the pressure that women have faced to alleviate the country’s fertility decline.

This month, a hospital in Kunming, the capital city of Yunnan in southwest China, announced that college students — but only those taller than 5-foot-5 — who donated their sperm could receive 4,500 yuan, or about $660. Sounding like a collective call to action, the announcement concluded with a slogan in pink font: “I donate sperm. I am outstanding. I am proud.”

Along with building up sperm banks, officials are also doing more to expand access to treatments like in vitro fertilization. Yet experts have noted that declining birthrates are related more to economic and cultural shifts than to infertility.

In the aftermath of the country’s Covid-19 lockdowns, nearly one in five Chinese people between the ages of 16 and 24 are unemployed, compounding the disillusionment of a generation in which many see the refusal to have children as an act of political resistance.

In a survey last year of about 20,000 younger Chinese people, mostly from 18 to 25, two-thirds of respondents said they did not want to have children. Demographers cite the costs and pressures of the Chinese educational system as a major concern, recommending policy solutions like shortening schooling by two years and eliminating the competitive exam for entrance to high school.

A child with her mother and grandmother at a mall in Shanghai.Credit...Qilai Shen for The New York Times

For now, many cities in China are trying to address the financial pressures of parenting with direct cash payments.

Last month, Shenzhen, a large city bordering Hong Kong, announced a proposal to provide 7,500 yuan, or about $1,100, to households who have one child — with additional payments for each sibling.

Tracy Chen, 36, a lawyer in Shenzhen who recently got married, said the subsidy would barely cover one month of a live-in nanny.

Ms. Chen said she initially wanted three children because she liked the idea of growing old with a large and lively family.

But seeing her older sister and friends navigate the expense of raising even one child opened her eyes. Many of Ms. Chen’s friends lived in expensive hotels during a postpartum confinement commonly practiced in China, known as “zuo yuezi.” And they paid extra for foreign-made baby formula, still distrustful of domestic brands after a tainted formula scandal in 2008 sickened thousands of babies in China.

Ms. Chen is thinking of trying for one child for now. She said the subsidy was a nice perk but that “it’s not enough to influence whether you will have a child or not.”

The New York Times · by Zixu Wang · February 26, 2023

8. Iraqi president says country now peaceful, life is returning

Iraqi president says country now peaceful, life is returning

AP · by JOHN DANISZEWSKI and ABBY SEWELL · February 27, 2023

BAGHDAD (AP) — Nearly 20 years after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein by U.S.-led forces, Iraqi President Abdul Latif Rashid wants the world to know his country now is at peace, democratic and intent on rebuilding economic life while maintaining a government that serves the whole country and the region.

Rashid told The Associated Press on Sunday that after overcoming the hardships of the past two decades, Iraq is ready to focus on improving everyday life for its people. Those hardships included years of resistance to foreign troops, violence between Sunnis and Shiites, and attacks by Islamic State group extremists who once controlled large areas, including Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul.

“Peace and security is all over the country, and I would be very glad if you will report that and emphasize on that, instead of giving a picture of Iraq ... still (as) a war zone, which a lot of media still do,” Rashid said.

While Iraq’s major fighting has ended, there have been some recent outbreaks of violence — including on the day of Rashid’s election, which came after a yearlong stalemate following the October 2021 election. Ahead of the vote, at least nine rockets targeted Iraq’s Parliament inside Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone.

After Rashid’s election, he nominated Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, who formed a government with the backing of a coalition of Iran-backed parties and with promises of improving security and public services.

Despite its oil wealth, Iraq’s infrastructure remains weak. Private generators fill in for the hours of daily state electricity cuts. Long-promised public transportation projects, including a Baghdad metro, have not come to fruition.

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Rashid said this is due to damage as “a result of conflicts and as a result of terror, as a result of a number of years living at war.”

Government critics say the sputtering electricity supply is also a result of endemic corruption, rooted in the country’s sectarian power-sharing system that allows political elites to use patronage networks to consolidate power.

Rashid, who spoke at his presidential quarters in Saddam’s former palace, also asserted that most Iraqis believe the 2003 invasion of Saddam-ruled Iraq by the United States and its allies was necessary because of the former dictator’s brutality.

He said he believes most Iraqis, “including all sections of the society, the Kurds, the Sunni, the Christian, the Shiites, they were all against” Saddam and appreciate that the U.S. and its allies came to “save” Iraq.

“Obviously certain things did not work out as we hoped. Nobody expected Daesh (the Islamic State group) and nobody expected car bombs,” he said. “It should have been controlled right from the beginning. It should have been studied and planned out right from the beginning. I think the myth was that once Saddam is removed, Iraq becomes heaven.”

The reality proved more difficult, he said, but it hasn’t weakened Iraq’s commitment to democracy.

“Even if you have conflicts and if we have arguments, it’s much better to have a freedom and democracy rather than a dictatorship,” he said.

However, mass anti-government demonstrations that kicked off in late 2019 were often put down by force. Hundreds of protesters were killed by security forces and state-backed armed groups.

Rashid acknowledged there are still conflicts, but urged Iraqis, particularly the younger generation, to be patient and have faith in the future. “We don’t have much choice but to live together ... and let our democratic election take place to represent our values,” said Rashid, a veteran Kurdish politician and former water minister after Saddam’s ouster.

Rashid assumed the presidency in October. Under Iraq’s unofficial power-sharing arrangement, the country’s president is always a Kurd, the prime minister a Shiite and the parliament speaker a Sunni.

Rashid’s job entails helping to maintain a delicate balance among Iraq’s various centers of political power and even-keel relations with both the U.S. and Iran, the government’s two key — and often opposing — international backers.

The balancing act is reflected in a monument near Baghdad airport. It extolls Iran’s Revolutionary Guard commander Qassem Soleimani, who was targeted and killed in a 2020 U.S. airstrike.

Improving relations with neighbors including Iran, Syria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Jordan is a source of strength for Iraq, Rashid said. Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia had for years kept a distance from Iraq, partly because of its ties to Iran.

He noted with pride that Iraq hosted a Mideast meeting of senior Arab lawmakers on Saturday and expressed the country’s willingness to continue serving as a mediator in now-stalled talks between regional rivals Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Rashid also promised to take a hard line on corruption.

In October, reports emerged that over $2.5 billion in Iraqi government revenue was embezzled by a network of businesses and officials from the country’s tax authority. And in recent months, amid allegations of widespread money laundering used to smuggle dollars to U.S.-sanctioned Iran and Syria, the U.S. has taken measures to tighten Iraq’s dollar supply, putting pressure on the currency.

“I admit, we did have and we still have some problems with corruption, but the government is very serious (about fighting it),” Rashid said, adding that the government and the central bank are taking measures to regulate transfers out of the country to deter money laundering.

Economically, he said, Iraq is focusing on rebuilding industry and agriculture damaged by years of conflict, and developing its natural gas reserves so as not to be dependent on buying gas from neighboring countries — notably Iran.

Despite the currency’s devaluation and inflation in recent months, Iraq’s prospects are good, he said, buoyed by strong oil production and high global oil prices.

“Iraq economically is in a sound position and probably is one of the countries in the world which (does not have) a deficit in our budget,” he said.

___

Associated Press writer Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad contributed to this report.

AP · by JOHN DANISZEWSKI and ABBY SEWELL · February 27, 2023

9. From McDonald’s to Ralph Lauren, U.S. Companies Are Planning China Expansions

From McDonald’s to Ralph Lauren, U.S. Companies Are Planning China Expansions

Many firms still see country’s huge consumer market as a promising long-term bet, though economic and geopolitical concerns linger

https://www.wsj.com/articles/from-mcdonalds-to-ralph-lauren-u-s-companies-are-planning-china-expansions-c1a33969

By Dan StrumpfFollow

Feb. 26, 2023 9:00 am ET

HONG KONG—Large American companies from fast food to high-end fashion are increasing their bets on China’s consumers in anticipation of a postpandemic rebound for the world’s second-biggest economy.

McDonald’s Corp. MCD -1.16%decrease; red down pointing triangle and Starbucks Corp. SBUX -1.85%decrease; red down pointing triangle are opening hundreds of new restaurants.

Retailers Ralph Lauren Corp. and Tapestry Inc., TPR -1.18%decrease; red down pointing triangle the owner of the Coach and Kate Spade brands, are launching new stores.

And Tyson Foods Inc. TSN -1.81%decrease; red down pointing triangle and Hormel Foods Corp. HRL -0.35%decrease; red down pointing triangle are opening new facilities, as they see a long-term appetite for American-style foods.

The investments come as Chinese leaders tell the world that the door is open for foreign businesses and publicly court Boeing Co. BA -4.80%decrease; red down pointing triangle The moves follow years of “zero Covid” policies that deeply isolated the country and triggered its worst economic slump in decades.

Despite the invitation, many companies remain cautious about China, as uncertainty persists over its economic health and as a deepening geopolitical rivalry with the U.S. ensnares technology companies and manufacturers.

Tesla’s Growing Competition in China Goes Beyond Just EVs

How ChatGPT’s AI Will Become Useful

It still needs to go through new versions and have its flaws exposed to be good.

By Andy KesslerFollow

Feb. 26, 2023 4:36 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ais-not-useful-yet-but-it-will-be-chatgpt-artificial-intelligence-robots-microsoft-bing-chatbot-elder-care-tyrell-corporation-self-driving-tesla-technology-a1a27df0

In the rudimentary days of videogames, I met the team that created the first multiplayer Formula 1 Grand Prix racing game. They had to alter the original code because they discovered almost every player at the start of the first race would turn his car around on the track and crash into the incoming traffic. I started to laugh, because that’s what I did too. Gives new meaning to the Facebook motto: Move fast and break things.

That’s exactly what’s going on with the newfangled generative AI chatbots. Everyone’s trying to break them and show their limitations and downsides. It’s human nature. A New York Times reporter was “thoroughly creeped out” after using Microsoft Bing’s chatbot. Sounds as if someone needs reassignment to the society pages. In 2016 Microsoft had to shut down its experimental chatbot, Tay, after users turned it into what some called a “neo-Nazi sexbot.”

Coders can’t test for everything, so they need thousands or millions banging away to find their flaws. Free testers. In the coming months, you’re going to hear a lot more about RLHF, reinforced learning from human feedback. Machine-learning systems scan large quantities of data on the internet but then learn by chatting with actual humans in a feedback loop to hone their skills.

Unfortunately, some people are ruder than others. This is what destroyed Tay. So ChatGPT currently limits its human feedback training to paid contractors. That will eventually change. Windows wasn’t ready until version 3.0; generative AI will get there too.

For now Microsoft’s solution is to limit users to six questions a session for the Bing chatbot, effectively giving each session an expiration date. This sounds eerily similar to the Tyrell Corporation’s Nexus-6 replicants from the 1982 movie “Blade Runner.” If I remember, that didn’t end well.

Every time something new comes out, lots of people try to break it or foolishly try to find the edge, like jumping into the back seat of a self-driving Tesla. This is especially scary given the recent recall of 362,800 Teslas with faulty “Full Self-Driving” software. And, reminiscent of the “Can I confess something?” scene in “Annie Hall,” I’ve always wondered: If I drove my car straight into a brick wall, would the collision avoidance actually work? I’m too chicken to try.

Every cyberattack is a lesson in breakage, like the 2015 hack of the Office of Personnel Management or the May 2021 ransomware shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline. Heck, Elon Musk’s X.com and Peter Thiel’s PayPal payment processors were initially so riddled with fraud that the media insisted e-commerce would never happen, naysaying what today is a $10 trillion business. Looking back, they were lucky they were attacked at an early stage when the stakes were much lower.

But be warned that with generative AI, even if it’s too early, if developers can build something, they will. So best to shake out all the bugs and limitations and creep reporters out now before things roll out to the masses.

Despite early glitches, useful things are coming. Search boxes aren’t very conversational. Using them is like grunting words to zero in on something you suspect exists. Now a more natural human interface can replace back-and-forth conversations with old-fashioned travel agents. Or stockbrokers. Or doctors.

Once conversations are human enough, the Eleanor Rigby floodgates—Ah, look at all the lonely people—will open. Eldercare may be the first big generative AI hit. Instead of grandma talking to the TV, a chatbot can stand in. Remember the 2013 movie “Her,” with Joaquin Phoenix’s character falling in love with an online bot voiced by Scarlett Johansson? This will become reality soon, no question. Someone will build it and against all warnings, millions will use it. In fact, the aptly named Replika AI Companion has launched, although its programmers quickly turned off the “erotic roleplay” feature. Hmmm.

It may take longer for “M3GAN,” this year’s movie thriller (I watched it as a comedy) to become reality. It’s about a robot companion for a child gone rogue. But products like this will happen. Mattel’s 2015 Hello Barbie, which would listen and talk to kids, eventually failed, but someone will get it right before long.

The trick is not to focus on the downside, like so many do with DNA crime-solving or facial-recognition systems or even the idea that Russian ads on social networks can tip elections. Let’s face it, every new technology is the Full Employment Act for ethicists—and scolds. Instead, with generative AI, focus on the upside of conversational search, companions for the lonely, and eventually an education system custom tailored to each student. Each time, crowds will move fast and try to break things and expose the flaws. Embrace that as part of the path to the future.

Write to kessler@wsj.com.

Appeared in the February 27, 2023, print edition as 'How ChatGPT Will Become Useful'.Opinion: Hits and Misse

11. The War Will Grind On: Reflecting on A Year of War in Ukraine

Excerpts:

As it turned out, events unfolded better than we had dared to hope. Russia chose not to target logistical infrastructure and prioritized air defenses over Ukrainian stocks. Moreover, it failed to brief and prepare its troops. Three vital days of confusion allowed Ukraine to reposition its forces and prevent the isolation of Kyiv. By the time we were back in Ukraine in April, Russian defeat appeared possible. Still, Ukrainian victory remained much harder to assure. It would depend upon a vast expansion of western support and the continued incompetence of the Russian military.

Today, it still does. Indeed, nine years into Russia’s war against Ukraine, we are no closer to having a clear vision for how the war will end. Russia’s failures have created the opportunity for Ukraine’s Western allies to end it on favorable terms. Now they need a concerted military and diplomatic strategy to do so.

The War Will Grind On: Reflecting on A Year of War in Ukraine - War on the Rocks

warontherocks.com · by Jack Watling · February 27, 2023

“So it begins!” This was the message shared among my team at the Royal United Services Institute on Feb. 22, 2022 as Putin signed the recognition of Luhansk and Donetsk and additional Russian forces poured into Eastern Ukraine. Since late November, when it became clear that Russia would launch a full-scale invasion, I had been working under a pervasive sense of dread. I couldn’t stop remembering the feeling in 2014 when Islamic State overran Mosul, shooting hundreds of Iraqi civilians in ditches, or the breakup of Saleh’s alliance with the Houthis in Yemen when friends started to be rounded up and disappeared. I knew that what would follow would be just as horrific, but on an altogether greater scale.

Recently returned from Ukraine, Nick Reynolds and I were uncertain about how things would pan out. On the one hand, neither of us felt the Russians had enough forces to seize and control Ukraine’s cities in the face of motivated popular resistance. We were anticipating protracted, bloody battles. At the same time, in the last meeting we had in Kyiv a Ukrainian general had assured us that “Seventy percent [chance] nothing will happen, thirty percent there will be some escalation in the Donbas.” Neither of us were convinced that the Ukrainian government had its forces in position to block the main axes of advance on Kyiv, while we both expected strikes on Ukraine’s munitions dumps and rail infrastructure to weaken its conventional resistance.

As it turned out, events unfolded better than we had dared to hope. Russia chose not to target logistical infrastructure and prioritized air defenses over Ukrainian stocks. Moreover, it failed to brief and prepare its troops. Three vital days of confusion allowed Ukraine to reposition its forces and prevent the isolation of Kyiv. By the time we were back in Ukraine in April, Russian defeat appeared possible. Still, Ukrainian victory remained much harder to assure. It would depend upon a vast expansion of western support and the continued incompetence of the Russian military.

Today, it still does. Indeed, nine years into Russia’s war against Ukraine, we are no closer to having a clear vision for how the war will end. Russia’s failures have created the opportunity for Ukraine’s Western allies to end it on favorable terms. Now they need a concerted military and diplomatic strategy to do so.

Russia’s Vulnerability

Western support arrived just in time, while the Russian military has failed to realize its potential. Crucially, Moscow failed to begin mobilization in May 2022. Long-range fires pulled apart Russia’s logistics and Ukraine managed two successful offensive operations to reclaim Kherson and Kharkiv before winter set in. Today, the Russian military is at the nadir of its strength: fielding poorly trained and poorly coordinated units with a diminishing stock of munitions. But, as is always the case in war, the enemy’s weakness is only significant if you have the capacity to capitalize upon it.

Russia’s latest offensive was launched in haste, with too few troops to make major breakthroughs. Around seven brigades of assault troops remain in Luhansk and about four in the South. The immediate tactical question that will dictate the course of the conflict over the remainder of the year is whether Russia can force Ukraine to commit its reserves to blunt its attacks. If it does, it may spoil Ukraine’s ability to launch offensive operations.

Russia’s mobilization and newly constructed defenses mean that Ukrainian offensive maneuver must begin with a deliberate breakthrough. Thus, Ukraine needs reserve units to exploit any success it achieves. If Ukraine is unable to get on the offensive then Russia can likely continue to reinforce its defensive positions and the stage will be set for a protracted conflict. If Russian defense industry consolidates production or if China begins to backfill Russian equipment, then the Russians may begin to generate major new combat units over the year.

There is a more favorable trajectory though. If Russia wastes its own reserves in costly attacks as near Vuhledar and Ukraine is not forced to commit its reserves, Kyiv could launch offensive operations and begin building momentum to liberate its occupied territories. With a steady training pipeline of personnel and formations set up in Europe, and the delivery of battalion sets of equipment — especially protected mobility — then Ukraine could continue to generate additional reserves to exploit its successes. Ukraine’s international partners will largely determine which trajectory is most likely.

Between Catastrophism and Euphoria

Throughout the war, expectations among policymakers have veered wildly between catastrophism and euphoria. This has posed a particular problem for analysts tasked with giving them a more realistic view. If in June it was exceedingly difficult to convince policymakers that a Russian victory was not inevitable, by September it was equally difficult to convince them that Ukrainian victory was not equally assured. The same tendency has bedeviled the public narrative on the war. The Kherson offensive, for example, was declared to have failed within days, even though the whole logic of the operation was to inflict unacceptable attrition on the Russians by pinning them against the Dnieper River, rather than to drive them from the city by assault.

These boom and bust expectations are driven by a national security structure that was built to conduct crisis response and is comfortable setting long-term strategy but struggles to deliver over the medium term. Until something is a crisis it remains insufficiently urgent to be forced up the agenda to reach a decision. A good example is munitions. The fact that Ukraine was burning through its partners’ munitions stocks was clear in June and analysts were raising the alarm from the start of the conflict. But the drive to expand munitions production — especially in Europe — only really accelerated in late 2022.

The tendency to make decisions late has driven sub-optimal outcomes. For instance, it was clear as far back as August that winter would provide an opportunity for bolstering Ukrainian forces. But the key decisions among Ukraine’s allies to try and maximize support for the Ukrainian military only took place in Ramstein in January 2023, wasting three months that could have been used to build up additional Ukrainian reserves.

The commitment of Ukraine’s partners to enabling the reclamation of its territory is a relief to Kyiv. President Joe Biden’s visit to the Ukrainian capital similarly signals that Russia’s hopes for outlasting Ukraine’s partners are misplaced. But once again it is vital that policy looks beyond the urgent to the important. This means that at the same time they work to secure Ukraine’s battlefield success, Western partners should also develop a clear negotiating position. Whatever position they adopt, it should be a unified one. Given the deep political divisions that exist, this means the difficult task of privately hashing out a common stance should begin right away.

To Suffocate a State

States are not just geographic entities. They are communities of people who expect prosperity and security from the government. This means that even if Ukraine can reclaim its occupied territories, the war will not necessarily end. Russia would still be able to manufacture loitering munitions and missiles and keep up a steady tempo of strikes. Its submarines could continue to blockade Odessa. The Russian air force could perpetually menace Ukraine’s skies. And the Russian special services could keep up their attempts to destabilize Ukrainian society.

As a result, Ukrainian air space would remain largely closed. Exports via the Black Sea would be blocked. Investment into the Ukrainian economy would remain minimal given the high cost of entry and the continued threat of airstrikes. Ukraine would remain unable to move on and continue to be deeply dependent upon its international partners for its fiscal survival. In short, Russia may decide that if it cannot occupy Ukraine it will nevertheless deny it peace. Sitting behind the threat of nuclear escalation Moscow could avoid threats to its own territory while restructuring its economy to manage the impact of Western sanctions.

This is only one example of how things could progress, but it and many permutations of it bear consideration. In back channels today the Russians are consistent in conveying their determination to continue the war. They offer no terms but Ukraine’s surrender. Conversely Ukraine’s international partners have consolidated around a military strategy but still remain divided over a political one. Charting a successful course forwards is both a marathon and a sprint, meaning that solving these divisions will be crucial to matching Moscow’s determination on the battlefield. Irrespective of how tired everyone is, the war will grind on.

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Dr. Jack Watling is senior research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

12. NATO on the precipice

Excerpts:

Part of that effort, Bauer said, is working to get countries to collaborate on building equipment that partners can use. It’s a job he thinks the European Union countries are well-suited to lead.

That’s a touchy subject for the EU, a self-proclaimed peace project that by definition can’t use its budget to buy weapons. But it can serve as a convener. And it agreed to do just that last week, pledging with NATO and Ukraine to jointly establish a more effective arms procurement system for Kyiv.

Talk, of course, is one thing. Traditionally NATO and the EU have been great at promising change, and forming committees and working groups to make that change, only to watch it get bogged down in domestic politics and big alliance in-fighting. And many countries have long fretted about the EU encroaching on NATO’s military turf.

But this time, there is a sense that things have to move, that western countries can’t let Putin win his big bet — that history would repeat itself, and that Europe and the U.S. would be frozen by an inability to agree.

“People need to be aware that this is a long fight. They also need to be brutally aware that this is a war,” the second NATO official said. “This is not a crisis. This is not some small incident somewhere that can be managed. This is an all-out war. And it’s treated that way now by politicians all across Europe and across the alliance, and that’s absolutely appropriate.”

NATO on the precipice

Politico · by Elena Giordano · February 24, 2023

After a year of bloody combat on its borders, NATO is on the cusp of sweeping change. Or so its leaders hope.

BY PAUL MCLEARY AND LILI BAYER

FEBRUARY 24, 2023 3:56 PM CET

9 MINUTES READ

WASHINGTON/BRUSSELS — The images tell the story.

In the packed meeting rooms and hallways of Munich’s Hotel Bayerischer Hof last weekend, back-slapping allies pushed an agenda with the kind of forward-looking determination NATO had long sought to portray but just as often struggled to achieve. They pledged more aid for Ukraine. They revamped plans for their own collective defense.

Two days later in Moscow, Vladimir Putin stood alone, rigidly ticking through another speech full of resentment and lonely nationalism, pausing only to allow his audience of grim-faced government functionaries to struggle to their feet in a series of mandatory ovations in a cold, cavernous hall.

With the war in Ukraine now one year old, and no clear path to peace at hand, a newly unified NATO is on the verge of making a series of seismic decisions beginning this summer to revolutionize how it defends itself while forcing slower members of the alliance into action.

The decisions in front of NATO will place the alliance — which protects 1 billion people — on a path to one the most sweeping transformations in its 74-year history. Plans set to be solidified at a summit in Lithuania this summer promise to revamp everything from allies’ annual budgets to new troop deployments to integrating defense industries across Europe.

The goal: Build an alliance that Putin wouldn’t dare directly challenge.

Yet the biggest obstacle could be the alliance itself, a lumbering collection of squabbling nations with parochial interests and a bureaucracy that has often promised way more than it has delivered. Now it has to seize the momentum of the past year to cut through red tape and crank up peacetime procurement strategies to meet an unpredictable, and likely increasingly belligerent Russia.

It’s “a massive undertaking,” said Benedetta Berti, head of policy planning at the NATO secretary-general’s office. The group has spent “decades of focusing our attention elsewhere,” she said. Terrorism, immigration — all took priority over Russia.

“It’s really a quite significant historic shift for the alliance,” she said.

For now, individual nations are making the right noises. But the proof will come later this year when they’re asked to open up their wallets, and defense firms are approached with plans to partner with rivals.

To hear alliance leaders and heads of state tell it, they’re ready to do it.

“Ukraine has to win this,” Adm. Rob Bauer, the head of NATO’s military committee, said on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. “We cannot allow Russia to win, and for a good reason — because the ambitions of Russia are much larger than Ukraine.”

All eyes on Vilnius

The big change will come In July, when NATO allies gather in Vilnius, Lithuania, for their big annual summit.

Gen. Chris Cavoli will reveal how personnel across the alliance will be called to help on short notice | Henrik Montgomery/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images

NATO’s top military leader will lay out a new plan for how the alliance will put more troops and equipment along the eastern front. And Gen. Chris Cavoli, supreme allied commander for Europe, will also reveal how personnel across the alliance will be called to help on short notice.

The changes will amount to a “reengineering” of how Europe is defended, one senior NATO official said.

The plans will be based on geographic regions, with NATO asking countries to take responsibility for different security areas, from space to ground and maritime forces.

“Allies will know even more clearly what their jobs will be in the defense of Europe,” the official said.

NATO leaders have also pledged to reinforce the alliance’s eastern defenses and make 300,000 troops ready to rush to help allies on short notice, should the need arise. Under the current NATO Response Force, the alliance can make available 40,000 troops in less than 15 days. Under the new force model, 100,000 troops could be activated in up to 10 days, with a further 200,000 ready to go in up to 30 days.

But a good plan can only get allies so far.

NATO’s aspirations represent a departure from the alliance’s previous focus on short-term crisis management. Essentially, the alliance is “going in the other direction and focusing more on collective security and deterrence and defense,” said a second NATO official, who like the first, requested anonymity to discuss ongoing planning.

Chief among NATO’s challenges: Getting everyone’s armed forces to cooperate. Countries such as Germany, which has underfunded its military modernization programs for years, will likely struggle to get up to speed. And Sweden and Finland — on the cusp of joining NATO — are working to integrate their forces into the alliance.

Others simply have to expand their ranks for NATO to meet its stated quotas.

“NATO needs the ability to add speed, put large formations in the field — much larger than they used to,” said Bastian Giegerich, director of defense and military analysis and the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

East vs. West

An east-west ideological fissure is also simmering within NATO.

Countries on the alliance’s eastern front have long been frustrated, at times publicly, with the slower pace of change many in Western Europe and the United States are advocating — even after Russia’s invasion.

Joe Biden traveled to Warsaw for a major speech last week that helped alleviate some of the tensions and perceived slights | Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

“We started to change and for western partners, it’s been kind of a delay,” Polish Armed Forces Gen. Rajmund Andrzejczak said during a visit to Washington this month.

Those concerns on the eastern front are being heard, tentatively.

Last summer, NATO branded Russia as its most direct threat — a significant shift from post-Cold War efforts to build a partnership with Moscow. U.S. President Joe Biden has also conducted his own charm offensive, traveling to Warsaw for a major speech last week that helped alleviate some of the tensions and perceived slights.

Still, NATO’s eastern front, which is within striking distance of Russia, is imploring its western neighbors to move faster to help fill in the gaps along the alliance’s edges and to buttress reinforcement plans.

It is important to “fix the slots — which countries are going to deliver which units,” said Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu, adding that he hopes the U.S. “will take a significant part.”

Officials and experts agree that these changes are needed for the long haul.

“If Ukraine manages to win, then Ukraine and Europe and NATO are going to have a very disgruntled Russia on its doorstep, rearming, mobilizing, ready to go again,” said Sean Monaghan, a visiting fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“If Ukraine loses and Russia wins,” he noted, the West would have “an emboldened Russia on our doorstep — so either way, NATO has a big Russia problem.”

Wakeup call from Russia

The rush across the Continent to rearm as weapons and equipment flows from long-dormant stockpiles into Ukraine has been as sudden as the invasion itself.

After years of flat defense budgets and Soviet-era equipment lingering in the motor pools across the eastern front, calls for more money and more Western equipment threaten to overwhelm defense firms without the capacity to fill those orders in the near term. That could create a readiness crisis in ammunition, tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and anti-armor weapons.

A damaged Russian tank near Kyiv on February 14, 2023 | Sergei Dolzhenko/EPA-EFE

NATO actually recognized this problem a decade ago but lacked the ability to do much about it. The first attempt to nudge member states into shaking off the post-Cold War doldrums started slowly in the years before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year.

After Moscow took Crimea and parts of the Donbas in 2014, the alliance signed the “Wales pledge” to spend 2 percent of economic output on defense by 2024.

The vast majority of countries politely ignored the vow, giving then-President Donald Trump a major talking point as he demanded Europe step up and stop relying on Washington to provide a security umbrella.

But nothing focuses attention like danger, and the sight of Russian tanks rumbling toward Kyiv as Putin ranted about Western depravity and Russian destiny jolted Europe into action. One year on, the bills from those early promises to do more are coming due.

“We are in this for the long haul” in Ukraine, said Bauer, the head of NATO’s Military Committee, a body comprising allies’ uniformed defense chiefs. But sustaining the pipeline funneling weapons and ammunition to Ukraine will take not only the will of individual governments but also a deep collaboration between the defense industries in Europe and North America. Those commitments are still a work in progress.

Part of that effort, Bauer said, is working to get countries to collaborate on building equipment that partners can use. It’s a job he thinks the European Union countries are well-suited to lead.

That’s a touchy subject for the EU, a self-proclaimed peace project that by definition can’t use its budget to buy weapons. But it can serve as a convener. And it agreed to do just that last week, pledging with NATO and Ukraine to jointly establish a more effective arms procurement system for Kyiv.

Talk, of course, is one thing. Traditionally NATO and the EU have been great at promising change, and forming committees and working groups to make that change, only to watch it get bogged down in domestic politics and big alliance in-fighting. And many countries have long fretted about the EU encroaching on NATO’s military turf.

But this time, there is a sense that things have to move, that western countries can’t let Putin win his big bet — that history would repeat itself, and that Europe and the U.S. would be frozen by an inability to agree.

“People need to be aware that this is a long fight. They also need to be brutally aware that this is a war,” the second NATO official said. “This is not a crisis. This is not some small incident somewhere that can be managed. This is an all-out war. And it’s treated that way now by politicians all across Europe and across the alliance, and that’s absolutely appropriate.”

Paul McLeary and Lili Bayer also contributed reporting from Munich.

Politico · by Elena Giordano · February 24, 2023

13. China’s coal plant approvals highest in seven years, research finds

China's support to climate change?

China’s coal plant approvals highest in seven years, research finds

The Washington Post · by Christian Shepherd · February 27, 2023

China last year approved the largest expansion of coal-fired power plants since 2015, a new report has found, showing how the world’s largest emitter still relies on a fossil fuel that scientists say must be quickly phased out to avoid the worst consequences of a warming atmosphere.

It also underscores the way China is at odds with the global shift away from greenhouse gas-emitting forms of energy — and from its own pledges to reduce its emissions.

The rush to build new coal-fired projects across the country meant that authorities granted permits for 106 gigawatts of capacity across 82 locations in 2022, the highest number in seven years and four times higher than in 2021.

This is according to new report from the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), a Finland-based nongovernmental organization, and the Global Energy Monitor, a nonprofit that tracks fossil fuel infrastructure.

“The speed at which projects progressed through permitting to construction in 2022 was extraordinary, with many projects sprouting up, gaining permits, obtaining financing and breaking ground apparently in a matter of months,” said Flora Champenois, research analyst at GEM.

“China continues to be the glaring exception to the ongoing global decline in coal plant development,” she said.

Not all those projects will necessarily materialize. But local governments appear to be moving as quickly as possible, with 50 gigawatts of construction now underway.

Already responsible for about half of the world’s coal production and consumption, the new facilities in China are equivalent to about six times the amount of total coal capacity added in the rest of the world.

Becoming the main holdout in a global trend to phase out coal runs counter to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s effort to cast China as a climate leader. In 2020, he pledged to peak the country’s carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and reach carbon neutrality by 2060, a move hailed as a breakthrough by environmentalists who hoped Xi would play a more active role in limiting the Earth’s warming.

Coming as the Trump administration finalized the withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Climate Accords, some wondered whether Beijing, not Washington, might lead a global transition toward renewable energy sources.

Modeling suggests that hitting the Paris agreement goal of limiting rising temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) over preindustrial levels is only possible if green energy adoption happens much faster and greenhouse gases are removed from the atmosphere.

China has made strides toward enabling a faster global energy transition. It pledged to stop building coal-fired power plants overseas. Massive installations of wind turbines and solar panels — 125 gigawatts worth last year — as well as surging adoption of electric vehicles have bolstered a sense that Beijing is committed to embracing carbon-reducing technologies.

But undercutting China’s progress toward a low-carbon economy is its inability to quit coal, which is the largest single source of greenhouse gas emissions. Xi has said that the country will begin to “phase down” coal consumption from 2026 onward, but he has not said when new builds will stop.

Preliminary data suggested China’s carbon dioxide output rose by 1.3 percent last year compared to 2021, reversing what had been the longest decline of emissions in recent history as sporadic coronavirus lockdowns slowed economic activity for around a year up until the summer of 2022, according to an analysis by CREA released earlier this month.

That uptick was primarily due to a record 3.3 percent rise in coal consumption and came even as output of steel and cement — the two largest users of the fossil fuel outside of power production — fell significantly. (CREA’s lead analyst, Lauri Myllyvirta, isn’t sure the numbers add up, because industry specific figures suggested to him that less coal was used than reported. That uncertainty is in itself troubling, he said.)

Coordinating with China on climate has proved difficult for the United States and European nations as negotiations are routinely interrupted by geopolitics. Beijing suspended talks in August after then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan, the self-governing island China claims as its own. Communication resumed three months later after a face-to-face meeting between President Biden and Xi in November.

But the main obstacles to China taking a faster path toward peaking its carbon dioxide emissions are domestic. Repeated electricity shortages and turbulent global energy markets caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have heightened the Chinese government’s long-standing concerns over the need for secure, reliable sources of power.

And then there is the problem of producing enough electricity to meet the growing demands of 1.4 billion people who on average only use about 40 percent of what a United States resident uses.

Experts believe China’s leadership considers coal essential to making sure that the lights stay on and factories keep humming even when energy systems are unexpectedly disrupted, as happened in August when an unprecedented heat wave caused hydropower shortages.

Building power plants is also a way for local governments to deliver a short-term boost to the economy by creating jobs and construction contracts, even if the projects are unlikely to make money in the long run.

Officials sometimes defend the decision to construct new plants as a necessary evil to better distribute energy production, which doesn’t necessarily mean the power sector will use more coal or emit more carbon dioxide overall.

Even if that is true, building hundreds of brand-new coal power plants will make meeting China’s climate targets harder and costlier as the coal lobby’s interest in protecting their investments grows, the report’s authors noted.

“The worst-case scenario is that the pressure to make use of the newly built coal power plants … leads to a moderation in China’s clean energy build out,” they wrote. “This could mean a major increase in China’s CO2 emissions over this decade, undermining the global climate effort, and could even put China’s climate commitments in danger.”

The Washington Post · by Christian Shepherd · February 27, 2023

14. CIA director Bill Burns: China has doubts whether it could accomplish invasion of Taiwan

But that does not mean they will not try or that we should relax our support for Taiwan. As Sun Tzu said: "Never assume your enemy will not attack. Make yourself invincible."

CIA director Bill Burns: China has doubts whether it could accomplish invasion of Taiwan

Axios · by Ivana Saric · February 26, 2023

Chinese President Xi Jinping and his military leaders likely have some doubts as to whether China could accomplish a successful invasion of Taiwan after witnessing the trajectory of Russia's war in Ukraine, CIA Director Bill Burns told CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday.

Driving the news: While U.S. intelligence indicates that Xi has instructed his country's army to be ready for a potential invasion by 2027, Burns stressed that a decision has not yet been made.

"I think we need to take very seriously Xi's ambitions with regard to ultimately controlling Taiwan. That doesn't, however, in our view, mean that a military conflict is inevitable," he added.

State of play: Tensions between China and Taiwan surged in 2022, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken warning in October that China could be accelerating plans to seize the self-governing island.

"President Xi and his military leadership have doubts today about whether they could accomplish that invasion. I think as they've looked at Putin's experience in Ukraine, that's probably reinforced some of those doubts as well," Burns said.
Burns noted that Russia has faced vast casualties, "cumulative economic damage," as well as "huge reputational damage" as a result of its war in Ukraine.
"There's no foreign leader who's watched more carefully Vladimir Putin's experience in Ukraine, the evolution of the war, than Xi Jinping has," Burns said.
"I think, in many ways, he's been unsettled and sobered by what he's seen," Burns added.

The big picture: The Chinese government has repeatedly vowed to take control of Taiwan, by force if necessary, and it reacts furiously to any gesture that seems to treat Taiwan as an independent state.

President Biden has vowed on more than one occasion that American forces would defend Taiwan if China's military invaded the self-governing island

Axios · by Ivana Saric · February 26, 2023

15. Why Russia's war is causing blackouts in Asia

Why Russia's war is causing blackouts in Asia

By BENJAMIN STORROW and SARA SCHONHARDT

02/25/2023 07:00 AM EST

Politico

The fighting on Ukrainian battlefields has disrupted the supply of energy worldwide. Some of the biggest impacts are happening in countries far from the war.

Asian countries are scrounging for fuel after liquefied natural gas cargoes were rerouted to wealthy European markets. | Vadim Ghirda/AP Photo

By Benjamin Storrow and Sara Schonhardt

02/25/2023 07:00 AM EST

Europe was expecting to freeze when Russia invaded Ukraine. Instead, the war’s shock waves left some Asian nations in the dark.

After a year of fighting, Europe’s gas reserves are bulging and its leaders are moving forward with ambitious plans to green their economies. But it’s starkly different thousands of miles away, where poor Asian countries are scrounging for fuel after liquefied natural gas cargoes were rerouted to wealthy European markets.

Some nations, including India and Indonesia, have resorted to burning more coal — a setback for the global fight against climate change. Others, like Bangladesh and Pakistan, have endured blackouts due to abrupt fuel shortages.

One year into Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s assault on Ukraine, deep fault lines are being exposed in the global energy system — especially between rich and poor nations. Those that can afford to pay rising prices are buying up energy resources such as natural gas, while preparing for climate change by developing renewable power such as wind and solar. Those that can’t are slipping back into the grip of dirtier fuels — or going dark.

“I think there will be greater gaps between countries,” said Jane Nakano, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The war’s impact was also felt across parts of Africa, where millions of people lost electricity as rising prices for fuel and food compounded the impacts of climate change and Covid-19.

The scramble by countries worldwide for coal, gas and oil supplies helped drive greenhouse gas emissions close to an all-time high last year, just as the clock is ticking on global climate efforts. Scientists say the world has nine years at current emissions rates until the rise in global temperatures since the dawn of the industrial era eclipses 1.5 degrees Celsius, the threshold for dire harm to people, economies and ecosystems.

Emerging economies in southern Asia, in particular, are vital to global climate efforts because their growing populations demand higher amounts of energy. They are also among the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

Pakistan, a country of 220 million people, is perhaps the most dramatic example. The country, already gripped by political turmoil, experienced devastating floods last year that caused more than $30 billion in damages.

The war made it worse.

More than a quarter of the gas that Pakistan used for power plants, factories and cooking food in 2021 came from international shipments of LNG, according to data from BP. But last year, companies rerouted much of it to wealthier ports in Europe, and to richer Asian nations that could still afford the higher prices.

Nine shipments bound for Pakistan were diverted to other countries, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. Prices for imported coal also soared, prompting Pakistan to increase its domestic production of lignite — a carbon-intensive form of fuel.

It still wasn’t enough energy.

The shortage collided with an extreme heat wave whose impact, scientists said, was multiplied by human-caused climate change. As electricity demand surged, Pakistan turned to emergency measures. The government ordered malls to close early, and it shut off streetlights.

Then last month, one attempt to ration fuel backfired spectacularly: Coal and nuclear plants that had been shut down overnight to conserve resources failed to restart. The nation went dark for 15 hours.

“When you’re desperate, you do what you need to do,” said Ahmad Faruqui, a Pakistani-born economist who tracks the country’s energy system.

Natural gas goes global

The world has experienced global energy crises before, such as the Arab oil embargoes of the 1970s. But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine spawned the first true global gas crisis.

Gas is traditionally a regional commodity transported through pipelines. That is especially true in Europe. Gas produced in Siberia is piped across Russia and into Europe, where it feeds power plants, factories and home furnaces. In 2021, about 40 percent of European gas consumption was supplied by Russia, according to the International Energy Agency.

Moscow launched its invasion in February 2022 at a moment of transition in gas markets. Liquefied natural gas, which is chilled to negative-260 degrees Fahrenheit and loaded on ships, was previously a niche market between countries like Qatar and Japan.

But LNG has gone global in recent years, fueled in part by a glut of cheap gas and new export terminals in the United States. The U.S., which shipped its first cargo of LNG in 2016, was the world’s largest exporter during the first half of 2022, before a Texas terminal caught fire and crimped U.S. shipments, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

So when Putin ordered the attack on Ukraine, Europe retaliated by turning to the U.S. and a few other countries to replace the gas it once received from Russia. U.S. shipments to Europe more than doubled in 2022, to 2.7 trillion cubic feet, according to Energy Department figures.

Europe’s efforts to stockpile gas stoked resentment in other parts of the world.

The frustrations came as U.S. gas shipments once bound for Asia were being diverted to Europe, sending prices soaring. In China, LNG demand tumbled 20 percent in the face of high prices and lower economic growth stemming from its pandemic lockdowns. The impact of high prices was particularly acute in South Asia, where countries like India, Pakistan and Bangladesh saw demand fall by a combined 16 percent, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.

Before the war, analysts expected that rising LNG demand in emerging Asian markets would rival that of China and India over the next 20 years.

Now, the picture is less clear. In its latest world energy outlook, the IEA projected a diminished role for natural gas in developing Asia, in part because of concerns about affordability.

Future decisions by developing countries may come down to which fuel is affordable and available, said Sam Reynolds, an energy finance analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. “And as the past year has shown, LNG meets neither of those criteria.”

‘Debt distress’ versus the climate crisis

Some countries are hedging their bets.

Coal generation in India spiked 21 percent between April and July of last year, when a heat wave baked the country. Some officials say coal will remain a vital part of the country’s energy mix well into the future. At the same time, India is working to build hundreds of gigawatts of renewable energy.

South Africa, Vietnam and Indonesia — all major coal consumers — have agreed to reduce coal use and cut carbon emissions in return for clean energy funding as part of Just Energy Transition Partnerships, an initiative led by the U.S. and other Group of Seven countries.

Officials in the Philippines have sought to boost their renewable energy targets, too, in a bid to generate more power domestically and cut emissions. They say part of that strategy depends on having gas as a backup.

But the war is making that difficult.

Several planned liquefied natural gas projects in the Philippines are being delayed, in part because of high gas prices and a lack of long-term contracts that would ensure consistent supplies. That’s creating uncertainty about LNG investments.

“Our objective, if possible, is how to reduce the cost of energy,” said Michael Sinocruz, director of the policy and planning bureau at the Philippines Department of Energy. “And to do that, we need to study carefully what would be the best mix for the Philippines.”

More renewables could spare the Philippines from volatility in the price and supply of fossil fuels. But if more renewables come online, the country would also need to invest in batteries, storage and backup energy, Sinocruz said.

“So in that case we need to balance,” he added.

Analysts say more international funding and private-sector investment are needed to accelerate clean energy transitions in emerging economies. Without it, countries may follow Pakistan’s path.

Soaring fuel costs have drained the country’s coffers. The IEA estimates that at least 30 percent of Pakistan’s import payments went to oil and LNG over the last nine months of 2022 — revealing a desperate attempt to keep its economy functioning. The central bank now has enough foreign exchange reserves to cover just three weeks of imports, Reuters reported this month.

The economic crisis means Pakistan lacks the creditworthiness to attract private investment in renewable energy infrastructure, said Rishikesh Ram Bhandary, assistant director of the Global Economic Governance Initiative at Boston University.

“If you’re Pakistan and you’re actually in debt distress, you’re not going to be able to borrow to build these gigantic things,” Ram Bhandary said.

So the country turned to coal.

Pakistan plans to halt LNG imports and quadruple domestic coal production, its energy minister told Reuters.

The announcement is all the more notable because coal generation was virtually nonexistent in Pakistan as recently as 2010. That changed when Pakistan exploited a domestic coal seam with financing from China. Later, it began importing coal. Last year, coal accounted for 30 percent of Pakistan’s power generation, according to the IEA.

“I don’t think, honestly, they are going to let go of coal. It is a prized resource to them,” said Faruqui, the economist. “Climate change is a long-term issue. In the near term we need to keep the lights on.”

POLITICO

Politico

16. Special Operations News - February 27, 2023 | SOF News

Special Operations News - February 27, 2023 | SOF News

sof.news · by SOF News · February 27, 2023

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

Photo / Image: 308th Rescue Squadron pararescumen climb into the back of a 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment MH-47G Chinook helicopter into Banana River, Florida, Feb. 15, 2023, during combat search and rescue training. The 160th SOAR’s mission is to organize, equip, train, resource and employ Army special operations aviation forces worldwide in support of contingency missions and combatant commanders. (Staff Sgt. Darius Sostre-Miroir).

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

SOF News

Reassignment of Rear Adm. Milton J. Sands III. He will be assigned as chief of staff, U.S. Special Operations Command, MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. Sands is currently serving as commander, Special Operations Command Africa.

New SOCAFRICA Cdr. Rear Adm. (lower half) Ronald A. Foy, will be assigned as commander, Special Operations Command Africa. Foy is currently serving as deputy director, Global Operations, Joint Staff, Washington, D.C.

Advanced Mortar System Used by CSOJTF-L. A computer-assisted 120mm mortar turret system is providing special operations forces of the Combined Special Operations Joint Task Force – Levant based at remote locations in the Middle East an extra layer of defense. “Futuristic Mortar Turret Seen in Action at U.S. Special Ops Base in Syria”, by Joseph Trevithick, The WarZone, February 21, 2023.

Navy SEAL Dies in Parachute Accident. A sailor died on February 19, 2023 after a military free fall training accident in Arizona. Chief Special Warfare Operator Michael Ernst was assigned to a Naval Special Warfare East Coast-based unit. Ernst enlisted in the Navy in August 2009. “Naval Special Warfare sailor dies in training accident”, Navy Times, February 21, 2023.

NSWG-1 Medical Unit. The Naval Special Warfare Group 1 has state-of-the-art medical facilities located at Coronado, California. Read more in “Naval Special Warfare, Naval Medical Center San Diego Enhance Partnership“, DVIDS, February 16, 2023.

919th SOW and a Brewery. Three loadmasters of the 919th Special Operations Wing, Duke Field, Florida have opened a brewery on Florida’s Emerald Coast. “Friendship turns into business for Citizen Air Commandos”, Air Force Reserve Command, February 9, 2023.

CST’s of Afghanistan. Jaclyn “Jax” Scott writes about the double standards and disparate treatment by Veterans Affairs against U.S. female soldiers who served on Cultural Support Teams (CSTs) in Afghanistan. “We Are Abandoning the Women of the Special Forces”, Special Operations Association of America, February 21, 2023.

Oops, USSOCOM’s Server Open to Public. Approximately three terabytes of internal military emails pertaining to the US Special Operations Command were accessible to the public and not password protected. “Misconfigured server exposes Defense Department Data”, The Cyberwire, February 22, 2023.

JSOC Intel Officer Pleads Guilty. A Lt. Col. (Ret) who served as an intelligence officer with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) and United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) will be sentenced for his actions in ‘taking classified documents home’. He faces up to ten years in prison. “Retired U.S. Air Force Officer Pleads Guilty to Unlawful Retention of Classified National Defense Information”, Department of Justice, February 24, 2023.

7th SFG(A) Veteran to Get New Home. A medically retired Green Beret will soon be receiving an adaptive home. “SOF Members Reunite for Different Mission”, 919th Special Operations Wing, February 23, 2023.

160th SOAR Awards. Members of the Night Stalkers were recognized for their participation in four different operations between 2019 and 2022. More than 50 of the Army’s most elite aviators and their support personnel received awards in a recent ceremony at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. “Special ops aviation unit presents dozens of valor, combat awards”, Army Times, February 22, 2023.

137th SOW and Emergency Response. The 137th Special Operations Wing conducted a major accident resonse exercise at Will Rogers Air National Guard Base, Oklahoma City, on February 8, 2023. “137th SOW, OKC first responders conduct tornado response exercise”, DVIDS, February 22, 2023.

International SOF

Norway and Covert Ops. Seymour Hersh, an American journalist, recently floated a story that Norway played a role in the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines. He also says that Norway supported U.S. Navy SEALs and the Central Intelligence Ageny in the conduct of raids along the North Vietnamese coastline over 60 years ago. “Covert Operations in Vietnam: The Incomplete History of U.S.-Norway Collaboration”, Countercurrents.org, February 23, 2023.

Afghan SOF in Ukraine? When the Afghan government collapsed after the defeat of the Afghan Army in the summer of 2021 there were many who advocated that Afghan special operations troops be recruited by the U.S. to fight in the Ukraine as part of an “Afghan foreign legion”. This effort did not get much headway and died a quick death. However, maybe the Russians have figured it out. “US-trained Afghan special forces recruited by Wagner Group in Ukraine”, The Cradle, February 25, 2023.

Ukrainian SOF Receive Estonian Equipment. The Defence Minister of Estonia arrived in Kyiv on Sunday (26 Feb 2023) on the occassion of the delivery of themal imagers, pistols, rifles, and UAVs. “Estonian Defence Minister visits Kyiv and hands over aid package to Special Operations Forces”, Yahoo!, February 26, 2023.

Western SF in Sahel. Oscar Rosengren provides an interesting article about Western special Forces that have been committed to stemming the Salafist expansion in the SAHEL region of Africa. He covers a wide range of topics to include the European SF in the region, the TSCTP, US Special Operations Command Africa, Operation Juniper Shield, the Flintlock exercise, and more. “Western Special Forces in the Sahel”, Grey Dynamics, February 24, 2023. See also “Sahel Security 2023: United States Forecast”, Grey Dynamics, February 25, 2023.

SOF History

U.S. Navy SEALs. Peter Suciu provides some history about the Navy SEALs to include some of its recent operations in the past few years. “U.S. Navy SEALs: The U.S. Military’s Ultimate Weapon”, 1945, September 21, 2023.

SF in El Salvador and Afghanistan. A paper done by Brian King during his attendence at the Army Sergeants Major Academy in 2008 has been posted online. Entitled “Special Forces in El Salvador and Afghanistan” – the pub is 10 pages long, PDF.

Jump onto Corregidor. On February 26, 1945, the 503rd Parachute Regimental Combat Team (PRCT) secured the island fortress (Wikipedia) of Corregidor after two weeks of fighting. It was assisted by the 34th Infantry Regiment, a unit that made a seaborne assault.

Commentary

Managing Risk for SOF. Tim Ball, a U.S. Army Special Forces officer, writes on how the change in focus to great power competition means the special operations forces may find themselved committed to operations that are likely to have less support and potentially have far more risk. “Managing Risk for Special Operations Forces in Large-Scale Combat Operations”, War on the Rocks, February 21, 2023.

SOF and AI. Kelley Jhong argues that with the advance of technology the special operations community will need to acquire greater in-depth knowledge of artificial intelligence to effectively and responsibly use military technologies that will increasingly fuse with decision-making processes. “Special Operations Forces Require Greater Proficiency in Artificial Intelligence”, War on the Rocks, February 23, 2023.

The Adaptability of Special Forces Organizations. Pierre Jean Dehaene is a PhD candidate at King’s College London and a soldier in the Belgian Army with a special operations background. He writes about the need for SOF organizations to adapt to the pressures of the world; to not be complacent. “The Building Blocks of a Special Forces Organism: Variation, Selective Pressure, and a Replication of a Soldier’s Perspective”, Small Wars Journal, February 21, 2023.

Nick Turse on U.S. Military Training in Africa. Turse never misses an opportunity to slam the U.S. military’s involvement in affairs overseas – especially when it comes to special operations forces in Africa. Read his latest in “How Many More Governments Will American-Trained Soldiers Overthrow?”, Rolling Stone, February 25, 2023.

Arrow Security & Training, LLC is a corporate sponsor of SOF News. AST offers a wide range of training and instruction courses and programs to include language and cultural services, training, role playing, and software and simulation. https://arrowsecuritytraining.com/

Upcoming Events

April 5-6, 2023. San Diego, California

Warrior West

ADS

April 14-16, 2023. Fort Benning, Georgia

Best Ranger Competion

May 8-11, 2023. Tampa, Florida

SOF Week

USSOCOM

May 16-18, 2023. Fort Bragg, NC and via Zoom

Geostrategic Symposium 2023

USASOC

May 22-26, 2023. Indianapolis, Indiana

Special Forces Association Convention

May 31, 2023. Ijamsville, MD

6th Annual Golf Tournament

Three Rangers Foundation

Podcasts, Videos, Pubs, and Movies

Video – Flintlock 2023 Exercise. The annual Flintlock exercise will soon kick off in Africa where SOF units from many nations take part in honing their skills and TTPs. Here is a short 30 second video by Special Operations Command Africa on some of the training that will take place. (DVIDS, 15 Feb 2023).

Pub – Joint Concept for Competing. This unclassified 91-page document was recently published. Learn more about it at Small Wars Journal, February 26, 2023.

Podcasts

SOFCAST. United States Special Operations Command

https://linktr.ee/sofcast

The Pinelander. Blacksmith Publishing

https://www.thepinelander.com/

The Indigenous Approach. 1st Special Forces Command

https://open.spotify.com/show/3n3I7g9LSmd143GYCy7pPA

Irregular Warfare Podcast. Modern War Institute at West Point

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/irregular-warfare-podcast/id1514636385

sof.news · by SOF News · February 27, 2023

17. We must treat cyber wars the same as we treat conventional military encounters

Excerpts:

Governments across the world must adapt with new sets of rules and accountability measures that reach far beyond physical confrontation. Without proper deterrence, governments are going to continually push the envelope in conducting cyber wars in the shadows.

It’s time to treat cyber wars the same as we treat conventional military encounters: with clear and defined rules of engagement, and stringent penalties for bad actors who purposefully defy those rules. Treating cyber crimes as war crimes is a critical, albeit not the only, step in that process. We need to employ an all-tools approach to facilitate cyber deterrence.

We must treat cyber wars the same as we treat conventional military encounters

BY DAVID HICKTON, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 02/26/23 9:00 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/cybersecurity/3871911-we-must-treat-cyber-wars-the-same-as-we-treat-conventional-military-encounters/

Pictures and videos emanating from Ukraine show the widespread destruction wrought by Russian troops during a year-long war that continuously generates news coverage. But there is another side to this conflict that is lesser known and harder to see.

A parallel war has been running alongside Russia’s conventional ground invasion, one that involves unrelenting cyber attacks across various segments of Ukrainian society, if with less success than many experts initially anticipated. Mixed results aside, this cyber warfare at times has been significant enough that lines are being blurred between where cyber attacks stop and conventional warfare begins.

Since the start of the invasion in late February 2022, Russian actors have attacked Ukraine with two primary goals: to damage critical infrastructure and to exfiltrate or destroy data. According to Ukraine’s Computer Emergency Response Team, more than 2,000 cyber attacks plagued Ukraine in 2022 alone. Taking it a step further, at least eight different forms of malware have been used by Russian saboteurs in the past year, according to Microsoft, 40 percent of which were targeted at “critical infrastructure sectors.” Other targets included Ukrainian government websites, financial institutions, energy and communication service providers, and media outlets.

Russia’s intense use of cyber attacks in Ukraine predates its ground invasion by at least eight years. When Russia invaded the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, suspected Russian hackers knocked out power to 230,000 customers in western Ukraine. Two years later, suspected Russian hackers used malware to disrupt Ukrainian airports, railways and banks. One month before its ground invasion last February, Russia launched a massive cyber attack targeting government institutions in an attempt to weaken Ukraine’s position ahead of the impending military action.

These types of crimes aren’t unique to Ukraine and exist in the absence of active war. In 2007, hackers attacked Estonia in what is believed to be the first major cyberattack on an entire country, crippling banks, government websites and media companies. Closer to home, a ransomware attack in 2021 disabled the Colonial Pipeline and created fuel shortages for days in the eastern and southern United States. That same year, hackers disabled 80 percent of the information technology infrastructure of Ireland’s health service, drastically disrupting patient care during a global pandemic in the worst known cyberattack on a health system in history.

There is little question that large-scale cyber attacks are only going to increase in frequency and intensity during war times and, as of now, there is little recourse to punish or otherwise deter cyber attacks against civilians during the fog of war. That’s why Ukrainian officials are trying to convince the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague to investigate whether Russia’s cyber attacks could be classified as war crimes. This is the first time a government has made such a request; if the ICC agrees, it could drastically alter how these crimes are prosecuted in the future.

Of course, not every cyber attack that occurs during war should be considered a war crime. Ukrainian chief digital transformation officer Victor Zhora argued that cyber attacks supporting military operations that target critical infrastructure affecting Ukrainian citizens should be investigated by the ICC, pointing to the simultaneous shelling and cyber attack on a large Ukrainian power plant.

Even with that caveat, convincing the ICC to act could be a difficult task. Cyber attacks are not explicitly defined as war crimes under the Geneva Conventions, as digital warfare obviously wasn’t a consideration in 1949 when the conventions were ratified. It’s clear that international law isn’t keeping up with rapid advancements and tactics in modern warfare, and there are no guarantees the ICC will act. What happens if it doesn’t?

Regardless of ICC action, the American government will likely continue to make frequent use of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, subject to jurisdiction. In October 2020, for instance, the Department of Justice charged six members of the Russian Sandworm group, which is considered to be responsible for many attacks in Ukraine, with computer fraud and conspiracy. That kind of country-based accountability is encouraging, but it doesn’t replace the need for international legal frameworks to adapt to the changing landscape of war.

Governments across the world must adapt with new sets of rules and accountability measures that reach far beyond physical confrontation. Without proper deterrence, governments are going to continually push the envelope in conducting cyber wars in the shadows.

It’s time to treat cyber wars the same as we treat conventional military encounters: with clear and defined rules of engagement, and stringent penalties for bad actors who purposefully defy those rules. Treating cyber crimes as war crimes is a critical, albeit not the only, step in that process. We need to employ an all-tools approach to facilitate cyber deterrence.

David Hickton is the founding director of the University of Pittsburgh’s Institute for Cyber Law, Policy, and Security, which hosts the Pittsburgh Task Force on Public Algorithms. He is a former U.S. attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania.

18. The making of a quagmire in Ukraine

Excerpts:

In the meanwhile, here are six lessons that have emerged after the first year of the war.

1. War in Europe is not dead

2. Deterrence failed to stop Russia

3. Combat power is more than a count of machines and people

4. But the machines of war still matter

5. Tanks are not yet ready for the museum

6. Wars are often fought in urban areas

One lesson yet to be learned

Is this last major war in which we will see fighter pilots?

The making of a quagmire in Ukraine

There is likely more war ahead than behind as conflict heads toward a stalemate that is delivering hard lessons to all sides

asiatimes.com · by Liam Collins · February 27, 2023

Most military analysts expected Ukraine to fall within days when Russia launched its invasion on February 24, 2022.

Yet one year into the war, Ukrainians have put up a fight and demonstrated remarkable resolve against a powerful military. In fact, some of those military analysts, including former US secretary of defense Mark Esper, have begun to wonder whether the war has reached a stalemate.

In my view, as a career US special forces officer, the war is not yet close to a stalemate. Instead, the lull in military activity is the normal “ebb and flow of a long war being fought by well-resourced countries with external support,” as noted by retired Australian General Mick Ryan.

Tragically, there is likely more of this war ahead of Ukraine than behind.

A looming stalemate

Large offensives, like the ones conducted by Ukraine in the fall of 2022, take time to plan and stage.

For the Ukrainians, planning their next counteroffensive is complicated by the fact that these operations are dependent on the delivery of Western equipment and, if that involves a new weapon system, that takes even more time.

Likewise, Russia, after sustaining significant losses in the war to date, must call upon reserves and try to repair a completely broken logistical system.

Since the early days of its invasion, Russia seems incapable of planning its own large offensives.

It is not a surprise, then, to see the pace of operations slow over the winter as both militaries try to rebuild combat power and prepare for their next major offensive.

What we are likely to see in the second year of the war – and there will be a full second year – was much of what we have seen for the past year.

Ukraine will hold territory where it can and surrender territory where it must to preserve combat power necessary to conduct counteroffensives.

Russian armored vehicles captured by Ukrainian forces being displayed at Independence Square in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Aug. 25, 2022. Photo: Metin Aktas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images / The Conversation

The challenge for Ukraine is that these counteroffensives become more difficult as Russian forces are consolidated into a smaller area. That limits Ukraine’s advantage in its ability to maneuver.

Because Russia lacks well-trained troops to conduct attacks, it will instead rely on artillery shellings to make relatively small territorial gains that offer little tactical and even less strategic value.

In my view, the war will drag on until the economic and political cost of the war become too great for Russia.

But make no mistake, Russia is nowhere close to that point and the war will likely go on for years before Russia reaches a point of an end game.

In the meanwhile, here are six lessons that have emerged after the first year of the war.

1. War in Europe is not dead

If Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008 or its illegal annexation of Crimea and direct support of separatists in Ukraine’s Donbas in 2014 did not make it clear, Russia’s most recent invasion presented irrefutable evidence that war on the continent of Europe is still a reality in 2023.

As a result, instead of NATO’s being “obsolete,” as claimed by then-president-elect Donald Trump in 2017, the invasion has only strengthened the European alliance.

So much so that Sweden and Finland, two famously neutral countries, are seeking NATO membership more than 70 years after NATO’s start.

2. Deterrence failed to stop Russia

It is difficult to know whether Russian President Vladimir Putin could have been prevented from invading Ukraine.

In my view, the United States and its NATO allies did not truly attempt to deter the earlier Russian invasions of Ukraine and Crimea, and these failures date back to the George W. Bush administration.

The sanctions following Russia’s invasion of Georgia and illegal annexation of Crimea were a relative slap on the wrist.

As Russia spent months building up its troops along the border, the United States and its allies did little more than threaten punishment should Russia invade. But those threats were ignored by Putin.

Once the invasion was imminent, instead of making a final attempt to deter, the United States, in effect, green-lighted the invasion by closing its embassy and relocating its diplomats.

By comparison, during World War II, the US refused to close its embassy in Paris even as Nazi Germany threatened France.

3. Combat power is more than a count of machines and people

At the start of the conflict, Russia was ranked as the second-most-powerful military in the world behind the United States.

It held a 10-1 advantage over Ukraine, ranked 22nd in world military power.

Although they are difficult to measure, the war has shown that doctrine, training, leadership and morale are also important factors.

Ukraine’s commitment to transform itself from a Soviet to a Western-style military in 2015 has paid off.

4. But the machines of war still matter

The Ukrainian population may have the will to resist, but without enough and the right weapons systems, they probably would have lost the conventional fight months ago and would now be waging an insurgent campaign across the country.

Most of the attention about the weapons Ukraine needs has been directed at HIMARS rocket systems, infantry fighting vehicles, tanks and fighter jets.

But with a much smaller military, Ukraine is in need of just about everything.

While it may not be as visible as tanks, ammunition is just as important, and Ukraine cannot produce enough internally to replace exhausted stockpiles.

A Ukrainian serviceman loads a truck with American Javelin antitank missiles on Feb. 11, 2022. Photo: Sergei Supinsky / AFP via Getty Images / The Conversation

Ukraine absolutely requires these weapons systems and ammunition to sustain the fight.

5. Tanks are not yet ready for the museum

Some analysts questioned whether tanks were passé following the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, given their vulnerability to Azerbaijani unmanned aerial systems.

Likewise, the United States ravaged Iraqi tanks during the Gulf War in 1991.

But the issue in both wars was not the tanks, but poor training and employment.

Tanks still have a role in military maneuvers, and the Ukrainians have demonstrated they can be very effective when employed properly.

6. Wars are often fought in urban areas

Militaries want to avoid urban warfare, and rightfully so.

It is arguably the most challenging environment in which to fight, and it is often the most brutal, as the war in Ukraine has demonstrated.

But the war has also demonstrated that urban areas cannot be avoided, and they are where a majority of the fighting has occurred.

Yet despite the prevalence of urban combat in Ukraine, the Philippines’ Marawi and Iraq, militaries remained woefully unprepared for this environment.

One lesson yet to be learned

Is this last major war in which we will see fighter pilots?

Flying fighter jets posed little risk during counterinsurgency campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, but they are extremely vulnerable to the antiaircraft systems of more advanced nations.

In the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, unmanned aircraft featured more prominently than fighter jets, and that has been the case in this war as well.

This is not surprising. It is easier and cheaper to build an aircraft if a human doesn’t have to fly it. It is too early to tell if this is the beginning or the end of the manned fighter jet.

More than likely, in my view this is simply the emergence of new weapons that will not replace completely the role of fighter pilots.

Liam Collins is Founding Director, Modern War Institute, United States Military Academy West Point

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

asiatimes.com · by Liam Collins · February 27, 2023

19. Elite Russian Forces Said to Suffer Losses in Ukraine

Excerpts:

The ministry said in an intelligence update that imagery from the Vuhledar section of Donetsk oblast shows “concentrated Russian vehicle losses,” with the vehicles probably from Russia’s 155th Naval Infantry Brigade.

The ministry said the Naval Infantry “has been tasked with some of the toughest tactical missions in the war and has suffered extremely high casualties.”

The ministry update, posted on Twitter, said the capability of Naval Infantry brigades has “almost certainly been significantly degraded” because its units have been replenished with “inexperienced mobilized personnel.”

Elite Russian Forces Said to Suffer Losses in Ukraine

February 26, 2023 4:27 AM

VOA News

voanews.com

An elite Russian infantry force has suffered significant losses in Ukraine, the British Defense Ministry said Sunday.

The ministry said in an intelligence update that imagery from the Vuhledar section of Donetsk oblast shows “concentrated Russian vehicle losses,” with the vehicles probably from Russia’s 155th Naval Infantry Brigade.

The ministry said the Naval Infantry “has been tasked with some of the toughest tactical missions in the war and has suffered extremely high casualties.”

The ministry update, posted on Twitter, said the capability of Naval Infantry brigades has “almost certainly been significantly degraded” because its units have been replenished with “inexperienced mobilized personnel.”

The European Union agreed Saturday to impose new sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. The restrictions "are directed at military and political decision-makers, companies supporting or working within the Russian military industry, and commanders in the Wagner Group,” the EU’s presidency said in a statement.

The 10th round of EU sanctions targets about 120 individuals and entities, including those involved in the abduction of Ukrainian children, those who spread disinformation, Iranians involved in sending drones to Russia and members and supporters of the Wagner Group mercenaries, including its activities in Africa.

The sanctions restrict exports of the electronic components used in Russian weapons, including missiles, drones and helicopters, and bans some rare earth minerals, electronic circuits and thermal cameras, the statement said.

The EU sanctions also prohibit transactions with three more Russian banks and lists 96 more entities, including seven from Iran that provide Russia with military drones used in attacks against civilian infrastructure in Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy applauded the sanctions and said in his nightly video address that Ukraine is working to extend sanctions to Russia’s nuclear sector "and all those involved in the missile program and the nuclear blackmail of the terrorist state."

Russian Commissioner for Human Rights Tatyana Moskalkova, who is included in the sanctions, said listing her "violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and all other international legal acts concerning human rights."

People walk past the destroyed Mariupol's theater, after the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in Mariupol in Russian-controlled Donetsk region, eastern Ukraine, Feb. 25, 2023.

Earlier Saturday, in its intelligence update, the British Defense Ministry said Russia has likely depleted its supply of Iranian one-way-attack uncrewed aerial vehicles.

The ministry said there have not been any reports of the vehicles being used in Ukraine “since around” Feb. 15, while at least 24 were reported downed between late January and early February.

“Scores were destroyed in the first few days of the year,” the ministry said.

Ukrainian and Western officials have said that Western sanctions are hampering Russia’s ability to replenish its stocks of guided weapons that rely on imported microchips.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, responding to that report, said Moscow has increased military production "by tens of times" at some factories and was closely studying weapons fired into Russian-held areas from the Ukrainian side in an effort to gain an advantage.

"We are not just expanding production, but also introducing the latest technologies, perfecting them literally 'on the march,'" he said in an article published Saturday in National Defense magazine.

“It was funny to hear the Kyiv fantasists reasoning that 'missiles ran out' in Russia or 'production stopped.'”

During the G-20 summit in Bangaluru, India, on Saturday, finance chiefs of the world’s largest economies condemned Moscow for its war on Ukraine, with only China and Russia not signing a joint statement.

With no consensus, India, which holds the G-20 presidency this year, said in what is called a “chair’s summary” that "most members strongly condemned the war in Ukraine and stressed that it is causing immense human suffering and exacerbating existing fragilities in the global economy."

Stating that it is essential to uphold international law, the summary said that “the use of or threat of use of nuclear weapons is inadmissible. The peaceful resolution of conflicts, efforts to address crises, as well as diplomacy and dialogue are vital. Today’s era must not be of war.”

The declaration noted that references to the war were “agreed to by all member countries except Russia and China.”

On Friday, a year after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the White House announced that the Pentagon would commit $2 billion more in military assistance to Ukraine’s defense against Russia. The package includes additional ammunition for HIMARS, or High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, 155 mm artillery rounds, munitions for laser-guided rocket systems, and funding for training, maintenance, and sustainment of equipment. U.S. President Joe Biden reasserted his vow that "Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia."

Zelenskyy has been pressing the U.S. and allies for fighter jets, but White House officials have said they are not the weaponry that Ukrainians need in the near term.

“There is no basis on which there is a rationale, according to our military now, to provide F-16s,” Biden said. “I am ruling it out for now,” he said during an ABC News interview Friday.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to support Ukraine’s infrastructure. Blinken said the State Department in coordination with the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Treasury Department are offering $10 billion in assistance, including budgetary support to Ukraine and additional energy assistance to support Ukrainians suffering from Russia’s attacks.

The Treasury Department said it is sanctioning Russia’s metals and mining sector among others. The action, taken in coordination with the G-7 leading industrial nations, seeks to punish 250 people and firms, puts financial blocks on banks, arms dealers and technology companies tied to weapons production, and goes after alleged sanctions evaders in countries from the United Arab Emirates to Switzerland.

VOA’s Anjana Pasricha contributed to this story from New Delhi.

The Associated Press and Reuters provided some information for this report.

voanews.com

20. Generative AI could be an authoritarian breakthrough in brainwashing

Excerpts:

American tech companies may also be tempted to sell generative AI capabilities, just as they inadvertently helped lay the foundations for China’s Great Firewall, ubiquitous surveillance apparatus, and Muslim minority gene harvesting through commercial enterprises.

Additionally, Chinese or Russian AI researchers can simply exploit several companies’ efforts to keep generative AI open source. Meta has begun “democratizing” access to its OBT-175B language model, just as AI company Hugging Face helped launch BLOOM, an open-access, multilingual model. Well-intentioned as such efforts may be, they are a boon to propagandists.

Companies instead need to treat generative AI development with the caution and security measures appropriate for a technology with immense potential to fuel despotism, and refrain from open-sourcing technical specifics of their cutting-edge models.

The U.S. government should clarify the strategic importance of generative AI, and restrict the export of cutting-edge generative AI models to untrustworthy partners now, building on similar measures that restrict the export of American surveillance tech. Federal research funding for generative AI should be limited to only trusted recipients with strong security practices. The U.S. and allies should also invest aggressively into counter-propaganda capabilities that can mitigate the coming waves of generative AI propaganda — both at home and within autocracies.

The alternative is a well-trod path: American tech companies bolstering techno-authoritarianism through a combination of profit-incentives and naivete. It’s time to do better.

Generative AI could be an authoritarian breakthrough in brainwashing

BY BILL DREXEL AND CALEB WITHERS, OPINION CONTRIBUTORS - 02/26/23 7:00 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/3871841-generative-ai-could-be-an-authoritarian-breakthrough-in-brainwashing/

Generative AI is poised to be the free world’s next great gift to authoritarians. The viral launch of ChatGPT — a system with eerily human-like capabilities in composing essays, poetry and computer code — has awakened the world’s dictators to the transformative power of generative AI to create unique, compelling content at scale.

But the fierce debate that has ensued among Western industry leaders on the risks of releasing advanced generative AI tools has largely missed where their effects are likely to be most pernicious: within autocracies. AI companies and the U.S. government alike must institute stricter norms for the development of tools like ChatGPT in full view of their game-changing potential for the world’s authoritarians — before it is too late.

So far, concerns around generative AI and autocrats have mostly focused on how these systems can turbocharge Chinese and Russian propaganda efforts in the United States. ChatGPT has already demonstrated generative AI’s ability to automate Chinese and Russian foreign disinformation with the push of a button. When combined with advancements in targeted advertising and other new precision propaganda techniques, generative AI portends a revolution in the speed, scale and credibility of autocratic influence operations.

But however daunting Chinese and Russian foreign disinformation efforts look in a post-GPT world, open societies receive only a small fraction of the propaganda that Beijing and Moscow blast into their own populations. And whereas democratic powers maintain robust communities of technologists dedicated to combating online manipulation, autocrats can use the full power of their states to optimize their propaganda’s influence.

In 2019, China’s Xi Jinping demanded just that when he ordered his party-state to leverage AI to “comprehensively increase” the ability of the Chinese Communist Party to mold Chinese public opinion. Russia’s Vladimir Putin has similarly doubled down on AI-enabled propaganda in the wake of his Ukraine invasion, including a fake video of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky calling for Ukrainians to surrender. These efforts are buttressed by a dizzying array of Chinese and Russian agencies tasked with thought control, cultivating a competitive ecosystem of digital propaganda tools underwritten by multibillion-dollar budgets each year.

China and Russia are, in other words, fertile ground for generative AI to usher in a historic breakthrough in brainwashing — a recipe for more international catastrophes, greater human rights abuses, and further entrenched despotism. As China refines and exports its techno-authoritarianism, would-be tyrants the world over are likely to cash in on the propaganda revolution.

Luckily, companies in the United States and allied nations have largely led the advance of generative AI capabilities. As the technology matures, this advantage will be increasingly important in giving open societies time to understand, detect and mitigate potential harms before autocratic states leverage the technologies for their own ends. But the free world risks squandering this advantage if these pioneering tools are easily acquired by authoritarians.

Unfortunately, keeping cutting-edge AI models out of autocrats’ hands is a tall order. On a technical level, generative AI models lend themselves to easy theft. Despite requiring enormous resources to build, once developed, models can be easily copied and adapted at minimal cost. That’s especially bad news as China routinely pillages American corporations’ tech.

American tech companies may also be tempted to sell generative AI capabilities, just as they inadvertently helped lay the foundations for China’s Great Firewall, ubiquitous surveillance apparatus, and Muslim minority gene harvesting through commercial enterprises.

Additionally, Chinese or Russian AI researchers can simply exploit several companies’ efforts to keep generative AI open source. Meta has begun “democratizing” access to its OBT-175B language model, just as AI company Hugging Face helped launch BLOOM, an open-access, multilingual model. Well-intentioned as such efforts may be, they are a boon to propagandists.

Companies instead need to treat generative AI development with the caution and security measures appropriate for a technology with immense potential to fuel despotism, and refrain from open-sourcing technical specifics of their cutting-edge models.

The U.S. government should clarify the strategic importance of generative AI, and restrict the export of cutting-edge generative AI models to untrustworthy partners now, building on similar measures that restrict the export of American surveillance tech. Federal research funding for generative AI should be limited to only trusted recipients with strong security practices. The U.S. and allies should also invest aggressively into counter-propaganda capabilities that can mitigate the coming waves of generative AI propaganda — both at home and within autocracies.

The alternative is a well-trod path: American tech companies bolstering techno-authoritarianism through a combination of profit-incentives and naivete. It’s time to do better.

Bill Drexel is an associate fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), where he researches AI and national security. He studied Chinese authoritarian technologies at Tsinghua University, Beijing, as a Schwarzman Scholar.

Caleb Withers is a research assistant at CNAS, focusing on AI safety and stability.

21. Zelensky fires top Ukrainian military commander

Zelensky fires top Ukrainian military commander

Axios · by Rebecca Falconer · February 27, 2023

Ukraine's joint forces commander has been dismissed from his role, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced in a brief decree on Sunday, per Reuters.

The big picture: The dismissal of Major Gen. Eduard Mykhailovich Moskalov, who had served in the role overseeing battles in the Donbas region since last March, is the latest in a series of Ukrainian leadership changes since the Russian military invasion began in February last year.

Zoom in: Several high-profile Ukrainian officials were fired or resigned last month as Zelensky moved to contain allegations of corruption.

What we're watching: It was not immediately clear why Zelensky fired Moskalyov as no reason was given in the one-line decree that was published on the Ukrainian president's official website.

Go deeper: Preparing for Putin's long war

Axios · by Rebecca Falconer · February 27, 2023

22. The Army doesn’t know why junior officers are leaving

Interesting survey. Graphics/data at the link: https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2023/02/24/the-army-doesnt-know-why-junior-officers-are-leaving/?SToverlay=2002c2d9-c344-4bbb-8610-e5794efcfa7d

Excertps:

Finally, the career engagement survey does not treat anticipated civilian employment opportunities as a reason to stay in or leave the Army. Instead, the study discusses civilian employment in an entirely separate section. This approach is flawed. The career engagement survey should assess civilian employment opportunities on the same five-point scale as it does the other questions.

The Army should recognize that civilian employment prospects lure many junior officers away from the profession. Senior leaders can contend with civilian employers. While the military may not realistically compete with corporate America’s salaries, leaders can address other facets of job satisfaction. For many officers vacating the Army for the private sector, organizational climate and career fulfillment matter more than money.

Hearing from hundreds of insightful, compassionate current and former junior offers, I witnessed firsthand the acute loss the Army is facing. Numerous respondents would have been great battalion and brigade commanders, perhaps even general officers. The Army could have retained many of them.

A toxic battalion commander does not simply jeopardize his unit during his tenure. He imperils the future of the entire organization.

The Army can fix its leadership problem. But it must first acknowledge that it has one.

The Army doesn’t know why junior officers are leaving

armytimes.com · by Capt. Lindsay Gabow · February 24, 2023

Does the Army know why junior officers leave? The discrepancy between two relevant studies suggests not.

Col. Everett Spain’s groundbreaking 2021 study, “The Battalion Commander Effect,” found that battalion commanders play a major role in determining whether lieutenants stay or leave the Army. Strangely, though, leadership did not even make the top-five reasons junior officers leave the Army in the Department of the Army Career Engagement Survey.

Implemented in 2020, the career engagement survey found that servicemembers, including junior officers, leave the Army primarily for family concerns. The survey identified the most important reasons for leaving the Army as: “Effects of deployments on my family/personal relationships,” “Impact of Army life on my significant other’s career plans/goals,” “Impact of Army life on family plans for children,” “The degree of stability/predictability of Army life,” and “Impact of military service on my family’s well-being.”

Struck by the disparity between “The Battalion Commander Effect” and the career engagement survey, I conducted an independent survey.

Survey Methodology

My survey’s population of interest was junior officers who plan to separate or recently separated from the Army.

I asked the following multiple-choice questions to determine whether the reasons for separation varied between certain demographics:

1. What is your rank?

2. What was your rank when you decided to separate from the Army?

3. Are you prior-enlisted?

4. What was your commissioning source?

5. What is/was your military service status?

The next question asked respondents to select at most four reasons for leaving the Army:

6. -Impediment to family/personal relationships

-Impediment to spouse’s career prospects

-Lack of fulfillment

-Poor leadership

-Better job prospects outside the Army

-Opposition to traditional Army schedule

-Lack of romantic prospects

-Physical/mental health concerns

-Disagreements with the evaluation/promotion system

-Lack of autonomy/control over my present and future

-Low/declining standards

-Other (if applicable, explain in the next question)

In the spirit of open-mindedness, the final two questions were short answers:

7. If you answered “other” in the previous question, please list your reason.

8. Please expand on your reason(s) for leaving the Army.

When the survey closed, the final sample size was 523. Calculated at the 95% confidence level, the survey’s margin of error was 5%.

Limitations

I relied on social media to circulate the survey. Dissemination platforms included satirical military pages on Instagram, which could have resulted in sampling bias.

The survey overrepresented the United States Military Academy at West Point-commissioned and Officer Candidate School-commissioned officers, while slightly underrepresenting Reserve Officer Training Corps-commissioned officers. Accordingly, commissioning source variance may have skewed the results.

Finally, the survey vehicle did not rank respondents’ selections 1-4 based on the weight of their decision to separate. Therefore, results can only be interpreted by their recurrence, not their influence.

Results

More than 40% of respondents mentioned four of five reasons. In descending order, these were: “lack of autonomy/control over my present/future,” “poor leadership,” “better job prospects outside the Army,” “impediment to family/personal relationships,” and “lack of fulfillment.”

One of multiple findings from a survey conducted by Capt. Lindsay Gabow on why junior officers are leaving the Army. (Jacki Belker/Staff)

Notably, the commissioning source produced considerable variance.

In descending order, ROTC-commissioned officers cited: “lack of autonomy/control over my present and future,” “impediment to family/personal relationships,” “poor leadership,” “better job prospects outside the Army,” and “lack of fulfillment.”

ROTC Reasons for Leaving the Army

One of multiple findings from a survey conducted by Capt. Lindsay Gabow on why junior officers are leaving the Army. (Jacki Belker/Staff)

West Point-commissioned officers cited: “lack of autonomy/control over my present and future,” “better job prospects outside the Army,” “lack of fulfillment,” “impediment to family/personal relationships,” and “poor leadership.”

West Point Reasons for Leaving the Army

One of multiple findings from a survey conducted by Capt. Lindsay Gabow on why junior officers are leaving the Army. (Jacki Belker/Staff)

Finally, OCS-commissioned officers cited: “poor leadership,” “lack of autonomy/control over my present/future,” “impediment to family/personal relationships,” “lack of fulfillment,” and “better job prospects outside the Army.”

OCS Reasons for Leaving the Army

One of multiple findings from a survey conducted by Capt. Lindsay Gabow on why junior officers are leaving the Army. (Jacki Belker/Staff)

Discussion

The results demonstrate that while outgoing junior officers consider family concerns, other issues matter equally or more.

West Point officers cited civilian job prospects more often than their ROTC and OCS counterparts. Known for its robust alumni network, the school positions its graduates well to succeed beyond the Army.

On the other hand, poor leadership motivated OCS-commissioned officers more than any other population surveyed. Of note, prior-enlisted respondents – representing all three major commissioning sources – also mentioned poor leadership most. These officers were once soldiers. Presumably empathetic, the prior-enlisted officer is perhaps quickest to identify the battalion commander who does not care about the Joes.

The results make a strong case for leadership as a decisive variable in junior officers’ decision to leave the Army.

While more than half of respondents named “poor leadership” as a distinct reason for leaving, many also selected leadership correlates. Comments often directly associated leadership with “lack of autonomy/control,” and “lack of fulfillment,” the most cited and fifth-most cited reason, respectively. Respondents also related less cited reasons to leadership, like “disagreements with the evaluation/promotion system” and “low/declining standards.”

When describing their specific leadership concerns on the last question, whether as a distinct reason or correlated with another reason, respondents repeatedly mentioned sycophancy and toxicity. Frequent words included: “yes-man,” “toxic,” and variations of “hypocrisy” and “uncaring.”

Clearly, the desire for freedom lures many junior officers away from the Army. But a closely matched impetus is poor leadership.

Recommendations

Here, I offer two explanations for the disparity between my results and the career engagement survey, along with potential remedies.

Whereas I specifically surveyed junior officers who left the Army or planned to do so, the career engagement survey targeted all active-duty servicemembers. Including such a broad population likely skewed its results. To accurately determine the top reasons for leaving the Army, the career engagement survey should have only considered servicemembers planning to leave. Additionally, for more precision, future DACES should report results by paygrade

Relatedly, the career engagement survey likely faced a selection bias. Many people avoid voluntary tasks, especially when seemingly onerous. 89.1% of those invited to complete the career engagement survey ignored the 80-question survey. By reducing its questions, the career engagement survey could encourage participation in skeptical circles.

The second explanation concerns question wording. Out of nearly 80 questions, two mention leadership: “Brigade Commander or higher leaders’ handling of concerns about discrimination,” and “The mentorship I receive from my unit or organizational leadership.” An additional two mention “chain of command”: “Technical or tactical competence of my current chain of command,” and “Supportiveness of my current chain of command.” These questions only partly or indirectly address leadership. Future career engagement surveys should approach leadership more comprehensively.

Finally, the career engagement survey does not treat anticipated civilian employment opportunities as a reason to stay in or leave the Army. Instead, the study discusses civilian employment in an entirely separate section. This approach is flawed. The career engagement survey should assess civilian employment opportunities on the same five-point scale as it does the other questions.

The Army should recognize that civilian employment prospects lure many junior officers away from the profession. Senior leaders can contend with civilian employers. While the military may not realistically compete with corporate America’s salaries, leaders can address other facets of job satisfaction. For many officers vacating the Army for the private sector, organizational climate and career fulfillment matter more than money.

Hearing from hundreds of insightful, compassionate current and former junior offers, I witnessed firsthand the acute loss the Army is facing. Numerous respondents would have been great battalion and brigade commanders, perhaps even general officers. The Army could have retained many of them.

A toxic battalion commander does not simply jeopardize his unit during his tenure. He imperils the future of the entire organization.

The Army can fix its leadership problem. But it must first acknowledge that it has one.

Lindsay Gabow is an active-duty U.S. Army captain stationed at Fort Bragg. Her commentary reflects her own opinions and research and does not purport to speak in any official capacity for the U.S. Army. She is in the process of transitioning out of the Army to attend law school. For questions or comments about her survey, please feel free to reach out to her on LinkedIn or via email at lindsaygabow13@gmail.com.

23. The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years (P3 Orion)

Those of us who served in the Southern Philippines benefited from the capabilities of this submarine hunter in fighting terrorists. We had to closely manage the number of flight hours we were allocated every month. Intercepted communications showed that the unique sound of the P3 would cause the ASG terrorists to go to ground for fear they would be discovered by the P3. During an MNLF uprising on Jolo in 2007 the P3 orbits over AFP defensive positions caused the MNLF to halt their attacks and deterred attacks on other positions.

The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years - SlashGear

slashgear.com · by Alex Hevesy · February 24, 2023

The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years

Rancho_runner/Getty Images

By /Feb. 24, 2023 6:17 pm EST

During Cold War between the Soviet Union and United States, submarines became a vital tool used by both sides. Subs, especially nuclear powered models, could stay hidden underneath the surface of waters all over the world for long periods of time. Soviet nuclear submarines made famous by pieces of pop culture history like those in Tom Clancy's "The Hunt for Red October" were a real threat. A submarine was capable of not only spying and gathering info, it could act as a weapons platform in the event of nuclear war.

Instead of relying on Sean Connery to have a change of heart and defect with a submarine, rendering it combat ineffective like the book and movie, the United States needed to develop equipment to detect submarines and protect its shorelines. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, engineers at Lockheed (now Lockheed Martin) took that challenge and developed a submarine hunter aircraft that ended up being significantly more useful and long-lasting than they initially thought. That plane was the Lockheed P-3 Orion.

From the Cold War to now

Rancho_runner/Getty Images

When the P-3 Orion first entered service in 1962, its initial mission was to detect and intercept Soviet submarines. Given the fact that nuclear war did not break out between Soviet and American subs, it's safe to say the first mission was a success. The first time the public became aware of the new sub-hunter was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, when it participated in the naval blockade of Cuba alongside aircraft carriers like the U.S.S. Intrepid.

The P-3 served all throughout the Cold War, and due to the versatility of its airframe, it was easily adapted to a variety of missions. According to Lockheed Martin, it was used in real-time surveillance and spy roles and scouting roles. In more recent years, the Orion was used stateside during disasters like Hurricane Katrina to relay information to relief crews on the ground. Due to its relatively small size and ability to fly at lower speeds than jet-powered aircraft, Orions have been used in forest fire-fighting efforts. The Orion has also excelled at keeping shipping lanes around the Horn of Africa free from pirates and preventing drug runners from entering the United States through the waters near Mexico.

About 60 years after the aircraft first took off, it's still in active service today in 17 different countries and is still in the process of being upgraded and adapted to different missions.

slashgear.com · by Alex Hevesy · February 24, 2023

24. America Must Become the Arsenal of Democracy Again

I conclur. But the question must also be asked. Can we afford the cost of beincing the Arsenal of Democracy? And the opposite question is can we afford not to?

America Must Become the Arsenal of Democracy Again

19fortyfive.com · by Wallace Gregson · February 26, 2023

We’re past the one-year mark since Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine. Thus far we have yet to see any new Russian moves. Just more of the same brutality.

No new Russian surprises could be a good thing, but with serious caveats. They are still there, still creating death and destruction increasingly focused on civilians. Perhaps due to the apparent lack of anything new from Russia’s forces, at least two major cable news outlets in the U.S. covered the Murdaugh trial live. BBC, by contrast, broadcast extensive video coverage of the carnage in Ukraine and described those who have suffered greatly.

The resemblance to the Battle of Britain went unmentioned but was obvious. The video scenes could have come from 80-year-old newsreels of London, Coventry, and other cities. Then, like now, the U.S. pledged all possible assistance short of direct involvement. FDR was severely constrained by isolationist sentiment and forced to employ more than a few clever devices, like Lend-Lease and Neutrality Patrols, to support Great Britain in its critical hours. Then, as now, it was not a stable posture, destined to long endure. A happy ending was far from assured, but the heroism of the Brits and their Royal Air Force brought it home.

Today’s posture over Ukraine is also not at all stable. Harry Kazianis’ recent piece on these pages asks the important questions. What is our policy? How does this end? Are we waiting for another Battle of Tannenberg to take a combatant off the field? This is stasis in the middle of a roiling danger area. A prolonged stalemate is not a stable end.

President Biden and the U.S. face a difficult challenge. Keeping 30 NATO nations, and more applying to join, together is no small task. Our domestic political challenges of course remain unresolved. There is good reason to keep complex deliberations secret.

But wait, there’s more!

China’s unrelenting military buildup amid expansive extra-territorial claims – e.g., undisputed historical sovereignty over the South China Sea – alarms and antagonizes our allies and friends in Asia. China’s coercion of Taiwan increases in frequency and severity. China’s subjugation of Hong Kong reveals their disdain for international agreements. North Korea continues its prohibited missile testing program and development of nuclear weapons. And then there is Russia and its belligerent activities around the disputed Kurile Islands. We do not have the luxury of a singular focus.

Already there are worries that the defense equipment and supplies going to Ukraine draw down on needed means for deterrence of conflict in Asia. It’s a mathematical certainty that drawing down on our war reserves decreases the size of those reserves, barring energetically expanded defense industry programs to replace equipment, supplies, and ammunition.

And herein may lie a stratagem that can break the status quo and introduce a new policy to the Ukraine issue. Sometimes a hard problem can be aided by making it bigger. This may be such a time. Treat the support of Ukraine as part of a growing global challenge.

Attack the weapons and supply shortages in both Europe and Asia, and better support Ukraine, through an emergency multinational defense industrial program. Create a new “Arsenal of Democracy” among willing nations. Franklin Roosevelt said: “Powerful enemies must be outfought and outproduced.” So, it is now. Ukraine has the fighting in hand. We owe them prompt and efficient material and training support. Fewer lengthy negotiations, more gear, and support.

It is a fact that we, our allies, and our friends face rising threats in Europe and Asia. We can directly affect the situation in Ukraine, and enhance our deterrence posture in Asia, with new, coordinated, multinational defense production. Get the highly competent Ukraine military what they need before they must repeatedly ask for it. To paraphrase a famous Pentagon statement: “sometimes you have to fight the war you have, not the one you wish you had”. We have this one in Ukraine. Freedom and global order are at stake there, and in Asia.

Eliminate the material shortages around the globe and leave no doubt, anywhere, that we have. In the U.S., this calls for a newly empowered industrial policy official. Congressional intervention will be needed to act on our acquisition regulations to allow the awarding of long-term contracts that will give industry the confidence to expand production and add shifts to the line. The goal, in the U.S. as well as other countries, is to simultaneously increase the military goods available to Ukraine as well as replenish U.S. and allied stores in Asia.

Given the demonstrated threat in Europe and Asia, it’s time to quit admiring the problem and act.

Wallace C. Gregson served as a former assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs (2009-11) and is currently a senior advisor at Avascent International. Gregson last served as the Commander, U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific; Commanding General, Fleet Marine Force, Pacific; and Commander, U.S. Marine Corps Bases, Pacific, headquartered at Camp H. M. Smith, Hawaii. He is a senior advisor to General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems.

19fortyfive.com · by Wallace Gregson · February 26, 2023

25. Without Evidence, Iran Denies Reports It Enriched Uranium to Near Weapons-Grade

Without Evidence, Iran Denies Reports It Enriched Uranium to Near Weapons-Grade

fdd.org · by Danielle Kleinman · February 24, 2023

Latest Developments

Iran yesterday and today denied reports attributed to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) by diplomatic sources that Tehran had enriched uranium to 84 percent purity — just short of weapons-grade levels of 90 percent — at the Fordow underground facility. A news website linked to the regime said on Thursday that Iran’s nuclear program is “completely peaceful” and described the allegations as an “inspector’s error” or “a deliberate action to create political atmospheres against Iran.” Today, Behrouz Kamalvandi, a spokesman for Iran’s civilian nuclear program, called the accusation a “conspiracy,” saying inspectors merely found “a particle of an atom that cannot be seen even under a microscope.”

Expert Analysis

“Washington must lead its partners in penalizing Iran and censuring the regime’s latest action at the IAEA Board of Governors meeting, which begins on March 6. Failing to act swiftly would suggest that the West will tolerate further enrichment advances, including Tehran potentially stockpiling atomic weapons-grade uranium.” — Andrea Stricker, Deputy Director of FDD’s Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program

Not an Accident

In light of Tehran’s long record of nuclear mendacity, Iran’s denials are not credible. It is unlikely that Iran’s enrichment levels would have accidentally fluctuated to 84 percent. As Olli Heinonen, a former deputy director general for safeguards at the IAEA, put it, “Such things do not happen accidentally. It takes some effort to modify a cascade to produce this level of enrichment.” Inspectors likely caught Tehran experimenting with higher enrichment levels approaching atomic weapons-grade, even if the higher enrichment happened in intermediate enrichment steps and did not accumulate as a stockpile.

Iran’s Atomic Advances

Since entering office in January 2021, the Biden administration has presided over numerous qualitative Iranian nuclear advances, as Tehran capitalized on reduced pressure and the West’s fruitless effort to restore the 2015 nuclear deal, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

In January 2021, Iran resumed 20 percent enrichment at Fordow for the first time since the JCPOA’s finalization. In April 2021, Tehran enriched uranium to 60 percent purity. The same year, Iran also produced uranium metal, a material used in nuclear weapon cores. Over the course of 2021 and 2022, Iran installed thousands of fast advanced centrifuges for uranium enrichment. Iran is now weeks away from producing enough weapons-grade uranium for four atomic bombs.

Related Analysis

“Iran Enriching Uranium to Near Weapons-Grade,” FDD Flash Brief

“Exploiting America’s Declining Pressure: Iran’s Nuclear Escalation Over Time,” by Behnam Ben Taleblu and Andrea Stricker

fdd.org · by Danielle Kleinman · February 24, 2023

26. UN General Assembly votes 141-7 for Russian Forces to Withdraw from Ukraine

UN General Assembly votes 141-7 for Russian Forces to Withdraw from Ukraine

fdd.org · by Jack Sullivan · February 24, 2023

February 24, 2023 | Policy Brief

Bradley Bowman

CMPP Senior Director

Jack Sullivan

Communications Manager and Research Associate

With an overwhelming vote of 141 in favor, seven opposed, and 32 abstentions, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly demanded on Thursday that Russia “immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its military forces from the territory of Ukraine.” While the resolution does not have the force of law, the lopsided vote demonstrates continued widespread international outrage toward the Kremlin one year after it initiated its large-scale, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

The adopted resolution reaffirms “commitment to the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” demands an immediate and full Russian military withdrawal, calls for an end to attacks on civilians and critical infrastructure in Ukraine, and emphasizes the need for accountability for crimes committed in Ukraine.

The resolution specifically condemned Russia for “violations and abuses committed against children,” including those who have been “forcibly transferred and deported.”

According to a Conflict Observatory report published last week, Russia “has systematically relocated at least 6,000 children from Ukraine to a network of re-education and adoption facilities.” Eleven of the camps where these children are being detained are located over 500 miles from Ukraine’s border with Russia, and two of the camps are in Siberia.

The resolution also demands that Russia immediately cease its attacks against hospitals and schools, calling to mind the widely denounced Russian airstrike against a maternity ward in Mariupol last March.

The six-nation club that sided with Russia by voting against the resolution includes North Korea, Syria, Belarus, Eritrea, Nicaragua, and Mali, a group of countries largely known for extensive human rights violations themselves.

In contrast, a wide coalition of nations voted in favor of the resolution. They included European democracies such as Ireland and Denmark, Middle-Eastern monarchies like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, and island nations such as Jamaica and Indonesia.

The list of 32 countries that abstained notably includes China and India.

Throughout the last year, Beijing has attempted to manage a difficult balancing act, providing diplomatic cover and cultivating its relationship with the Kremlin while trying to avoid the international disdain and potential consequences associated with supporting the invasion. Earlier this week, the Biden administration revealed that China has provided key industrial inputs to Russia’s war machine and that China is considering providing Russia with suicide drones similar to the Iranian Shahed-136 the Kremlin uses to destroy Ukraine’s critical infrastructure. The reality is that China and Russia are closer than they have been in decades, united in their disdain for the United States and the international rules-based order that constrains each government’s ambitions.

India, the world’s largest democracy and a growing partner of the United States, maintains longstanding security, diplomatic, and economic ties with Russia. New Delhi has resisted criticizing the Kremlin while importing record amounts of Russian oil, helping to fund Putin’s aggression in Ukraine. China’s growing alignment with Russia likely causes some consternation in New Delhi, given its long-standing border dispute with Beijing.

This resolution Thursday demonstrates continued international outrage toward the Kremlin for its invasion of Ukraine, offering a reminder that Russia could end the war tomorrow by ending its aggression and withdrawing its troops. Unfortunately, resolutions at the General Assembly won’t make that happen. The only hope of defeating the Russian invasion is by urgently delivering weapons to Ukraine in large and sustained quantities.

Bradley Bowman serves as senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where Jack Sullivan is a research associate. For more analysis from the authors and CMPP, please subscribe HERE. Follow FDD on Twitter @FDD and @FDD_CMPP. Follow Bradley on Twitter @Brad_L_Bowman. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

fdd.org · by Jack Sullivan · February 24, 2023

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

V/R

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow

Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Phone: 202-573-8647

Personal Email: d avid.maxwell161@gmail.com

Web Site: www.fdd.org

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Subscribe to FDD’s new podcast, Foreign Podicy

FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

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

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

Access NSS HERE

Company Name | Website

Change your mind with these gateway drugs to intellectual humility

Intellectual humility demands that we examine our motivations for holding certain beliefs.

https://bigthink.com/the-well/change-your-mind-intellectual-humility/

Credit: Vincent Romero, Jorm Sangsorn / Adobe Stock

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Sideswiped from our blind spots

The backrooms of our minds

Thinking about thinking about thinking

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PJM Interconnection sounds the latest alarm that fossil-fuel plants are shutting down without adequate replacement power. The political class yawns.

U.S. And Taiwan Set To Exchange Hundreds Of Troops For Training

Report from Geneva: The WHO CA+ Treaty Falls Short

Vladimir Putin will be killed by his own inner circle, Zelensky predicts

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, FEBRUARY 26, 2023

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The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years - SlashGear

The Legendary U.S. Surveillance Plane That Flew For Over 50 Years

From the Cold War to now

America Must Become the Arsenal of Democracy Again

Without Evidence, Iran Denies Reports It Enriched Uranium to Near Weapons-Grade

Latest Developments

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Not an Accident

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UN General Assembly votes 141-7 for Russian Forces to Withdraw from Ukraine