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Quotes of the Day:
"You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you."
– Eric Hoffer
"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."
– Aldous Huxley
"Nothing else in the world...not all the armies...is so powerful as an idea whose time has come."
– Victor Hugo
1. Immigrants’ Recent Effects on Government Budgets: 1994–2023
2. Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell - CIA
3. CIA is Sunsetting the World Factbook
4. There Is Only One Sphere of Influence
5. EXCLUSIVE: HASC chair seeking $450B for defense in reconciliation
6.Army moves 3 companies to Phase III of Flight School Next competition
7. Fears of a nuclear arms race rise as New START expires
8. This Week in American History: The First War for Hearts and Minds
9. Soldier who died shielding Polish ally to receive Medal of Honor
10. Army to deploy 10th Mountain Division brigade to CENTCOM
11. Marine awarded for designing the Corps’ first fully NDAA-compliant 3D-printed drone at $700 a pop
12. Don’t mention ‘Article 5,’ Finland warns US on Ukraine
13. Keith Kellogg says he left Trump's White House to be 'free to talk' about Ukraine
14. A CRINK in the Armor of Deterrence: The Axis of Upheaval in the Indo-Pacific
15. China’s Redlines Aren’t Where You Think They Are
16. Failure of Economic Statecraft Against Parasitic Hybrid Actors in the MENA Region
17. From Conflict to Troubled “Peace”: Lessons From Colombia’s Counterinsurgency
18. Night Vision at a Crossroads: When Technology Outpaces the Neurobiology of Close Combat
19. The Limits of Russian Power
20. Strength Over Peace: Venezuela, Iran, and the Dicey Politics of Military Intervention
21. Command Responsibility at Home: Governors, the Guard, and Domestic Readiness
22. Sun Tzu in the Supply Chain: The New Face of Economic War With China
1. Immigrants’ Recent Effects on Government Budgets: 1994–2023
Summary:
Using an updated National Academies (NASEM) fiscal model, the authors estimate immigrants’ cumulative effects on US federal, state, and local budgets from 1994 to 2023. In every year, immigrants generated more in taxes than they received in benefits. Over 30 years, immigrants produced a $10.6 trillion net surplus in taxes versus total spending and, including reduced interest costs, $14.5 trillion in real 2024 dollar debt savings. The analysis is described as conservative because it excludes indirect growth effects. Without immigrants, public debt would exceed 200 percent of GDP, nearly double the 2023 level.
Comment: Something most of us intuitively knew and believed. Will these facts have any impact on the anti-immigrant narrative?
the entire report can be downloaded in PDF at this link: https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2026-02/White-Paper-Immigrants-Recent-Effects-on-Government-Budgets-1994-2023.pdf
Immigrants’ Recent Effects on Government Budgets: 1994–2023
February 3, 2026 • White Paper
By David J. Bier, Michael Howard, and Julián Salazar
https://www.cato.org/white-paper/immigrants-recent-effects-government-budgets-1994-2023?utm
Recent increases in immigration have rekindled concerns about their effects on government budgets. This paper updates a model of these effects first developed by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) to shed light on how immigrants, both legal and illegal, and their children affect government budgets. This analysis is the first to estimate the cumulative fiscal effect of immigrants on federal, state, and local budgets over 30 years.
The government first began gathering detailed information on benefits use by citizenship status in 1994. The data show:
- For each year from 1994 to 2023, the US immigrant population generated more in taxes than they received in benefits from all levels of government.
- Over that period, immigrants created a cumulative fiscal surplus of $14.5 trillion in real 2024 US dollars, including $3.9 trillion in savings on interest on the debt.
- Without immigrants, US government public debt at all levels would be at least 205 percent of gross domestic product (GDP)—nearly twice its 2023 level.
These results, which do not account for any of immigration’s indirect, tax-revenue-boosting effects on economic growth, represent the lower bound of the positive fiscal effects. Even by this conservative analysis, immigrants may have already prevented a fiscal crisis.
Introduction
This report is an update of a 2017 report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) on the fiscal effects of immigration.1 The NASEM authors shared their model with the Cato Institute, which allowed for further expansion and refinement. The model provides a comprehensive estimate of the fiscal flows to and from immigrants, both legal and illegal, in the United States and utilizes the highest quality data available from the US government. It accounts for current government expenditures and receipts (revenue), both direct and indirect spending, as well as all levels of government (federal, state, and local).
The primary data source for the NASEM–Cato model is the Annual Social and Economic Supplement from the US Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey.2 In this report, we make a few methodological refinements and data improvements to the NASEM model. Among other things, we use the most up-to-date research on the distribution of corporate tax payments between workers and owners of corporations,3 and we account for how immigration increases property values and therefore property tax revenue.4 We also incorporate all nontax revenues; improve the methodology for identifying benefits’ use in mixed-status (i.e., containing both citizens and noncitizens) households; improve the estimates for Medicare and Medicaid benefits received; and provide evidence supporting the NASEM estimates that do not assume immigrants increase spending on pure public goods (e.g., the military). The Appendix (and specifically the List of Variables in the Fiscal Effects Model) exhaustively detail our full methodology and data sources.
In this report, we update the NASEM historical analysis through 2023, the most recent year for which all the data were available when we prepared this analysis. Our purpose is only to report what has actually happened with government budgets and immigrants to this point. Cato Institute research has previously produced forward-looking estimates of the fiscal effects of immigrants, which are compatible with our conclusions here.5 Whatever the future holds—and we believe our estimates show it is bright—most Americans incorrectly believe that immigrants have already caused US budget deficits,6 and this belief appears to contribute to negative views about immigrants.7
The NASEM–Cato model shows the following:
- Every year from 1994 to 2023, immigrants have paid more in taxes than they received in benefits.
- Immigrants generated nearly $10.6 trillion more in federal, state, and local taxes than they induced in total government spending.
- Accounting for savings on interest payments on the national debt, immigrants saved $14.5 trillion in debt over this 30-year period.
- Immigrants cut US budget deficits by about a third from 1994 to 2023, and fiscal savings grew to $878 billion in 2023 (Figure 1).
- Noncitizens accounted for $6.3 trillion of the $14.5 trillion debt savings.
- College graduate immigrants accounted for $11.7 trillion in savings, while non–college graduates accounted for $2.8 trillion.
- The cohort of immigrants entering from 1990 to 1993, just before data collection began in 1994, was fiscally positive $1.7 trillion, and was still positive after 30 years in 2022–2023 (Table 1).
- Even including the second generation (see Box 1 for definitions), who are mostly still children who will become taxpayers soon, the fiscal effect of immigration was positive every year.
- Immigrants in all categories of educational attainment, including high school dropouts, lowered the ratio of deficit to gross domestic product (GDP) during the 30-year period.
-
Without the contributions of immigrants, public debt at all levels would already be above 200 percent of US GDP—nearly twice the 2023 level and a threshold some analysts believe would trigger a debt crisis.8
2. Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell - CIA
Comment: What is happening at the CIA? Is this a fiscal decision or a policy decision?
I have depended on the World Fact Book for basic quick reference and information years especially after they became available online. They were a staple at the library when we used to do research there.
Below the announcement on the CIA web page is an AP report with these two peculiar excerpts.
What happened to public good?
Excerpts:
The announcement posted to the CIA’s website offered no reason for the decision to end the Factbook, but it follows a vow from Director John Ratcliffe to end programs that don’t advance the agency’s core missions.
...
The White House has moved to cut staffing at the CIA and the National Security Agency early in Trump’s second term, forcing the agency to do more with less.
Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell - CIA
cia.gov
https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/spotlighting-the-world-factbook-as-we-bid-a-fond-farewell/?trk=feed_main-feed-card_feed-article-content
One of CIA’s oldest and most recognizable intelligence publications, The World Factbook, has sunset. The World Factbook served the Intelligence Community and the general public as a longstanding, one-stop basic reference about countries and communities around the globe. Let’s take a quick look into the history of The World Factbook.
Over many decades, The World Factbook evolved from a classified to unclassified, hardcopy to electronic product that added new categories, and even new global entities. The original classified publication, titled The National Basic Intelligence Factbook, launched in 1962. The first unclassified companion version was issued in 1971. A decade later it was renamed The World Factbook. In 1997, The World Factbook went digital and debuted to a worldwide audience on CIA.gov, where it garnered millions of views each year.
The World Factbook appealed to researchers, news organizations, teachers, students, and international travelers. Some readers even inquired whether their preferred geographic designation or world entity could be included on the high-profile site.
Finally, only CIA insiders would know that officers donated some of their personal travel photos to The World Factbook, which hosted more than 5,000 photographs that were copyright-free for anyone to access and use.
Though the World Factbook is gone, in the spirit of its global reach and legacy, we hope you will stay curious about the world and find ways to explore it… in person or virtually.
cia.gov
CIA ends publication of its popular World Factbook reference tool
AP · DAVID KLEPPER · February 4, 2026
https://apnews.com/article/cia-world-factbook-ratcliffe-trump-fbec61ce16c4b3db59db9cefce0da043
WASHINGTON (AP) — Close the cover on the CIA World Factbook: The spy agency announced Wednesday that after more than 60 years, it is shuttering the popular reference manual.
The announcement posted to the CIA’s website offered no reason for the decision to end the Factbook, but it follows a vow from Director John Ratcliffe to end programs that don’t advance the agency’s core missions.
First launched in 1962 as a printed, classified reference manual for intelligence officers, the Factbook offered a detailed, by-the-numbers picture of foreign nations, their economies, militaries, resources and societies. The Factbook proved so useful that other federal agencies began using it, and within a decade, an unclassified version was released to the public.
After going online in 1997, the Factbook quickly became a popular reference site for journalists, trivia aficionados and the writers of college essays, racking up millions of visits per year.
The White House has moved to cut staffing at the CIA and the National Security Agency early in Trump’s second term, forcing the agency to do more with less.
The CIA did not return a message seeking comment Wednesday about the decision to cease publication of the Factbook.
AP · DAVID KLEPPER · February 4, 2026
3. CIA is Sunsetting the World Factbook
Comment: Another legacy of the OSS (COI) falling by the wayside.
Some useful background and updated information from SOF News. It is good to know the online map resource will remain.
CIA is Sunsetting the World Factbook
February 4, 2026 SOF News Intelligence 0
https://sof.news/intelligence/the-world-factbook/?utm
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) announced the retirement 1 of The World Factbook on February 4, 2026. The Factbook has long been one of the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) most valuable public reference products. For many years, going back to 1962 when it was known as The National Basic Intelligence Factbook, it was an excellent resource to intelligence professionals. In 1971, an unclassified companion was issued . . . and then in the 1997 it went digital and was available to the world on www.cia.gov.
It has been a longstanding, one-stop basic reference about countries around the world. Government officials, members of Congress, the military services, news organizations, academics, teachers, students, and travelers all found The World Factbook a valuable resource. It provided unclassified basic . . . and sometimes detailed information about each country in the world; providing information on geography, population, politics, economy, military strength, and much more. For many visitors The World Factbook was a starting point for a variety of research topics.
It also displayed useful maps for each country – maps detailing the political, administrative, transportation, and terrain aspects of the countries. Fortunately, the CIA still has its map resource online. Time will tell if this stays online or gets taken down.
The origins of The World Factbook actually goes back to the World War II era. The United States needed to undertake a more coordinated approach to intelligence gathering and reporting. The Coordinator of Information (COI), led by General William “Wild Bill” Donovan, was responsible for developing a strategic basic intelligence program. 2
The products produced would be the foundation of the other forms of intelligence. Working in conjunction with the Army and Navy intelligence departments, the COI established the Joint Army Navy Intelligence Studies (JANIS). During the years of 1943 to 1947, JANIS published 23 intelligence studies. After the Central Intelligence Agency was established in 1947, it assumed responsibility for the JANIS basic intelligence program. JANIS was then renamed the National Intelligence Survey (NIS). In 1962 it became a printed, classified reference for intelligence officers and ‘cleared’ government officials and military members.
In 1971, the unclassified Factbook was created as an annual summary of the NIS studies. In 1973 it replaced the NIS studies and became the CIA’s publication of basic intelligence. The Factbook became available to the public in 1975 (printed format). 3 Official versions of the Factbook were available from the US Government Printing Office (GPO). It was renamed The World Factbook in 1981. Then it went online in 1997.
There was no reason provided by the CIA for the discontinuance of public access to the Factbook. It is unknown if there is a replacement tool that will be coming soon. Since the beginning of the second Trump administration, there have been many changes to the intelligence community (IC). It is sad to see this valuable legacy of the CIA go away. Hopefully, the agency rolls out a replacement resource for the Factbook soon.
**********
Image: Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
Endnotes:
- “Spotlighting the World Factbook As We Bid a Fond Farewell”, CIA, February 4, 2026.
- https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/spotlighting-the-world-factbook-as-we-bid-a-fond-farewell/
- “History of the World Factbook”, CIA, September 30, 2020.
- https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/history-of-the-world-factbook/
- View The World Factbook 1990 printed version online. CIA, PDF, 408 pages.
- https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/THE WORLD FACTBOOK 1990%5B15815916%5D.pdf
References:
The World Factbook, Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Factbook
4. There Is Only One Sphere of Influence
Summary:
Beckley argues the world has only one true sphere of influence: the United States in the Western Hemisphere. China and Russia can intimidate neighbors and cause disruption, but they cannot consolidate regional control or sustain power projection into America’s backyard. He claims U.S. dominance rests on military overmatch, economic centrality, the dollar’s regional pull, and staying power that does not require constant coercion. This asymmetry is dangerous because it can breed U.S. complacency and challenger revisionism, and it can tempt Washington to substitute coercive policing for order-building. Yet it also gives the United States a secure base, credible exit options, and leverage to anchor allied rearmament and a tougher free-world coalition.
Excerpts:
In this emerging system, the Western Hemisphere is not merely a buffer but the United States’ home base. Despite persistent violence, corruption, and migration pressures, the hemisphere remains a coherent political and economic community—capitalist, broadly democratic, and historically resistant to Old World empires. It is richer, more populous, more urban, and more institutionally developed than at any point in its history, and more closely aligned with the United States than it has been in decades. Anti-American sentiment has not disappeared, but the interests of regional powers are converging when it comes to security, economic growth, and wariness of China. Taken together, these conditions give the hemisphere the depth and resilience to serve as the secure foundation of a global democratic order.
Whether this advantage endures will depend on the ability of the United States to avoid the central error made by Russia and China: treating neighbors and partners as wards rather than as allies. Closed, coercive spheres breed resistance and decay; open spheres built on centrality compound power by drawing others in. The United States already sits at the hub of Western finance, trade, migration, technology, and security networks. It need not dominate the Western Hemisphere by force as long as it remains the market others cannot replace, manages the currency others cannot escape, and provides the security no rival can match.
The central question of the coming era is not whether other spheres may someday form—an unlikely prospect—but whether the United States, as the only power that already possesses one, can use its dominance to sustain order rather than merely exploit advantage. On that choice will turn not only the fate of American primacy but also the future of the international system.
There Is Only One Sphere of Influence
Foreign Affairs · More by Michael Beckley · February 4, 2026
Why America Can Project Power With Little Constraint—and Its Rivals Cannot
February 4, 2026
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/there-only-one-sphere-influence?utm
The Washington Monument in Washington, D.C., January 2026 Tyrone Siu / Reuters
MICHAEL BECKLEY is Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University, Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and Head of Asia Research at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.
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Why America Can Project Power With Little Constraint—and Its Rivals Cannot
Michael Beckley
After the United States captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and President Donald Trump revived talk of acquiring Greenland, commentators reached for old clichés: the rebirth of the Monroe Doctrine, the return of great-power spheres of influence, the end of Pax Americana. But these episodes revealed something more exceptional. The world today has only one true sphere of influence. The United States alone dominates a vast home region, not merely as a buffer against competitors such as China and Russia, but as a hemispheric base from which American power and commerce can project outward, largely unconstrained by rivals.
This configuration has no modern precedent. During the Cold War, the American sphere was confronted by a vast Soviet one. In earlier, multipolar eras, European powers ruled overseas empires and planted colonies deep in the Western Hemisphere, contesting U.S. influence even close to home. But that world is long gone. The American sphere now stands alone. China and Russia cannot consolidate control over their own regions, much less project sustained power into the United States’ backyard. They can intimidate neighbors and sow disruption, but their influence quickly runs into resistance and chokepoints. The result is not multipolarity but stark asymmetry: one consolidated American sphere and contested space everywhere else.
This asymmetry produces U.S. dominance, but of a dangerous kind. A one-sphere world leaves Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin too aggrieved to accept the status quo and the United States too secure to take Eurasian threats seriously until they erupt. It also tempts Washington to trade stewardship of a global order for coercive rule in its own backyard, swapping forms of power that compound through trade and alliances for ones that breed backlash through resource extraction and imperial policing.
Yet this same imbalance also creates an opening. The United States can use its sphere not as a substitute for international order, but as its foundation. A one-sphere world gives Washington two rare advantages: unmatched power and a secure home base from which it could, if necessary, disengage from Eurasia. That pairing—strength with a credible exit option—is already sharpening incentives among U.S. allies to rearm. While pundits fixate on Davos speeches, states on the frontlines of Chinese and Russian coercion are starting to rebuild their militaries, industries, and supply chains, reviving what the liberal order gradually lost over time: capable partners for the United States. For the first time in decades, the outlines of a tougher, more resilient free world are coming into view. Whether these efforts endure will depend on whether the United States can avoid China and Russia’s greatest mistake—treating partners as vassals rather than contributors to shared strength.
ONLY GAME IN TOWN
Many analysts argue that U.S. primacy is fading and that the world is reorganizing into multipolar spheres. Some even urge Washington to grant China a sphere of influence in Asia and grant Russia one in eastern Europe in exchange for peace. But spheres of influence are not diplomatic concessions. They are political facts, produced by power, geography, and, above all, the choices of weaker states. A country commands a true sphere of influence only when its neighbors defer to it on security, when foreign rivals cannot intervene decisively, and when control can be sustained without the constant use of force. When those conditions are absent, simply recognizing a sphere changes nothing.
Historically, spheres of influence have been built in two main ways: through conquest, or by binding neighbors with security guarantees, market access, and institutions that make exit prohibitively costly. The methods of construction differ, but the requirements do not. A true sphere demands military dominance, economic centrality, and staying power. By those standards, the United States possesses a sphere of influence in the Western Hemisphere. No other power has a comparable one.
Start with military dominance. Washington spends as much as 12 times more on defense than all other countries in the Western Hemisphere combined. South of the Rio Grande, roughly two-thirds of states maintain little more than internal security forces. Collectively, the region’s 33 countries field fewer than 700 combat aircraft, around 30 warships, and about 20 submarines—set against the United States’ nearly 3,000 combat aircraft, more than 120 warships, and roughly 65 submarines.
Canada is the partial exception, with a military power projection capacity composed of two fighter squadrons, a single mechanized brigade, and a small frigate fleet. Even so, roughly half of its forces are unavailable at any given time because aging platforms are stuck in maintenance backlogs and chronic personnel shortages leave ships, aircraft, and units short of crew. Like their counterparts elsewhere in the hemisphere, Canadian forces also depend heavily on the United States for intelligence, refueling, transport, and targeting.
There is one consolidated American sphere and contested space everywhere else.
In practice, regional militaries function less as competitors than as auxiliaries to American power. Through access agreements and joint training programs spanning most of the hemisphere, the U.S. military enjoys near-complete freedom of action and can intervene with minimal resistance—as demonstrated most recently in Venezuela.
Economic centrality reinforces this dominance. The United States is the Western Hemisphere’s linchpin market. Nearly half of exports from South America, and anywhere from 60 to 80 percent of those from Canada and Mexico, go to the United States. This is not reroutable commodity trade of the kind many countries conduct with China, but tightly integrated supply chain trade—finished goods and components built specifically for the U.S. market. If U.S. neighbors lose that market, production will collapse rather than shift elsewhere.
The Western Hemisphere is also a de facto U.S. dollar zone. Several countries use the dollar outright, many peg their own currencies to it, and most regional trade and borrowing is U.S. dollar denominated. In crises, rescue finance runs through U.S. institutions, and remittances from the United States sustain large shares of GDP across Central America and the Caribbean. The result is structural leverage for the United States: other governments tied to the dollar have strong incentives to accommodate Washington rather than risk financial instability.
Finally, the United States has staying power because it is not trying to install an alien political or economic project in the region. The Soviet Union imposed communism on Eastern Europe and Central Asia through coercion, and when its power faltered, states defected immediately. The U.S. sphere works differently. Anti-American sentiment is widespread, but most governments in the Western Hemisphere are no longer organized around projects fundamentally hostile to American power. Latin America has moved away from state-led socialism and revolutionary nationalism—discredited by the collapses of Venezuela and Cuba—toward governments preoccupied with managing crime and inflation, building fiscal stability, and attracting private investment. These priorities do not make the region pro-American, but they limit the appeal of posturing against the United States and reduce incentives to challenge American primacy outright.
Just as important, there is no credible alternative to U.S. dominance in the Western Hemisphere. China and Russia offer transactions, not systems. Beijing builds infrastructure but pushes subsidized exports and opaque loans while extracting resources. Moscow sells commodities and weapons. Neither offers a political or economic framework that regional states can meaningfully join, nor an ideology most would choose to emulate. Both are ruled by brutal dictatorships with uncertain succession plans and erratic policy—Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s “zero COVID” lockdowns are only the most obvious examples—and neither could protect its closest regional client when Washington moved against Maduro. With populations and economies shrinking relative to the United States, China and Russia offer would-be partners a future of smaller markets, weaker balance sheets, and dependence on distant, capricious regimes.
NOT SO GREAT POWERS
Russian and Chinese spheres, if they existed, would not be subtle. Putin casts himself as a latter-day Peter the Great and portrays the post–Cold War order as having stripped Russia of its civilizational domain—the “Russian World,” a deliberately vague space defined by language, religion, and imperial history that extends well beyond Russia’s borders. A true Russian sphere would go far beyond the gray-zone coercion, such as assassinations or disinformation campaigns, that Moscow already employs against its neighbors. It would create a belt of fully neutralized states—the Baltics, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine, perhaps even Poland and Romania—barred from NATO and the European Union, hosting no Western military forces, and aligning their foreign policies with that of Moscow. Their economies would be folded into a customs bloc, lowering trade barriers to Russia while raising them to the West. Russian troops and intelligence services would operate freely within the sphere. The Kremlin would screen leaders in each country and remove dissenters. In Putin’s telling, such a sphere would form “one of the poles of the modern world.”
A Chinese sphere would be broader still. Taiwan, parts of India, and perhaps some of Japan’s Ryukyu Islands would be absorbed outright. Australia, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, and Vietnam would be pushed into strategic neutrality, with their militaries capped and U.S. forces expelled from their territories. The East China and South China Seas would become de facto Chinese waters, with neighbors forced to seek Beijing’s permission to operate beyond their own coasts. Economically, the arrangement would be neocolonial. As Chinese Premier Li Keqiang told Trump in 2017, China envisions a world in which it monopolizes advanced manufacturing while others supply commodities. States would borrow heavily from Beijing to buy Chinese goods and install Chinese systems, routing data and royalties back to Beijing while respecting the Chinese Communist Party’s redlines. Under this constant pressure, democratic institutions across Asia would steadily erode.
If these spheres sound far-fetched, it is because they are. Neither Russia nor China has the military dominance, economic centrality, or staying power to impose them. Russia’s failure is the starkest. It has thrown the full weight of its conventional military power at a single, poorer neighbor—Ukraine—mobilizing the Russian economy, emptying Soviet stockpiles, conscripting hundreds of thousands of Russian citizens, and calling in every ally it can muster. Yet after more than a decade of conflict, including four years of full-scale war, Russian forces have advanced barely 30 miles beyond their 2014 lines at a cost of 1.2 million casualties, comparable to total U.S. casualties in World War II.
Military failure has accelerated Russia’s economic decline. Cut off from European energy markets, hemorrhaging talent as millions of Russians flee the country, and devoting as much as half of its national budget (and nearly twice as much of its GDP as it did before the invasion) to military spending, Russia is becoming an insolvent, hypermilitarized petrostate able to wreck neighbors but unable to attract or lead them. In response, former Soviet states are dismantling their ties to Moscow, replacing Russian weapons with those from other countries, rerouting trade, settling disputes without Russian mediation, and pivoting toward China and Europe, whose economic influence in Russia’s near abroad now dwarfs Moscow’s. Once the main power linking Central Asia, the South Caucasus, and eastern Europe, Russia is increasingly being bypassed rather than obeyed.
China’s prospects look brighter. It generates roughly half of Asia’s GDP and accounts for nearly half of the continent’s military spending, dominates key industries, and is the top trading partner of nearly every Asian economy. Through island building in the South China Sea and investments in the global infrastructure project known as the Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing has extended its reach across Asia.
A one-sphere world gives Washington two rare advantages.
But scale is not overmatch. Unlike the United States, China operates in the world’s most competitive neighborhood. Its neighbors include seven of the world’s 15 most populous countries, four of the top 15 economies and military spenders, and four nuclear-armed states—along with several more that could rapidly acquire nuclear weapons. Over the past eight decades, Beijing has disputed borders with every one of its neighbors, fought wars against five of them—India, Japan, South Korea, the Soviet Union, and Vietnam—and still contests territory with at least ten. China also faces sustained pressure from the United States, which stations roughly 90,000 troops, hundreds of aircraft, and dozens of warships and missile batteries near China’s coast. When Washington first built its sphere in Latin America in the nineteenth century, Eurasia’s great powers were tied down fighting one another. Today, the United States, secure in the Western Hemisphere, projects immense power into China’s backyard.
Modern technology further constrains Chinese military power. Precision missiles, drones, and smart mines now allow even weaker states to destroy massed forces at a fraction of the cost—an effect on vivid display in Ukraine—and China’s neighbors have stockpiled these asymmetric weapons. Conquest, moreover, is no longer cumulative. In earlier eras, victors grew stronger as they expanded, seizing farms, factories, and resources. Today, advanced economies are more fragile: people flee, data disappears, and supply chains collapse. If China invaded Taiwan, for instance, the island’s semiconductor industry would likely be destroyed, leaving Beijing with ruins, not riches.
China also cannot buy a sphere. Unlike the United States, which pulls neighbors in through consumer demand, China pushes them away by flooding markets with subsidized exports that hollow out local industry. It now runs a record $1.2 trillion trade surplus and dumps excess goods abroad. In many Asian economies, imports from China have doubled over the past five years. The result is backlash, not deference. China lacks monetary pull as well: the renminbi still trails the U.S. dollar in Asian and global trade, and only about three percent of regional reserves are held in it.
Beijing has attempted to compensate through state-directed finance, but the Belt and Road Initiative has failed to make China Asia’s economic hub. Several of the region’s largest economies—India, Japan, and South Korea—never joined, and more than three-quarters of China’s overseas lending has gone to middle- and upper-income countries outside any plausible Chinese sphere, led by the United States and Russia. Meanwhile, widespread defaults have turned China’s financial reach into a liability, recasting Beijing as the world’s largest debt collector instead of a development partner. By 2022, roughly 60 percent of China’s overseas lending portfolio—and by 2023, nearly 80 percent of its developing-world borrowers—was tied to governments in debt distress, triggering serial renegotiations with countries such as Kenya, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Zambia.
China remains an industrial superpower (it produces roughly a third of the world’s manufactured goods and dominates sectors from shipbuilding to electric vehicles and batteries), but the foundations of that power are eroding. China's economy has been shrinking relative to the United States’ in dollar terms since 2021, its population is set to halve by the end of this century, productivity has been stagnant for more than a decade, and the national debt has reached 300 percent of GDP and is climbing fast. Disposable income averages barely $6,000 per person, and most workers lack even a high school education. China will remain Asia’s strongest state for the foreseeable future, but it does not possess the surplus wealth and power needed to dominate the world’s toughest region.
MORE POWER, MORE PROBLEMS
A one-sphere world is a gift to the United States, but it is also destabilizing. An international system with one effective sphere, several frustrated challengers, and large exposed regions does not produce a durable equilibrium. The same asymmetry that insulates and empowers Washington also distorts the incentives of adversaries, allies, and the United States itself in ways that invite conflict.
The first danger is that a one-sphere world will leave Russia and China unable to accept the status quo. Neither power has ever been more secure or more prosperous than it was in the post–Cold War era. But a one-sphere world threatens their status as great powers and the political monopolies that rule them.
Russia’s fundamental problem is that its former vassals are thriving without it. Since 1990, the ex-Soviet states that democratized and joined the European Union have grown more than twice as fast as Russia. Russians were about twice as rich as Poles were in 1990, whereas today Poles are roughly 70 percent richer than Russians. Ukraine’s westward turn would bring that arc of prosperity to Russia’s doorstep, and for Putin, that prospect is intolerable. A free and successful Ukraine would expose his rule as one presiding over national decline and prove that countries long treated as inferior can surpass Russia by embracing the very liberal order the Kremlin rejects.
China’s grievance runs along a different axis. Whereas Russia is threatened by the success of states that slipped its grasp, China is threatened by the structure of a one-sphere world. Lacking a sphere of its own, Beijing’s late-twentieth-century ascent depended on integration into the U.S.-led order. That strategy delivered extraordinary growth, but at a price: it bound China to an international system designed to prevent the emergence of new regional hegemons and to entrench open markets, open information, and enduring U.S. military primacy. What enabled China’s rise also constrained its expansion and threatened its political foundations.
From Beijing’s perspective, then, the U.S.-led order has always been a mixed bargain. The order restrained Japanese rearmament but entrenched a permanent U.S. military presence along China’s periphery. It kept sea-lanes open but froze Beijing’s claims to Taiwan and the East China and South China Seas. It enabled access to energy and raw materials from Africa and the Middle East but routed those flows through maritime chokepoints, such as the Strait of Malacca, policed by the U.S. Navy. More broadly, integration exposed China’s domestic population to foreign capital, information, legal norms, and economic volatility—eroding the Chinese Communist Party’s monopoly on power and deepening China’s dependence on Western demand, finance, and rules.
The U.S. Navy sailing off the coast of Puerto Rico, December 2025 Ricardo Arduengo / Reuters
Chinese leaders believe they know where this path leads. The Soviet Union tried to reconcile its Communist Party rule with domestic liberalization and accommodation with the West—and lost both its regime and its empire. Xi has built his rule around that lesson. He is therefore willing to trade growth for control and integration for autonomy, embracing mercantilism, self-reliance, and bloc building, even at the cost of confrontation with the United States.
Alongside fear, however, there is also ambition. Russia and China are trying not merely to survive but to reverse historic loss. Great powers rarely accept demotion. Twentieth-century Germany and Japan had to be crushed before abandoning their empires, and France and the United Kingdom clung to theirs long after losing the capacity to sustain them. The Cold War was relatively stable in part because the Soviet Union was defending a vast territorial settlement won through victory in World War II.
Russia and China, by contrast, chafe against borders imposed through defeats and seek to overturn them. Both are heirs to Eurasian land empires with centuries of unified rule and a sense that regional primacy is a birthright. The Soviet implosion thus registered in Moscow not as a limited setback but, as Putin has argued, as the twentieth century’s chief geopolitical catastrophe. It ended Moscow’s control over roughly half the territory and population it once ruled and unleashed economic collapse alongside one of the sharpest peacetime declines in life expectancy on record, with male life expectancy plunging by six years in the early 1990s.
China’s grievance runs deeper still. During its “century of humiliation,” from 1839 to 1949, foreign powers defeated China in repeated wars, seized territory and set up treaty ports, imposed extraterritorial rule, and dismembered the Qing empire. Reversing those defeats—and making China whole again by reclaiming lost territory—sits at the core of the Communist Party’s nationalism. A one-sphere world stands in the way of those ambitions and thus risks fueling wars of restoration as imperial heirs mount increasingly dangerous bids to recover territory rather than accept permanent second-class standing.
Although Russia and China cannot steamroll their neighboring regions as Nazi Germany, imperial Japan, or the Soviet Union once did, they are more able to lash out around the world—including inside the United States itself. They lack regional empires but not global reach. Embedded in finance, supply chains, and communications networks, they can cripple economies through cyberattacks, degrade U.S. power by sabotaging satellites and undersea cables, fracture alliances through disinformation, and coerce countries by weaponizing chokepoints and nuclear threats. These tools allow pressure to accumulate and retaliation to spiral, raising the risk of catastrophic war. Russian and Chinese bids for regional hegemony may be doomed, but if deterrence fails, they remain capable of enormous destruction.
WAVERING WEST
Paradoxically, a one-sphere world makes it more likely that the United States will fail in some way to deter China or Russia. Secure at home, the United States enjoys wide latitude abroad. But that freedom breeds complacency. Eurasian threats feel distant, encouraging rhetorical defiance without the sustained military, economic, and industrial preparation needed to make deterrence credible.
The pattern is familiar. In the 1930s, the United States opposed German and Japanese expansion but outsourced enforcement to toothless international laws such as the Kellogg-Briand Pact, a treaty signed by various great powers in 1928 that outlawed war as a method of resolving international disputes. It also stayed out of the League of Nations, withdrew forces from Europe while enforcing war-debt payments that destabilized Germany, and abandoned naval rearmament in Asia even as it escalated sanctions on Japan. The result was provocation without deterrence, and eventually Pearl Harbor. After the Cold War, Washington repeated the same mistake with Russia. It expanded NATO to Russia’s borders, nearly doubling the alliance by admitting 12 new members, including former Soviet states, while cutting U.S. troop levels in Europe roughly in half. In 2008, it floated NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine without extending credible security guarantees, antagonizing Russia without deterring it and helping set the stage for its wars with those countries.
At other moments, the United States has signaled indifference only to rush into war once foreign aggression revealed a region’s true importance. In 1949, for instance, Washington excluded South Korea from the U.S. defense perimeter and withdrew its troops, inviting North Korea’s invasion the following year. Washington then reversed course and engaged in a full-scale war on the Korean Peninsula. A similar pattern appeared in 1990, when the United States made little effort to deter Iraq’s Saddam Hussein from seizing Kuwait and then launched a major war to reverse his invasion.
Today, the United States is once again vacillating between retreat and resistance. At times, Washington implies that its vital interests lie only in the Western Hemisphere and that it might accommodate China and Russia beyond it. On other occasions, it sanctions Beijing and Moscow and arms their neighbors. That ambiguity is compounded by a lack of preparation. U.S. munitions would run out within weeks of the beginning of any major hot conflict, and its bases, satellites, and critical infrastructure remain dangerously exposed to Chinese and Russian cyber and missile attacks.
Russia and China lack regional empires but not global reach.
Most unsettling is how tempting it is, in a one-sphere world, for the United States to cash out of the order business altogether. Secure at home and facing no rival spheres abroad, Washington is allowing its alliances to slide toward protection rackets, its trade relationships toward trade wars, and major sea-lanes toward militarized zones. The institutions the United States once underwrote are fraying, and the markets it upheld are fragmenting. Some U.S. partners, including Canada and the United Kingdom, now look for short-term security wherever they can find it, even at the cost of long-term dependence on China. The result is not stability but the slow hollowing out of the relationships that once converted American dominance into a durable order.
None of this should inspire nostalgia for the old liberal order. Much of what Washington is now accused of dismantling was already broken. The World Trade Organization was hobbled well before its dispute-settlement system collapsed in 2019, having failed to discipline subsidies, industrial policy, and nontariff barriers—the very tools that now define economic competition. Arms control withered as China declined to join most regimes while quietly assembling the world’s largest missile force. Meanwhile, many U.S. allies, sheltered by American guarantees, cut defense spending, expanded welfare states, and grew dependent on Chinese markets and Russian energy. The order’s moral authority eroded as serial human rights abusers were routinely elected to the UN Human Rights Council and Western-backed institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank funneled aid to repressive regimes. By integrating China and Russia into this hollowed-out system and granting them easy access to Western markets and technology, the United States empowered its most dangerous rivals.
As broken as the liberal order has become, however, the absence of order would be far worse. Anarchy does not produce peace or prosperity, but rather mercantilism, arms races, and war. The question, then, is not whether the United States should support an international order but whether it can help rebuild one fit for the world that now exists.
TOUGH LOVE
A one-sphere world carries dangers, but it also gives the United States a rare chance to reset the international order from a position of historic strength. The removal of Maduro showed what that strength can achieve. In hours, Washington toppled a destructive narco-kleptocrat, shut down a hub for sanctions evasion, and punctured the myth of Chinese and Russian reach in the Western Hemisphere. It also revealed the authoritarian axis for what it is: a loose coalition bound by resentment, not by values or mutual defense. Most important, the episode showed that U.S. military power still works. Deterrence begins with perception, and perception comes from proof. In a world drifting toward disorder, the competent use of force has outsize effects, shaping the calculations of adversaries contemplating aggression and of allies deciding how, and with whom, to secure their future.
Trump squandered part of that advantage by provoking an unnecessary showdown over Greenland and pushing major partners to hedge rather than close ranks. Canada now touts a “strategic partnership” with China. The United Kingdom is reengaging Beijing economically while agreeing in principle to transfer sovereignty over Diego Garcia, a British colonial territory in the Indian Ocean that hosts a critical U.S. military base, to Mauritius, injecting uncertainty into a cornerstone of Western Indo-Pacific power projection. It has also approved the construction of a massive new Chinese embassy in London atop sensitive communications infrastructure. France, meanwhile, is courting Chinese investment in the name of “strategic autonomy.”
Yet even as these rear-area partners rehearse Western decline from a distance, a more resilient free world is taking shape in the places where great-power war would likely be fought. Defense spending among European NATO members has increased by more than half since 2019, concentrated in countries along Europe’s eastern flank facing Russia. In East Asia, the first island chain, the collection of countries surrounding China’s eastern coast, is hardening into a forward line of deterrence as Japan rearms and acquires long-range strike forces, Taiwan extends conscription and stockpiles munitions, and the Philippines reopens U.S. bases. Australia is also undertaking the largest peacetime military buildup in its history.
This rearmament is being reinforced economically. Europe has slashed its dependence on Russian energy, cutting Russia’s share of EU gas imports from over 40 percent before the war to well under 20 percent today while banning coal and embargoing most Russian oil. Japan and South Korea have sharply curtailed new manufacturing investment in China. Japan and the Netherlands now block exports of advanced chipmaking equipment to Beijing, while France and Germany are tightening scrutiny of Chinese acquisitions in ports, power grids, and telecom networks. Manufacturing tied to U.S. demand is increasingly flowing to India, Mexico, and Vietnam rather than China’s coastal hubs. Trade with China remains sizable, but capital, technology, and control over supply chains are starting to move elsewhere.
The United States is once again vacillating between retreat and resistance.
The central task of U.S. foreign policy should be to consolidate this patchwork of responses into a durable alliance. Washington should reaffirm its security guarantees for partners that meet clear standards—sustained defense spending, expanded munitions production, and assured access for U.S. forces—while conditioning preferential access to U.S. markets, capital, and technology on strict limits to Chinese investment and technology transfer and on continued restrictions on Russian energy exports. These commitments could be reinforced through allied co-production, long-term procurement contracts, and shared stockpiles that lock in supply chain shifts away from Russia and China. The result would be a hardened frontline that increases pressure on both Russia and China, cutting Moscow off from energy rents, constraining Beijing’s access to Western technology and export markets, and offering neighboring states credible alternatives to subordination.
In the absence of U.S. support, however, these efforts would remain fragmented and reversible. Some states would fail to rearm and others would hedge, investing in narrow self-defense rather than contributing meaningfully to a wider coalition. Moscow and Beijing would exploit these gaps, isolating and pressuring neighbors one by one. Western economies might shift some production out of China, but they would deepen trade in other sectors and pursue competing industrial strategies, splintering supply chains rather than binding them together. Over time, higher costs, electoral churn, and persistent Russian and Chinese coercion through trade retaliation, energy leverage, and political interference would erode support for economic disengagement and military coordination. By contrast, if the United States anchors allied efforts—backing partners that commit forces, territory, and industrial capacity to shared defense—it could consolidate a coalition with the power to blunt Russian and Chinese campaigns of intimidation, subversion, and territorial conquest.
In this emerging system, the Western Hemisphere is not merely a buffer but the United States’ home base. Despite persistent violence, corruption, and migration pressures, the hemisphere remains a coherent political and economic community—capitalist, broadly democratic, and historically resistant to Old World empires. It is richer, more populous, more urban, and more institutionally developed than at any point in its history, and more closely aligned with the United States than it has been in decades. Anti-American sentiment has not disappeared, but the interests of regional powers are converging when it comes to security, economic growth, and wariness of China. Taken together, these conditions give the hemisphere the depth and resilience to serve as the secure foundation of a global democratic order.
Whether this advantage endures will depend on the ability of the United States to avoid the central error made by Russia and China: treating neighbors and partners as wards rather than as allies. Closed, coercive spheres breed resistance and decay; open spheres built on centrality compound power by drawing others in. The United States already sits at the hub of Western finance, trade, migration, technology, and security networks. It need not dominate the Western Hemisphere by force as long as it remains the market others cannot replace, manages the currency others cannot escape, and provides the security no rival can match.
The central question of the coming era is not whether other spheres may someday form—an unlikely prospect—but whether the United States, as the only power that already possesses one, can use its dominance to sustain order rather than merely exploit advantage. On that choice will turn not only the fate of American primacy but also the future of the international system.
Foreign Affairs · More by Michael Beckley · February 4, 2026
5. EXCLUSIVE: HASC chair seeking $450B for defense in reconciliation
Summary:
HASC Chair Mike Rogers says he is pursuing two FY27 goals: securing $450 billion for defense in a reconciliation bill and using the next NDAA to expand the defense industrial base. He says he is coordinating with Sen. Roger Wicker and has informed party leadership. Rogers argues $450 billion is needed to reach a $1.5 trillion FY27 defense budget target, describing a gap if the White House requests about $1.03 trillion and $20 billion rolls over from prior reconciliation. He acknowledges passage is difficult given tight margins and some GOP plans omitting defense. Rogers ties the funding to major modernization programs and says NDAA efforts will focus on commercial-friendly acquisition and incentives for traditional and nontraditional firms, with possible tax-policy fixes.
Comment: Will this help transformation (versus modernization) in our military? There seem to be some important provisions in this. Is reconciliation the way to accomplish this? How will this affect the NDS line of effort to "supercharge the defense industrial base?" What is the impact if he is unsuccessful due to the political divisions?
EXCLUSIVE: HASC chair seeking $450B for defense in reconciliation - Breaking Defense
breakingdefense.com · Valerie Insinna · February 4, 2026
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers told Breaking Defense the next NDAA will focus on expanding the defense industrial base.
By Valerie Insinna on February 04, 2026 5:26 pm
https://breakingdefense.com/2026/02/exclusive-hasc-chair-seeking-450b-for-defense-in-reconciliation/?utm
WASHINGTON — The fiscal 2027 budget season has barely started, but the head of the House Armed Services Committee is setting two major goals for the year: securing $450 billion for defense in an upcoming reconciliation bill, and using the next defense policy bill to expand the defense industrial base.
In an exclusive interview with Breaking Defense, HASC Chairman Mike Rogers said that he is working with his Senate counterpart, Sen. Roger Wicker, to lock that funding in.
“We’ve informed our leadership of that,” he said Wednesday. “We’re not talking about something frivolous here. We’re talking about national defense.”
That $450 billion would be three times the $150 billion secured for defense in last year’s reconciliation effort — which itself represented the first time defense money was secured through the reconciliation procedure. However, Rogers argued that the funding would be necessary to achieve the target, laid down by President Donald Trump, of a $1.5 trillion defense budget for FY27.
Rogers explained his math thusly: If the White House requests a budget equivalent to last year’s, at about $1.03 trillion, and rolls over the $20 billion left over from last year’s reconciliation bill, that leaves a gap of about $450 billion to hit $1.5 trillion.
And while appropriators have final say on defense spending during the normal budget process, authorizers, such as Rogers, have control in reconciliation.
Knowing when to build on commercial systems and when to develop something new can be the difference between parity and information dominance.
However, getting $450 billion in defense spending into a reconciliation bill and passed into law could be an uphill battle.
While Republicans are able to pass a reconciliation bill without help from Democrat votes, they will face tight margins and a narrow timeframe for doing so, as Democrats are projected to take back the House in the upcoming midterm elections. And securing Republican support for additional defense funding in reconciliation is not a given: A recent blueprint for the second reconciliation bill put out by the House Republican Study Committee did not list defense among other priority areas such as home ownership and health care.
However, Rogers stressed that a $1.5 trillion defense budget is necessary to be able to pay for major modernization projects including the Golden Dome missile shield, sixth-generation F-47 fighter jet, and Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile program.
“We have all these big ticket items that we have to do, and you can’t do that on a trillion-dollar budget. You just can’t,” he said. “So that’s the sobering side of the story that I think we’re going to be able to offer to our colleagues when it comes to getting the votes to do this.”
What To Expect In The FY27 NDAA
Meanwhile, HASC has already begun early work on the FY27 National Defense Authorization Act, which will prioritize the expansion of the defense industrial base, Rogers said.
“We tilled the soil last year by trying to improve acquisition processes to make it more commercial, so that it’s easier for industry to work with the government,” he said. “That was on purpose, because we do have to expand the defense industrial base. It’s gotten very small, and it’s atrophied, and it needs a lot of attention.”
Following the end of the Cold War, the defense industry narrowed to just six prime contractors, after the infamous Last Supper meeting in 1993 where Pentagon leaders told defense executives to consolidate or risk going out of business.
Over the past decade, the industrial base has grown, as venture capital-backed defense tech startups like Anduril and Palantir entered the scene. But Rogers said he would like to see a larger number of commercial companies start making products for the Defense Department.
“That’s our question to these folks, and we’ve already started bringing them in and asking them, ‘What can we do to incentivize you to get into the defense production?’” he said. “Taking the traditionals and non-traditionals, what can we do to incentivize you to grow? [For] the primes, what can we do to incentivize you to expand?
HASC still is in its early stages of understanding the problem and doesn’t have “preconceived ideas” about exactly what legislative steps may need to be taken to widen the aperture for new entrants to the defense sector, Rogers said.
“I don’t know what all the obstacles are going to be,” he said. “I’m expecting some of them may be outside our jurisdiction. For example, tax policy. There may be something about our tax structure that disincentivizes expansion. If so, let us know so we can work with our counterparts on the Ways and Means Committee to address that.”
breakingdefense.com · Valerie Insinna · February 4, 2026
6. Army moves 3 companies to Phase III of Flight School Next competition
Summary:
The Army advanced three firms to Phase III of its Flight School Next competition to train helicopter pilots at Fort Rucker. Bell, M1, and Lockheed Martin will submit full written Commercial Solution Proposals under the December commercial solutions opening. The three had already cleared Phase II presentations on pricing, innovation, and program frameworks. Lockheed says it will team with Robinson, using the Robinson R-66 as a subcontractor platform, and M1 also plans to offer the R-66. Bell is competing independently with its 505 model. Flight School Next seeks more than aircraft, including a new curriculum and acquisition approach built around a contractor-owned, contractor-operated model. The Army aims to award by end of September and train 900 to 1,500 rotary-wing pilots annually over a 26-year period. Airbus and other firms also bid or declined comment.
Army moves 3 companies to Phase III of Flight School Next competition - Breaking Defense
breakingdefense.com · Carley Welch · February 4, 2026
Bell, M1 and Lockheed Martin confirmed to Breaking Defense that they have been selected to move on to the next phase of the competition.
By Carley Welch on February 04, 2026 2:08 pm
https://breakingdefense.com/2026/02/army-moves-3-companies-to-phase-iii-of-flight-school-next-competition/?utm
WASHINGTON — The Army has selected three companies to move on to the next phase of its Flight School Next competition, the service’s new multi-faceted program to train helicopter pilots at Fort Rucker.
Today Bell, M1 and Lockheed Martin confirmed to Breaking Defense that they have been selected to move on to Phase III of the competition, which entails submitting a full written Commercial Solution Proposal for their offering, per the original commercial solutions opening (CSO) posted in December.
“We are grateful for the Army’s confidence in our Flight School Next solution to move on to Phase III,” Todd Morar, vice president of Air and Commercial Solutions at Lockheed Martin said in a company statement today. “For years we have been refining a comprehensive solution that aligns with the Army’s vision for a modern, affordable and high quality training pipeline that will produce fundamentally better aviators.”
Today’s announcement comes after the same three companies were selected to move to the second phase of the competition last month. That phase involved giving presentations on pricing, innovation and the companies’ overall frameworks for the program according to the CSO.
Lockheed had previously identified itself as a prime contractor for the overall competition, and today revealed that it would be partnering with civilian helicopter manufacturer Robinson for the program. Robinson will be competing as a sub contractor with its R-66 aircraft for both Lockheed and M1.
“We are proud to be selected by Lockheed Martin as the platform of choice for the Army’s next primary trainer, a decision that aligns mission requirements with fiscal reality,” President and CEO of Robinson David Smith said in Lockheed’s statement today.
Balancing security and access to data are critical to providing users with trustworthy, reliable data for real-time decisions.
M1 also confirmed to Breaking Defense that the company is moving forward in the competition with Robinson’s R-66.
“We are proud to have multiple proposals selected to advance to Phase III,” George Krivo, chairman and CEO of M1 said in a company statement today. “This is M1’s top priority. Every day we work to further refine and improve our solution to ensure the Army can produce more proficient Army Aviators in an efficient, effective, and innovative manner.”
As for Bell, it is competing as its own entity and is offering its 505 model for the competition.
“Our team is proud and excited to move on to the next phase of Flight School Next,” John Novalis, strategic director of Flight School Next at Bell, said in a company announcement today. “This next phase is a critical point in the competition and Bell along with our teammates are ready to demonstrate what we believe is the most cost-effective and low-risk solution for the Army’s next-generation flight training program.
The Flight School Next program includes more than the airframes itself, as the service is also looking for a new curriculum and a new acquisition model. Per the original CSO, Flight School Next will have a contractor-owned, contractor-operated (COCO) model, which allows the company to own and run the program instead of the government.
The primes’ role in Flight School Next will be to handle the finances, big-picture repairs, supply chain management, logistical support and more, while the subs will handle supplying the helicopters and its spare parts, component-level repairs, technical support, most of the curriculum and upgrades.
The service’s goal is to make an award by the end of September, and it is looking to provide training for 900 to 1,500 rotary wing pilots per year with a period of performance of 26 years, according to the CSO.
Along with Bell, Lockheed, M1 and Robinson, the incumbent flight school vendor Airbus replied to the original call-for-solutions notice in November, and told Breaking Defense it was bidding its UH-72 Lakota fleet. A spokesperson for the company last week referred all queries regarding Flight School Next to the Army, but the Army declined to comment on the program.
Other companies originally vying for the program include Leonardo with its TH-73 helo and Boeing as its prime; MD Helicopters with its 530 helo; and Enstrom Helicopters with its 480B model. Spokespeople for Boeing, MD Helicopters and Enstrom Helicopters declined to comment if they would be moving forward in the program.
UPDATED 2/04/2026 at 3:42 p.m. EST to include a statement from M1.
breakingdefense.com · Carley Welch · February 4, 2026
7. Fears of a nuclear arms race rise as New START expires
Summary:
New START, the last major U.S.-Russia arms control treaty, expires Feb. 5, raising fears of a new nuclear arms race and “friendly proliferation.” At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Sen. Jack Reed and witnesses Timothy Morrison, Rose Gottemoeller, and former STRATCOM commander Charles Richard warned that doubts about U.S. extended deterrence are prompting renewed nuclear debate among allies in Europe, Japan, and South Korea. Gottemoeller urged a one-year extension, while others cautioned it could constrain U.S. development without stopping Russian violations. Witnesses noted New START’s gaps, including new Russian systems and the absence of China, whose buildup could reach 1,500 warheads by 2035. Missile defense proposals drew skepticism.
Comment: What defines an arms race if we already possess the capability to destroy the world ten times over? Do we seek to destroy the world 20 times over? Apologies for the sarcastic comment - but how do we measure an "arms race?" Is it purely numbers of warheads and delivery systems or the capabilities or the potential effects achieved? Is "arms race" or "friendly proliferation" the right term when we are talking about new countries potentially seeking nuclear weapons?
Fears of a nuclear arms race rise as New START expires
defenseone.com · Patrick Tucker
By Patrick Tucker
Science & Technology Editor
February 5, 2026 01:42 AM ET
Fading U.S. leadership has countries from Poland to South Korea thinking about nuclear-weapons programs of their own.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2026/02/fears-nuclear-arms-race-rise-new-start-expires/411210/?oref=defenseone_today_nl&utm
The Feb. 5 expiration of the last key U.S.-Russia arms-control agreement, combined with uncertainty about the U.S. commitment to defend European allies, has U.S. lawmakers and former officials worried about the prospects of nuclear proliferation and a new arms race.
“We've seen agitation between this administration and many of our allies, and there is renewed interest, I think, in many countries, particularly in Europe, Japan, and South Korea, in having their own nuclear-deterrence systems quickly,” Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., said at Tuesday’s hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Reed asked others at the hearing whether they agreed.
“I don't think you can understate the risk of proliferation,” replied Timothy Morrison, a former deputy assistant to the president for National Security Affairs and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.
At least some U.S. allies are considering developing nuclear weapons of their own, said Rose Gottemoeller, a former NATO deputy secretary general.
“I am very concerned about the potential for proliferation, so-called friendly proliferation. I do not think it will be helpful to stability and security,” Gottemoeller said. “There are many, I would say, debates and discussions that have surprised us among our NATO allies. Thursday will see the lapse of the 14-year-old New START agreement, which caps U.S. and Russian deployed strategic nuclear forces at 1,550 warheads and 700 delivery systems.
Gottemoeller urged the White House to renew the treaty for one year. Other witnesses, including Charles Richard, who as a Navy admiral led U.S. Strategic Command, did not, as it would constrain U.S. weapons development without necessarily stopping Russian violations.
All witnesses agreed the treaty had its limitations. It did not address nuclear-development trends, such as Russia’s development of unmanned submarines hypersonic missiles, and new tactical or lower-yield weapons that Russia has threatened to use against Ukraine. It also does not involve China, which has expressed skepticism about joining any such talks.
The collapse of New START was not unexpected, in part due to its limitations. “I think the New START Treaty will go out with a whimper,” said Morrison.
Less expected was the rise of tensions between the United States and Europe, including President Trump’s threats to seize territory belonging to NATO allies.
On Jan. 25, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson confirmed that the country had begun preliminary talks with France and the U.K., Europe’s two nuclear powers, about potential collaboration on nuclear weapons. This follows remarks last March from Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk that Poland must begin to explore its own options for developing nuclear weapons.
Such developments would have been unthinkable a few years ago, under the U.S. commitment to the “nuclear umbrella”, a guarantee that the United States would use its nuclear weapons in retaliation to any Russian nuclear attack on a NATO nation. But according to one Swedish newspaper, “the umbrella is gone.”
That may be premature. The United States has made no formal announcement that it is pulling back on its guarantee of nuclear protection in Europe. But as Gottemoeller pointed out, the White House has done little to reassure allies.
“The Secretary of War has stated that the United States will continue to extend the nuclear deterrent to our allies. But the fact that we are not seeing the administration really articulate this policy at a high level—neither the National Security Strategy nor the National Defense Strategy addresses it—is leading allies to think about extending nuclear deterrence themselves,” she said.
Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, pointed out during the hearing that “extended deterrence” appeared only once in the new National Security Strategy, which focuses much more on critiquing the European Union.
The witnesses also shared concerns about China’s rapid nuclear-weapons development. By 2035, Pentagon officials have predicted, China will have up to 1,500 warheads to deploy on ICBMs, submarines, and bombers.
“I think we have never seen a buildup that is proceeding as comprehensively and at this speed,” said Morrison. “I think maybe it breaks some of our models.”
In response, South Korea and other Asian nations are returned to long-abandoned discussions about building their own nukes.
“Our Asia-Pacific allies are certainly re-examining their own defense needs to include the possibility of them acquiring their own nuclear weapons,” said Richard. “I don't know of any proliferation that is actually occurring. We certainly have a longstanding history and have had successful extended deterrence commitments to both of those, and there are still options available to us.”
None of the witnesses said that the development of a new “Golden Dome” missile shield offered perfect protection against a widening number of nuclear threats. But Richard was adamant that an advanced missile shield, including space-based interceptors, would still make an attack on the United States less likely by “introducing a lack of confidence on the part of your opponent that their attack is going to be successful, yet they will carry all the consequences of having started it.”
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., countered that he did not feel that was sufficient. “I am very concerned that we could throw a trillion dollars at a problem that ultimately we will find is unsolvable,” he said. “I really worry about the future for our kids and our grandkids, living in a world where we have multiple countries with potentially thousands and thousands of nuclear weapons.”
defenseone.com · Patrick Tucker
8. This Week in American History: The First War for Hearts and Minds
Summary:
Historian Jonathan Horn recounts a February 1776 meeting in New York Harbor between Lord Drummond, an unofficial peace emissary, and British General Henry Clinton. Clinton argued Britain should seek “to gain the hearts and subdue the minds of America,” a phrase later associated with counterinsurgency thinking and cited by Max Boot and General David Petraeus as a concise way to describe winning a conflict like this. Clinton recorded the exchange in a memorandum now held in the Henry Clinton Papers at the University of Michigan. Drummond’s back-channel effort failed after Washington condemned it as improper. Clinton then sailed to North Carolina expecting loyalist support and reinforcements, but found loyalists already defeated at Moores Creek Bridge and no help arriving, underscoring how hard “hearts and minds” would be.
Comment: Our history still has impact and influence. I think we have long mischaracterized hearts and minds. Too often we associate the hearts" with being gentle rather than tough and trying to make people love us rather than enhance the legitimacy of the governing element. and I think this has led SD/W to his lethality campaign. it is interesting to note the original phrase from Henry Clinton: “To gain the hearts and subdue the minds of America was, in my opinion, worthwhile.” I am fond of Matt Armstrong's better description of what we have to do - focus on "minds and will." I am not interested in making people love us but rather influencing target audiences to make reasonable choices rather than one based on emotion.
Interestingly, you can describe the American Revolution in terms of Mao's three phases of protracted war (of course Mao as well as Ho/Giap in Vietnam studied the American Revolution and developed and modeled their strategies from it).
The three phases of an insurgency (Mao’s Protracted War) (FM 100-20 and FM 31-20, 1990)
a. Phase I: Latent or Incipient Phase. Resistance leadership develops the resistance movement into an effective clandestine organization. Prepares the population psychologically to resist subversion – propaganda, demonstrations, boycotts, and sabotage) There is no major outbreak of armed violence. Shadow government may be established. Tasks include:
(1) Recruit, organize, and train cadres.
(2) Infiltrate key government organizations and civil groups.
(3) establish cellular intelligence, operational, and support networks
(4) Organize or develop cooperative relationships with legitimate political action groups, youth groups, trade unions, and other front organizations to develop popular support for later political and military activities.
(5) Solicit and otherwise obtain funds (rob banks, embezzle, outside donations)
(6) Develop sources of external support.
b. Phase II: Guerrilla Warfare. (also known as the stalemate phase) Initiation of low-level violence – sabotage, terrorism, propaganda, mobilize masses, create base areas for low-level guerrilla action, proclaim counter-government, expand attacks, expand political activity, enlarge forces, enlarge and link base areas.
c. Phase III: War of movement of mobile warfare. Transition from guerrilla to conventional operations (guerrilla warfare will/can continue). If successful brings the collapse of the established government or the withdrawal of the occupying power. Without direct intervention the Phase III insurgency takes on the characteristics of a civil war. Establish a national government, consolidate military political front allies; consolidate military-political dominance; neutralize/eliminate former political elite. The insurgent government becomes responsible for the population.
The latent or incipient phase starts with grievances. The declaration of Independence was about "grievances communicated well." Basically Henry Clinton realized that the way to prevent the transition from the latent or incipient phase to the guerilla warfare or stalemate phase was by addressing the grievances. But this is rarely done well or effectively and often not at all. And of course Britain did not want to address the grievances just as most governments in power do not. But there are lessons here. So many lessons.
This Week in American History: The First War for Hearts and Minds
thefp.com
“To gain the hearts and subdue the minds of America was, in my opinion, worthwhile.”
02.04.26
https://www.thefp.com/p/this-week-in-american-history-the-df8
As part of our celebration of America at 250, we’ve started a weekly newsletter by historian Jonathan Horn. Learn what happened this week in American history, why it matters, and what else you should see and read in The Free Press and beyond. This week Jonathan looks at the British general who coined the phrase “hearts and minds” as a military strategy. To get this newsletter in your inbox every week, sign up here. —The Editors
One man had come to America to bring peace through negotiations. The other had come to impose peace through war. Two hundred fifty years ago this week, Lord Drummond, a Scottish noble acting as an unofficial peace emissary, and Henry Clinton, a high-ranking British general, met on a warship in New York Harbor. The surprise is how much they agreed upon. During their conversation, Clinton summed up his preferred strategy this way: “To gain the hearts and subdue the minds of America.”
With that turn of phrase, a British general fighting to thwart the American Revolution articulated the doctrine that the nation born out of the struggle would later deploy itself in places such as Vietnam and Iraq: winning hearts and minds. Max Boot, in his book about the history of guerrilla warfare, credits Clinton with “the first recorded use of ‘hearts and minds’ in a counterinsurgency context.” No less of an authority than General David Petraeus has written that the phrase remains the “most succinct explanation for how to win a counterinsurgency.”
Among the British high command in America in 1776, Clinton was far from alone in preferring to placate the colonists rather than conquer them. Before one of them became the top British army commander in America and the other became the top navy commander, the famous Howe brothers had made a name back in England as colonial sympathizers. Admiral Richard Howe had tried to negotiate with Benjamin Franklin in London after another Howe sibling, Caroline, had struck up a relationship with the American through a shared love of chess. Meanwhile, General William Howe had spoken out against punishing the colonists too harshly for the Boston Tea Party and had run for a seat in Parliament on a pledge not to serve in America in the event of war there. It would, I’m sorry to report, not be the last time a campaign promise went unkept.
In May 1775, William Howe arrived in besieged Boston along with two other major generals, Clinton and John Burgoyne, aboard a ship fittingly christened Cerberus for the mythological three-headed dog. Although Howe and Clinton shared an interest in winning hearts and minds, it didn’t extend to each other’s. Characterized by historians as “cerebral” and “insecure”—and by himself as a “shy bitch”—the 45-year-old Clinton longed for an independent command. It was his departure from Boston in January 1776 that led George Washington, as discussed here last week, to worry that an invasion of New York City might be imminent.
As it turned out, Clinton was only stopping over in New York en route to North Carolina, where he had orders to strike a blow against the rebels in the South. Before proceeding the rest of the way down the coast, he received the visit from Lord Drummond on February 7, 1776. Though the British government had not officially sent the Scotsman to carry out negotiations, he claimed that ministers had winked at his scheme to make overtures to New York’s John Jay and other members of the Continental Congress deemed most open to reconciliation.
Fortunately for historians, Clinton made a memorandum of his conversation with Drummond. The document now resides in the Henry Clinton Papers at the University of Michigan’s William L. Clements Library, which kindly shared a copy with The Free Press. “I did not doubt that this country might be conquered, but did much whether it was worthwhile to have it when conquered,” Clinton recorded telling Drummond before adding: “To gain the hearts and subdue the minds of America was, in my opinion, worthwhile.”
Though Clinton wished for its success, Drummond’s mission stood no chance. Upon learning of the attempt at back-channel negotiations, Washington declared it improper. “I hope [it] will never be thought of,” he wrote to John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress. “[Drummond’s] conduct in this instance is premature and officious.”
Clinton’s mission to North Carolina proved no more successful. He had been told to expect large numbers of loyalist troops, as well as British regiments from Ireland, ready to fight by his side. But when he reached the colony in March, he discovered otherwise. North Carolina’s loyalists had already suffered a disastrous defeat at the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge on February 27, and reinforcements from across the Atlantic were nowhere in sight. What to do next was unclear, but this much could already be seen: Winning hearts and minds in America would not be easy.
Something to See: The 250th anniversary of the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge will take place at the battlefield in Currie, North Carolina, from February 27 to March 1. Scheduled events include a wreath laying, military demonstrations, and guided tours. Those in search of General Clinton will find his resting place along with King George III’s at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle. For a delightful look at Clinton, George III, the Howe brothers, and others, read The Men Who Lost America by Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy.
The 250th anniversary of the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge will take place from February 27 to March 1. (NPS)
O’Shaughnessy describes how George III came to believe that the American Revolution, if not thwarted, would spread to Britain’s other colonies. Had the king seen the petition addressed to Washington on February 8, 1776, from residents of Nova Scotia, it would have confirmed those fears. “The inhabitants of Nova Scotia. . . have been under the greatest anxiety and apprehension ever since the great contest subsisting between Great Britain and the American colonies,” the petition read. “With anxious desires have we been waiting for the success of your righteous cause, and that you would cast an eye of pity towards this forlorn part.”
Write to Us
We want to know how you’re commemorating American history where you live. Keep us posted on upcoming reenactments, exhibits, and celebrations, and we’ll include some items every week in these endnotes. Write to us at America@theFP.com, and don’t be surprised if we write back asking for pictures.
Meanwhile, Across the Republic
—Anniversaries apropos of nothing: Fifteenth Amendment ratified (February 3, 1870); Philippine-American War begins (February 4, 1899); Northeast Blizzard of ’78 strikes (February 5–7, 1978).
—History read of the week: Check out the essay in National Review by the great Richard Brookhiser on what decades of studying the Founding Fathers have taught him. “Parties were the apple of discord; they still are,” he writes. “But the Founders also learned, as must the players in any lasting political system, the remedy—how to deal with defeat. Losers can keep watch on the winners. . . . In time, maybe the losers will get back in again.”
—Stories—some true, some perhaps not—abound of Ulysses S. Grant driving his carriage at high speeds through the streets of Washington, D.C. But even he would have trouble keeping up with the Indy cars set to tear through the city’s streets in honor of America’s 250th birthday. Per CBS News, President Donald Trump announced that the Freedom 250 Grand Prix will take place on August 23. No word yet what it will mean for the city’s much-debated speed-enforcement cameras.
Stories abound of Ulysses S. Grant driving his carriage at high speeds through the streets of Washington, D.C. (Library of Congress)
—Thomas Jefferson loved music but thought his countrymen needed, to put it delicately, more practice time. “[Music] is the favorite passion of my soul, and fortune has cast my lot in a country where it is in a state of deplorable barbarism,” he wrote in 1778. It’s a sign of how far Americans have come that the Charlottesville Ballet, near his Monticello estate, has partnered with Opera on the James for America250: Voices of Virginia. Thanks to Brianna Copeland from the ballet for writing to us about the performance, which will occur in Charlottesville on March 14 and Lynchburg on March 21. There’ll be no tiptoeing around history.
thefp.com
9. Soldier who died shielding Polish ally to receive Medal of Honor
Summary:
Army Staff Sgt. Michael H. Ollis, 24, will receive the Medal of Honor 13 years after dying in Afghanistan when he stepped between a suicide bomber and Polish Lt. Karol Cierpica, absorbing the blast and saving the officer. Ollis’s father said POTUS called the family Tuesday night to confirm approval; the White House did not confirm publicly, and no ceremony date is set. Ollis previously received the Distinguished Service Cross. His citation describes him accounting for soldiers, moving to engage attackers with Cierpica, then shielding the wounded ally and incapacitating an insurgent before the vest detonated. Ollis is memorialized at Camp Kościuszko in Poland, and Cierpica named his son Michael.
Comment: There are almost no words for this except these: "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."
Soldier who died shielding Polish ally to receive Medal of Honor
By Hope Hodge Seck
Feb 4, 2026, 12:45 PM
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2026/02/04/soldier-who-died-shielding-polish-ally-to-receive-medal-of-honor/?utm
President Donald Trump called the family of Staff Sgt. Michael H. Ollis to confirm that their son was approved for the award. (Fort Drum Public Affairs)
The last act of Army Staff Sgt. Michael Ollis, 24, was to step between an Afghan suicide bomber and a Polish army officer — taking the force of the blast and sacrificing his own life to save another. Now, 13 years later, he’ll receive the military’s highest award for his valor, according to his parents.
Robert Ollis, Michael’s father, confirmed to Military Times via phone that he and Michael’s mother Linda had received a call from President Donald Trump Tuesday night confirming Ollis was approved for the award. The infantryman from Staten Island had previously been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s second-highest combat honor, for his actions.
Robert Ollis said the call with the president was “bittersweet.”
“We wanted this for Michael, but being his father, I want my son back,” he said. Beyond that, though, he added, “This is the best.”
“Our prayers have been answered,” Ollis continued. “There is a God, and if you keep annoying him, He’ll come through.”
The White House did not respond to a query seeking confirmation of the award.
Robert Ollis said he’d heard from the Pentagon on Wednesday morning that the news had not been intended for announcement yet. No date has been confirmed for the award ceremony, Ollis said.
Ollis has become something of a symbol of the power of military alliances. In Camp Kościuszko in Poznan, Poland, a mess hall named after Ollis — the “SSG Michael H. Ollis Warrior Grill” — honors his memory and sacrifice, according to a 2024 Army news release.
In an even more meaningful tribute, the Polish soldier Ollis saved, Lt. Karol Cierpica, would name his son Michael in honor of the fallen soldier.
According to previous Military Times reporting, Ollis, assigned to the 10th Mountain Division’s 2nd Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, had been posted at Forward Operating Base Ghazni in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province on Aug. 28, 2013, when the base was breached by a car bomb. The breach allowed for 10 enemy fighters wearing suicide vests to make their way inside the outer wall. More insurgents pelted the base with mortars and grenades from outside.
According to Ollis’s medal citation, he accounted for his soldiers and checked for casualties before running toward the enemy assault. He linked up with Cierpica and they moved toward the attackers and began to engage them “without their personal protection equipment and armed only with their rifles.”
“While fighting along the perimeter of the forward operating base, an insurgent came around a corner and immediately engaged them with small arms fire,” Ollis’s citation reads. “With complete disregard for his own safety, Staff Sergeant Ollis positioned himself between the insurgent and [Cierpica] who had been wounded in both legs and was unable to walk. Staff Sergeant Ollis fired on the insurgent and incapacitated him, but as he approached the insurgent, the insurgent’s suicide vest detonated, mortally wounding him.”
Tom Sileo, whose 2024 book “I Have Your Back” documented Ollis’ story and heroism, told Military Times in a Wednesday interview that he’d initially connected with the Ollis family in 2014 and stayed in touch with them over the years.
“From the first moment I heard about the story and read about it, the fact that he had saved a foreign soldier’s life and lost his own life in the process … that really jumped out at me,” Sileo said. “I thought it said a lot about our alliances and and about the heroism, of course, of these brave men and women of our military, that they’d be willing to lay their lives down for someone from a different country, and in this case, somebody that that I came to learn through research that Michael really had only encountered a few minutes before he saved his life.”
The Ollis family, Sileo said, had been contacting officials for years about upgrading Michael’s award to the Medal of Honor. Sileo said he had corresponded for years about the matter with now-Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, beginning when he was a Fox News host. He credited Eric Geressy, senior adviser to the Secretary of Defense for Strategy and a retired Army infantryman from Staten Island, for throwing his weight behind the effort as well.
“Michael earned this by what he did on Aug. 28, 2013, but Eric Geressy in particular deserves a ton of credit for making this happen,” Sileo said.
Ollis’s award news comes shortly after the release of the 2026 National Defense Strategy, which emphasized burden-sharing with European allies and chastised some for “irresponsible choices” in protecting their own security. Sileo emphasized that Ollis’s 2013 actions far preceded the current administration and cautioned against making political inferences. But, he said, the story was still significant for today’s climate.
“Maybe this can remind those in charge of how important those alliances are, and what a beautiful way for Michael’s legacy to live on,” Sileo said. “And that’s my hope that the medal... can become something even greater that reminds those in charge of how important these alliances are.”
10. Army to deploy 10th Mountain Division brigade to CENTCOM
Summary:
The Army announced that the 10th Mountain Division’s 2nd Mobile Brigade Combat Team will deploy to U.S. Central Command, which covers operations across the Middle East and parts of Central and South Asia. The unit will replace an Iowa National Guard brigade, the 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry Division, whose soldiers are beginning a phased return from a deployment supporting Operation Inherent Resolve. The Guard unit said it worked with coalition and regional partners to reduce ISIS capabilities in Iraq and Syria and that some forces are redeploying due to progress toward CENTCOM objectives. The article notes Operation Inherent Resolve began in 2014, U.S. forces remain to prevent ISIS resurgence, and CENTCOM reported strikes on ISIS targets in Syria from Jan. 27 through Monday. The Army called the move a regular rotation, did not specify countries, and gave no timeline. It also describes Mobile Brigade Combat Teams as a new formation under Transforming in Contact to increase mobility, reconnaissance, and targeting.
There is no rest for our Army: from infantrymen to air defenders to logistics, communications, and intelligence units supporting the joint force, our Army is required everywhere, in every theater. But our Army is truly transforming in contact and this is an excellent illustration of that.
Army to deploy 10th Mountain Division brigade to CENTCOM
By Eve Sampson
Feb 4, 2026, 05:38 PM
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2026/02/04/army-to-deploy-10th-mountain-division-brigade-to-centcom/?utm
U.S. soldiers assigned to the 10th Mountain Division shoot a 60mm mortar during a training exercise at the Joint Readiness Training Center on Fort Polk, Louisiana, Aug. 15, 2025. (Spc. Mariah Aguilar/U.S. Army)
A brigade from the 10th Mountain Division will deploy to U.S. Central Command, an area that oversees military operations across the Middle East and parts of Central and South Asia, the Army announced earlier this week.
The 2nd Mobile Brigade Combat Team will take over from an Iowa National Guard unit, which on Monday said that its soldiers would begin returning from deployment in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.
“During their deployment, these soldiers worked alongside coalition and regional partners to significantly reduce the capabilities of ISIS in Iraq and Syria, helping improve security and stability throughout the region,” the 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry Division, said in a statement on social media.
The brigade also said that, “due to progress achieved toward U.S. Central Command objectives, some soldiers and units have completed their assigned missions and are beginning a phased redeployment home in accordance with higher headquarters guidance.”
The U.S. launched Operation Inherent Resolve in 2014 to counter the Islamic State’s expansion into Iraq and Syria.
While ISIS lost control of its self-declared caliphate in 2019, U.S. and coalition forces have remained in the region to support partner forces and prevent the group’s resurgence.
U.S. operations against the group have persisted. In the wake of a December attack that killed two Iowa National Guard soldiers and an American civilian interpreter, CENTCOM said Wednesday that U.S. forces conducted multiple strikes against ISIS targets across Syria between Jan. 27 and Monday.
This deployment is a regular rotation of forces, the Army said. The announcement did not specify in which countries the brigade would operate. It also did not include a timeline for the deployment.
Mobile Brigade Combat Teams — like the incoming brigade — are a new formation, introduced as part of the service’s Transforming in Contact initiative, that reorganizes traditional infantry brigades to be more mobile and have more reconnaissance and targeting capabilities.
About Eve Sampson
Eve Sampson is a reporter and former Army officer. She has covered conflict across the world, writing for The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Associated Press.
11. Marine awarded for designing the Corps’ first fully NDAA-compliant 3D-printed drone at $700 a pop
Summary:
Marine Sgt. Henry David Volpe, an automotive maintenance technician with 2nd Marine Logistics Group, led development of HANX, the Marine Corps’ first fully NDAA-compliant 3D-printed drone, with a base cost around $700 and a one-kilogram payload. Built at the II MEF Innovation Campus, the effort focused on sourcing approved parts to reduce supply-chain and security risks, including concerns about “backdoor software.” A unit spokesperson said Volpe will receive the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal. The article contrasts prior Marine training builds that used cheap Chinese components with the requirement that operational drones meet NDAA restrictions. The Corps also uses separate non-networked commercial drones for training to simulate adversary systems. Units in II MEF are already exploring HANX modifications for tasks like EOD and training; range remains under testing.
Comment: Turn them loose on complex problems. It is our Marines, soldiers, sailors, and airmen who are the best innovators. I believe our services recognize that.
Marine awarded for designing the Corps’ first fully NDAA-compliant 3D-printed drone at $700 a pop
defensescoop.com · dlawrence · February 4, 2026
Marine Sgt. Henry David Volpe, an automotive maintenance technician with the 2nd Marine Logistics Group out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, was credited as having led the development of the HANX drone, which can be modified for different military tasks and can carry a one-kilogram payload.
By
Drew F. Lawrence
https://defensescoop.com/2026/02/04/marine-sgt-awarded-3d-printed-drone-ndaa-compliant-hanx/?utm
At roughly $700 per base model, the HANX platform is the Marine Corps’ first 3D-printed drone that complies with laws prohibiting the U.S. military from acquiring and using unmanned aerial systems with parts from certain foreign entities, according to the service.
Marine Sgt. Henry David Volpe, an automotive maintenance technician with the 2nd Marine Logistics Group out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, was credited as having led the development of the HANX drone, which can be modified for different military tasks and can carry a one-kilogram payload.
Taking his previous experience with 3D printing to the II Marine Expeditionary Force Innovation Campus — the unit’s hub for Marines to tinker with design modeling, robotics and manufacturing to come up with solutions for “ground level” problems — Volpe got to work on developing HANX, to include ensuring it complies with the National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA.
“Anyone can create a cheap drone using cheap non-approved parts,” Volpe, for whom HANX is named after, said in a service press release last week. “However, finding parts that don’t run the risk of having backdoor software is difficult.”
A spokesperson for his unit told DefenseScoop Volpe is set to receive the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal for his efforts.
For the U.S. military to use drones, the parts need to comply with the NDAA to avoid using material from adversarial countries such as China over supply chain and security concerns. Just last year, Marines were learning how to build small drones, but they were using cheap, readily-available Chinese components to do so.
The UAS supply chain has proved to be a significant hurdle amid a wide availability of low-cost components made around the world, especially China. Late last year, DefenseScoop reported that a majority of drones cleared through the military’s UAS vetting program had motors sourced from China, though officials said those components were considered low risk for exploitation.
“These systems are rigorously vetted to ensure they are NDAA-compliant and do not contain critical components from covered foreign entities,” Lt. Col. Eric Flanagan, a spokesperson for the Marine Corps, told DefenseScoop of the Corps’ “primary operational drone fleet,” which were approved programs of record and through the military’s Blue UAS cleared list.
He said the service is “fully committed to complying with” military policy, congressional mandates and the NDAA.
“While our training systems are strictly compliant, the Marine Corps does utilize a separate set of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) drones for specific, non-networked purposes,” he said in part of a response to DefenseScoop’s question about NDAA compliance and if the service was using parts from China. He did not say where the COTS drones were from. “A key use for these systems is to realistically simulate adversary capabilities during training exercises.”
Those platforms, he added, are never connected to any military network and the “practice allows our Marines to train against the types of systems they might actually face, enhancing their readiness and counter-UAS skills.”
As the military top-shops establish more formal processes to develop and produce unmanned aerial systems, junior troops from multiple branches have been designing their own — and the services have been using them.
Volpe visited Fort Campbell, Kentucky, where soldiers have developed their own home-grown drones. In true interservice rivalry fashion, he was inspired to make his own.
“Their drone has some capabilities mine doesn’t, and some very nice cameras with it, but what I saw was a big price tag. I knew I could make something far cheaper without sacrificing too many features,” he said. “The [Army] design and hardware selection was also contracted out to third and fourth parties, making their 3D-printed drone an assembly [that] can’t be entirely done by soldiers.”
DefenseScoop reported in January that the Marine Corps was anticipating buying 10,000 first-person-view drones this year after it standardized a training program for its troops to certify on small UAS use. The service asked industry to make these drones for under $4,000 per unit, but with HANX ringing in at a fraction of that price, 3D-printed systems could play a big role.
A spokesperson for 2nd Marine Logistics Group, 1st Lt. Jorin Hollenbeak told DefenseScoop that the cost of HANX could change depending on what accessories are added to it, and its maximum range is still being tested.
“This in-house manufacturing capability is a key part of our broader strategy to equip all of our formations with an appropriate mix of unmanned systems,” Flanagan said. “While it is premature to provide exact figures on how many 3D-printed drones will be part of our overall inventory, this capability allows us to be more agile, cost-effective, and responsive to the evolving threats on the battlefield.”
Hollenbeak said multiple units within II MEF have shown interest in modifying HANX for specific uses, including explosive ordnance disposal and public affairs. The Innovation Campus is exploring ways to use the system for offensive, logistics and surveillance training, he noted.
“I had never accomplished something like this,” Volpe said, according to the press release. “I’ve been to college before, rebuilt engines, but this is mine. This is what I designed. This is what I made.”
Written by Drew F. Lawrence
Drew F. Lawrence is a Reporter at DefenseScoop, where he covers defense technology, systems, policy and personnel. A graduate of the George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs, he has also been published in Military.com, CNN, The Washington Post, Task & Purpose and The War Horse. In 2022, he was named among the top ten military veteran journalists, and has earned awards in podcasting and national defense reporting. Originally from Massachusetts, he is a proud New England sports fan and an Army veteran.
defensescoop.com · dlawrence · February 4, 2026
12. Don’t mention ‘Article 5,’ Finland warns US on Ukraine
Summary:
Finland warned U.S. officials against calling postwar security pledges to Ukraine “Article 5-like,” arguing the phrase could blur a needed “firewall” between NATO’s mutual defense guarantee and any bilateral commitments to Ukraine, according to a State Department cable obtained by POLITICO. Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen raised the issue in January meetings with Reps. Jack Bergman and Sarah Elfreth, while stressing Russia is a long-term strategic threat and cautioning against a weak peace that leaves Ukraine unable to deter future aggression. Analysts cited risks: implying NATO involvement, feeding domestic opposition, and tempting Russia to probe the pledge. Concerns are amplified by uncertainty about allied capacity and POTUS’s dim view of NATO.
Comment: Sometimes we are lazy and undisciplined in our language and toss out terms without sufficient analysis or understanding of their potential effects. This is wise counsel from the Finnish foreign minister.
But here is the conundrum: If even “Article 5-like” language can dilute NATO’s unique guarantee, what words preserve deterrence for Ukraine without creating false expectations of NATO involvement? Or should we bite the bullet and do the right thing and stand up to Putin and make NATO security guarantees? Let us learn, adapt, and anticipate. I think we must anticipate Putin's future actions and take the necessary steps to deter them. Which leaves us with the fundamental question: What will deter Putin in the future after some kind of agreement is reached? We cannot only think about the near term agreement but anticipate what comes next. What do we need to do now to mitigate the future threats that are likely to occur?
Exclusive
Don’t mention ‘Article 5,’ Finland warns US on Ukraine
Some NATO countries worry using any version of the term “Article 5” for Ukraine defense could weaken its deterrence.
Finland's Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen laid out her country's concerns about using the term "Article 5-like" in reference to Ukraine during a meeting with American lawmakers. | Michaela Stache/AFP via Getty Images
By Nahal Toosi and Paul McLeary
02/04/2026 06:30 PM EST
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/04/dont-mention-article-5-finland-warns-us-on-ukraine-00766043?utm
Finland has urged U.S. officials not to describe future security pledges to a postwar Ukraine as “Article 5-like,” implying that doing so could undercut the mutual defense clause at the heart of the NATO military alliance, according to a State Department cable obtained by POLITICO.
The Jan. 20 cable hints at worries in some corners over the labels used during peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow. They show how sensitive some phrases can be in the national security realm, even when officials are merely trying to offer an analogy to various audiences.
According to the cable, sent from the U.S. Embassy in Helsinki to Washington, Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen discussed the issue on Jan. 19 with U.S. Reps. Jack Bergman (R-Mich.) and Sarah Elfreth (D-Md.), both of whom are members of the House Armed Services Committee.
Valtonen underscored Finland’s view that Russia is a “long-term strategic threat” and cautioned against a “weak” peace deal for Ukraine that would hinder its ability to defend itself against future Russian aggression, the cable states.
But Valtonen cautioned against any suggestions of “Article 5-like” security guarantees in a postwar Ukraine, the cable adds. She warned that it risked conflating NATO’s Article 5 guarantees with whatever bilateral promises are made to Ukraine. It also quotes her as saying there should be a “firewall” between NATO and future security guarantees to Ukraine. Finland’s defense minister made similar points in a later meeting, according to the cable.
Article 5 is a critical clause in the NATO pact that means an armed attack on one member of the 32-member alliance will be treated as an attack on all members. NATO has invoked the article only once: after Islamist terrorists attacked the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001.
The documents’ contents offer insight into concerns voiced by other Finnish leaders who have said that, while they want to help Ukraine protect itself, the concept of a security “guarantee” is a more serious matter they’re not ready to agree to just yet.
A Finnish official said Valtonen’s office wouldn’t comment on confidential discussions, though underscored Helsinki’s long-standing goal of eventually accepting Ukraine into the NATO alliance.
“Finland’s objective is to ensure that Ukraine receives the strongest possible security arrangements and guarantees in support of a sustainable and lasting peace,” the official said, who was granted anonymity to speak about sensitive policy matters. “Finland’s position is that Ukraine’s future lies within NATO.”
Former NATO officials and analysts said the cable reflects growing concerns in various capitals about how engaging with a postwar Ukraine could affect individual countries in the long run.
One potential problem is that “using the term Article 5 in other contexts implies NATO involvement that is not in fact a part of any of these proposed arrangements,” said Edward Wrong, a former NATO official. “Finland and many other NATO members want to ensure it is understood that Article 5 is unique to NATO.”
The State Department declined to comment.
Elfreth, one of the U.S. lawmakers Valtonen met with, did not address the session with the Finnish foreign minister directly, but said in a statement: “From our many meetings, it was clear to me that our NATO allies, new and old, are committed to advancing shared goals of defending our partners from Russian and other adversarial influences.
Bergman declined to comment.
Using Article 5 as a parallel has multiple upsides and downsides, especially given the range of attitudes toward Ukraine in NATO, the former officials and analysts said. That’s further complicated by the likelihood that individual countries, or select groups of countries — but not NATO itself — will offer Ukraine security aid in the near future.
One challenge is that by referring to Article 5, even with the “like” attached to it, national leaders could hand political ammunition to opposition groups, said Josh Shifrinson, a scholar with the University of Maryland, College Park, who advocates for a more restrained foreign policy.
There’s also the possibility that framing a security pledge to Ukraine as “Article 5-like” will entice Russia to test what that truly means.
If Russia stages some sort of an armed attack and the countries backing Ukraine struggle to respond, that could raise questions about the strength of NATO’s Article 5, said Rachel Ellehuus, a former Biden administration Defense Department official assigned to NATO.
On top of that, other members of NATO, especially those in Europe, are acutely aware of President Donald Trump’s dim views of the alliance. They are reacting to his demands that they step up defense spending and have taken on the lion’s share of aid to Ukraine. Given economic uncertainties in the years ahead, just how much they can support Ukraine is in question.
“I’m guessing the Finns don’t want to overpromise and under-deliver,” Ellehuus said.
Spokespeople for NATO declined to comment.
Finland is one of NATO’s newest members, having joined after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The Finnish foreign minister comes across in the cable as tough on Russia, a country with which Finland shares an 830-mile border.
“We should not be naïve in thinking they will change, especially if sanctions get [lifted]” and Russia becomes “empowered politically and economically,” Valtonen is quoted as saying.
Although there are ongoing talks among the U.S., Ukraine and Russia in various formats, Russian leader Vladimir Putin has not committed to a substantial cease-fire and has made demands that many Ukrainians consider unacceptable for a peace deal.
Victor Jack contributed to this report from Brussels.
13. Keith Kellogg says he left Trump's White House to be 'free to talk' about Ukraine
Summary:
Keith Kellogg, a retired three-star Army general and former envoy for Ukraine in POTUS’s White House, said he left government on Dec. 31, 2025, to be “more open and free” to talk about the war while staying engaged from outside. He joined the America First Policy Institute and rejected speculation that he departed due to friction over Ukraine policy, calling it a routine transition tied to the confirmation process. The White House said his departure was scheduled. Kellogg said he helped lead sensitive efforts, including negotiations on a U.S.–Ukraine minerals deal, and condemned Russian attacks. He claimed Russia has failed to achieve its objectives and suggested time favors Ukraine after winter. He said he plans to return to Ukraine soon to assess conditions firsthand.
Comment: I missed the memo. I did not know that he left. The America First Policy Institute is the main think tank that supports the Administration and I think it is more important than the Heritage Foundation.
LTG Kellogg argues Russia has “failed” and is looking for the best way out while attacks continue. What strategic indicators would validate or refute his claim that time favors Ukraine after winter?
Keith Kellogg says he left Trump's White House to be 'free to talk' about Ukraine
kyivindependent.com · Tim Zadorozhnyy · February 4, 2026
https://kyivindependent.com/keith-kellogg-says-he-left-trumps-white-house-to-be-free-to-talk-about-ukraine/
Editor's note: This story has been updated with a comment from the White House.
Keith Kellogg, formerly U.S. President Donald Trump's envoy on Ukraine and widely regarded in Kyiv as one of the most pro-Ukrainian voices in the White House, said his work on Ukraine is far from over after leaving government at the end of 2025.
A highly decorated, retired three-star U.S. Army general stepped down on Dec. 31 and has since joined the America First Policy Institute, a Washington think tank.
In an interview with the Kyiv Independent, he described the shift as a way to remain engaged on Ukraine while gaining greater freedom to speak directly about the war.
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"I wanted to spend more time on the outside where I could be much more open and free to talk about Ukraine than I was inside the government," Kellogg said.
A career military officer whose views on Russia were shaped during the Cold War, Kellogg has long promoted a "peace through strength" approach.
That posture made him a trusted figure in Kyiv, where his departure from the administration was met with concern about the future direction of U.S. foreign policy.
Inside the White House, Kellogg played a central role in several sensitive diplomatic efforts. He led negotiations on the U.S.–Ukraine minerals deal and repeatedly condemned Russian attacks on Ukrainian cities in unusually blunt language for a Trump's envoy.
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Supporters of Ukraine credit him with helping sustain U.S.–Ukrainian engagement during a period marked by uncertainty and internal debate in Washington.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy talks with U.S. Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg on Feb. 20, 2025, in Kyiv. (Vitalii Nosach/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)
His exit from government quickly sparked speculation that disagreements with the Trump administration over Ukraine policy lay behind the move.
Kellogg dismissed the claim outright, framing the changes as a routine transition tied to the confirmation process after a year of work.
"None of it's true," he said. "It was a time to move and time to go on. There's absolutely no truth to any type of friction or imbalance at all."
White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly told the Kyiv Independent that the former envoy's departure had been planned in advance.
"General Keith Kellogg is a highly respected American patriot," she said. "His departure was previously scheduled, and the administration wishes him well."
Kellogg framed his current role as a return to familiar territory.
"It just gives me time to do something different. It goes back to an area I was comfortable in, in writing and talking about it and being on the news ways."
Initially appointed as special envoy for both Ukraine and Russia, Kellogg was later reassigned to focus exclusively on Ukraine. The Kremlin reportedly objected to his participation in peace talks, viewing him as too openly supportive of Kyiv.
Asked whether Russia had tried to keep him out of participation in the negotiations, Kellogg did not outright deny it.
"I don't think the Russians necessarily wanted me to be on that part of the team," he said. "That was fine with me. I had enough things to be working with the Ukrainian team and bringing it back to the White House."
Now outside government, Kellogg has spoken even more candidly about the war, arguing that Russia has failed to achieve its objectives in Ukraine and that President Vladimir Putin's definition of victory is out of step with reality on the ground.
"Putin's definition of winning is not my definition," Kellogg said. "I think he has failed. I think Russia has failed."
He added that the Kremlin has reached a stage where it is searching for "the best way possible" to exit the war, even as Russian forces continue near-daily attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure.
Kellogg also suggested that time favors Kyiv. While acknowledging the strain of winter and sustained strikes on the power grid, he said the months ahead could shift the balance.
"When you come out of the winter, the longer the days go by, I think it is better for Ukraine than it is for Russia in the long term."
In Ukraine, Kellogg remains a well-known and often warmly regarded figure. President Volodymyr Zelensky has joked publicly that Kellogg's visits to Kyiv seemed to shield the capital from Russian air attacks as effectively as Patriot air defense systems.
Kellogg said he personally heard Zelensky make the remark during the YES conference in Kyiv several months ago and confirmed that he is aware of the comparison.
He also said he plans to return to Ukraine in the near future, signaling that his engagement with the country will continue despite his exit from formal office.
"Yes, we'll be back to Ukraine," Kellogg said. "We'll be back there, going to Kyiv and meeting with the people as well. So yes, it will happen in the near term."
He added that the purpose of the visit would be to assess conditions on the ground firsthand, reiterating that the trip "will be true" and that he intends to come back.
kyivindependent.com · Tim Zadorozhnyy · February 4, 2026
14. A CRINK in the Armor of Deterrence: The Axis of Upheaval in the Indo-Pacific
Summary:
The authors argue that deterring a China move on Taiwan may depend less on air and naval power than on forward-postured ground forces, especially U.S. Forces Korea, that can hold Beijing’s interests at risk while also deterring a ground war on the Korean Peninsula. They frame the key problem as the China-Russia-Iran-north Korea (CRINK) alignment, with the Russia-north Korea partnership as the most operationally mature driver of a credible two-front challenge. They claim Moscow’s support has increased Kim Jong Un’s resources, legitimacy, and access to advanced capabilities, constraining U.S. options and weakening deterrence. They propose a multi-pronged response: strengthen forward posture in South Korea, institutionalize trilateral coordination with Japan, tighten sanctions and exposure of illicit networks, and use targeted diplomacy to constrain the most destabilizing transfers.
Comment: I believe it is wrong to separate and compartmentalize the actions of China and north Korea and Russia and north Korea. This argument has already been rejected by the USD/W (P). But this article leads to some important questions and considerations.
If USFK is both a peninsula deterrent and a cross-theater lever against Beijing, what specific “costs” must it credibly impose to change Xi’s risk calculus before a Taiwan crisis begins? Again the fundamental question of what deters Xi (and Kim and Putin) must be answered.
The authors argue the Russia-north Korea partnership makes “reverse Kissinger” logic implausible. What evidence would prove this relationship is truly durable rather than transactional and reversible? I think the relationship will remain "strongly transactional" until it isn't necessary anymore. But I think both Putin and Kim will assess it is very necessary for each for the foreseeable future.
If the proposed answer is more posture, more trilateral integration, more sanctions, and selective diplomacy, where is the point of diminishing returns, and what tradeoffs in readiness or escalation risk follow? A strategic challenge the strategists and planners must solve.
A CRINK in the Armor of Deterrence: The Axis of Upheaval in the Indo-Pacific
by Christopher Lee, by Ben Blane
|
02.05.2026 at 06:00am
https://smallwarsjournal.com/2026/02/05/a-crink-in-the-armor-of-deterrence/
In the calculus of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, America’s most decisive deterrent may not be a carrier strike group or a bomber task force, but a forward-postured ground-force capable of holding Beijing’s interests at risk while simultaneously deterring a ground war on the Korean Peninsula. The new National Security Strategy (NSS) rightly prioritizes the Chinese Communist Party as the pacing threat, with the invasion of Taiwan the most prescient danger to a free and open Indo-Pacific. Yet beyond this explicit focus lie tacitly overt challenges that carry equally consequential implications for regional stability that cannot be ignored.
Chief among them is the burgeoning China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea (CRINK) alignment and, more specifically, the battle-hardened partnership between Moscow and Pyongyang. No longer peripheral, this relationship functions as a direct logistical and strategic pipeline that enables Beijing to divert Washington’s attention and tie down U.S. forces. In any Taiwan contingency, South Korea will inevitably face a newly provocative and emboldened North Korea, forcing allied planners to contend with a second front.
But viewing U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) merely as a defensive backstop misses its most critical role. As General Xavier T. Brunson, Commander of United Nations Command, Combined Forces Command, and USFK has repeatedly reiterated the centrality of USFK – anchored by the U.S. Army’s only field army and enabled by its unique geographic and operational posture – provides a powerful preemptive lever to impose direct costs on the Chinese Communist Party. Properly leveraged, USFK fundamentally alters President Xi’s risk analysis and offers policymakers a more potent path to deterring a two-front war before it begins.
Russia-North Korea: CRINK’s Rising Comradeship
The emergence of a credible two-front challenge in Northeast Asia is neither accidental nor episodic. It is the product of deliberate state action, enabled most directly by Russia’s evolving partnership with North Korea. While China stands to benefit from any diversion of U.S. attention during a Taiwan contingency, it is Moscow – not Beijing – that has most tangibly altered Pyongyang’s capabilities, confidence, and willingness to act. Since the onset of Russia’s war in Ukraine, the relationship has shifted from episodic arms transitions into a sustained strategic alignment, providing Kim Jong-un with resources, legitimacy, and access to military technology unavailable through any other partner.
This evolution matters, not because it reflects a centralized CRINK strategy, but because it materially constrains U.S. and allied options. Russian support has redacted the plausibility of decoupling North Korea from broader anti-U.S. alignments through diplomatic realignment, or so-called reverse Kissinger approach. Rather than a fissure to be exploited, the Russia-North Korea partnership increasingly functions as a force multiplier within CRINK – accelerating North Korea’s military development while directly supporting China’s concepts for unrestricted warfare with direct implications for a Taiwan contingency.
Accordingly, comprehending how this partnership has emerged, how it functions, and how it accelerates Beijing’s capacity for future territorial aggression is critical. This new partnership within CRINK now constitutes a central driver undermining U.S. efforts to reestablish deterrence in the region.
When Putin Met Kim: CRINK’s Center of Gravity
What began as transactional arms exchanges between North Korea and Russia has deepened significantly into a formal strategic alignment with far-reaching security implications. Since mid-2024, the relationship has progressed from opportunistic weapons transfers into a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Treaty signed by Vladimir Putin and Kim, reportedly including mutual defense commitments. Under this arrangement, North Korea has supplied Russia with large quantities of artillery ammunition, ballistic missiles, and as many as 11,000 troops in support of Moscow’s war in Kyiv.
In return, Moscow has provided Pyongyang with financial relief, diplomatic legitimacy, and potential access to advanced military technologies – including missile guidance, electronic warfare, air defense capabilities, and advanced intelligence supporting operational planning and targeting today. These exchanges have transformed North Korea from a chronic regional irritant into a more capable, risk-acceptant actor with growing confidence in its ability to coordinate regional provocations against the U.S. and allied forces.
The December 2025 NSS reinforces the U.S. focus on the Indo-Pacific and the Chinese Communist Party as the pacing threat, while simultaneously prioritizing a swift resolution in Ukraine and renewed “strategic stability” with Russia. While welcomed in Moscow, this shift raised concerns among Korea watchers, who warned it may signal reduced U.S. urgency toward the Russia-North Korea partnership. While North Korea is notably absent from the strategic spotlight, the most consequential reading lies in what the strategy implies:
Moscow’s ongoing partnership with Pyongyang effectively strengthens a second front critical to Beijing’s ability to execute a successful Taipei contingency. This partnership directly supports Xi’s concept of unrestricted war by forcing U.S. and allied forces to divide attention and resources across multiple theaters, signaling that regional strategy must account for the operational leverage this partnership provides to China.
Among CRINK, the Russia-North Korea partnership has emerged as the most operationally mature and immediately consequential alignment. While China, Iran, and Russia cooperate across economic and technological domains, the Moscow-Pyongyang relationship is an overt military partnership demonstrated through direct battlefield integration in Kyiv.
This partnership accelerates North Korea’s nuclear and missile development timelines while providing Kim with a degree of strategic autonomy from Beijing the world has not seen in decades. In doing so, it creates a more permissive environment for coordinated pressure against U.S. and allied interests and linking European and Indo-Pacific theaters through active military cooperation rather than abstract alignment.
From Comradeship to Brinkmanship: Implications for Deterrence and Regional Stability
The maturation of the Russia-North Korea partnership carries implications well beyond the war in Ukraine. Russian non-compliance with United Nations sanctions, including the veto of Resolution 1718 enforcement mechanisms, has significantly weakened denuclearization diplomacy and eroded international constraints. Simultaneously, this partnership complicates the reestablishment of deterrence for the U.S.-South Korea alliance. Russian assistance that materially improves North Korea’s survivable nuclear capabilities raises unavoidable questions about deterrence credibility, alliance assurance mechanisms, and the evolving role of the Nuclear Consultative Group.
More broadly, the alignment of two nuclear-armed states that explicitly reject the No First Use policy – Russia and North Korea – alongside China’s rapid force expansion, intensifies escalation risks in Northeast Asia. Pundits assessed this convergence as a revisionist alignment – one that actively undermines global sanctions regimes and emboldens North Korean provocations. North Korea is no longer a dependent proxy but an increasingly capable actor operating within a permissive, great-power ecosystem. Even if hostilities in Ukraine subside, the Russia-North Korea partnership is unlikely to dissolve, with mutual benefits eliminating the prospect of short-term diplomatic separation strategies and reinforcing the need for deterrence rooted in posture, integration, and denial.
For the U.S. and its allies, the challenge is not to reverse this alignment, but to prevent it from translating into coordinated coercion across theaters. This requires treating the Korean Peninsula not as a secondary contingency but as a central node in cross-theater deterrence – one that will shape Beijing’s calculations in a Taiwan crisis rather than merely respond to Pyongyang’s provocations.
If the war in Ukraine comes to an end, it will accelerate China-Russia cooperation rather than diminish it. The U.S. and allies must contain this adversary alignment to prevent its expansion to other countries. The strongest response lies in deepening alliances and working with partners to counter this alignment, while tactically constraining the forms of cooperation that pose the greatest risk to U.S. and allied interests. While the Russia-North Korea cooperation extends Moscow’s capacity to sustain its campaign in Ukraine, its broader significance lies in accelerating North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs, which has direct implications for regional stability and U.S. national security. Addressing these and the strategic signals they send requires a coordinated, multi-pronged approach.
Countering the Axis: A Multi-Pronged Approach
No single measure can dismantle the Russia-North Korea partnership, rooted as it is in mutual desperation: Moscow’s isolation from the West and Pyongyang’s reliance on sanctions evasions for regime survival. Nevertheless, a balanced, multi-pronged approach can mitigate the partnership’s most dangerous effects by containing risk, deterring escalation, and exploiting internal vulnerabilities. The following four pillars form the foundation of this strategy.
1. Strengthening Forward-Postured Deterrence on the Korean Peninsula
The priority is establishing deterrence through additional rotational capabilities forward postured in South Korea and assigned to USFK. While the U.S. can deploy more advanced capabilities to the Korean Peninsula, those forces must be fully integrated across the broader Indo-Pacific theater rather than treated as a peninsula-bound asset. Properly postured, they must provide both flexible deterrence and response options relevant to a Taiwan contingency while also ready to respond to a secondary front in a protracted and adaptive war. General Brunson illustrates how Korea occupies a unique position at the nexus of geography, allied partnerships, and operational reach, placing it at the forefront of driving technological innovation, deterrence concepts, and joint and multinational coordination – not just for the region but across the entire joint force. In this context, South Korea must be positioned to present Xi with something he can feel – a credible, integrated military reality that complicates Chinese Communist Party planning and raises the perceived costs of territorial aggression beyond the Taiwan Strait.
2. Enhancing Trilateral Alliance Coordination
Beyond force posture, the U.S. must elevate alliance coordination by institutionalizing and operationally testing the trilateral cooperation with South Korea and Japan around a broader threat that explicitly includes a Taiwan contingency and a secondary front response. Historically, trilateral mechanisms focused almost exclusively on North Korea; the growing Moscow-Pyongyang nexus requires planners include the Russia factor as a standing assumption – one capable of providing logistical support to both China and North Korea in order to open a second front and to further prolong a Taiwan contingency.
Expanding joint exercises – such as Freedom Shield and Orient Shield – can simulate hybrid contingencies involving coordinated missile launchers, cyber operations, or gray-zone coercion. This trilateral cooperation approach enables Japan to assume a greater share of the operational burden for both a Taiwan contingency and a secondary front, while South Korea can visibly demonstrate and rehearse its commitment under the 1953 Mutual Defense Treaty, capabilities that would otherwise be exercised only after deterrence efforts have failed. A strong, unified trilateral response clearly communicated to Moscow can deter Russian involvement in a Taiwan contingency by sharply raising the costs of participation, thereby allowing U.S. allies and partners to remain focused on the pacing threat.
3. Policy and Targeted Diplomacy
The effectiveness of U.S., South Korea, and regional allies’ military efforts depends on policy frameworks that constrain the transactional foundations of the Russia-North Korea partnership and preserve avenues for targeted diplomacy and de-escalation. Robust sanctions enforcement, multilateral mechanisms such as the UN structure, and systematic exposure of illicit activity underpin deterrence by limiting the flow of weapons, technology, and financing that sustains this relationship while multilateral mechanisms – including newer initiatives such as the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team launched in 2025 – serve as critical enablers by increasing transparency and disrupting evasion networks. Targeted designations of entities involved in technology transfers, as well as secondary sanctions on third parties facilitating illicit trade, further strain the partnership’s operational viability. Furthermore, maintaining limited, purpose-built diplomatic channels – leveraging existing President Trump’s personal rapport with Kim established during the 2018-2019 summits – can create off-ramps focused on constraining the most destabilizing forms of cooperation, such as nuclear or advanced military technology transfers, without reviving unrealistic expectations of near-term denuclearization. Parallel engagement with China, which tacitly accepts North Korea’s nuclear status but prioritizes regional stability to avoid refugee flows and uncontrolled escalations, can reinforce shared incentives to limit Pyongyang’s most provocative behavior. Because the relationship is fundamentally opportunistic – exchanging Russian capital and technical assistance for North Korean munitions – publicly revealing arms transfers, shipping routes, and financial intermediaries will erode trust between the parties. When calibrated carefully and paired with diplomatic signaling, such disclosures impose reputational and operational costs that reinforce allied and military posture while preserving space for de-escalation, a critical component of Peace Through Strength.
4. Countering Hybrid and Asymmetric Threats
Allied deterrence is reinforced when military pressure is complemented by policy-enabled diplomatic and hybrid measures that exploit distrust among authoritarian partners. Investments in cyber defense, intelligence collection, and law-enforcement coordination are essential to disrupt the covert activities that sustain the Russia-North Korea partnership, including cyber operations, organized crime networks, and illicit finance. Because the Russia-North Korea partnership thrives in opacity, policies that increase transparency, resilience, and exposure directly enable allied forces by narrowing the strategic space in which Moscow and Pyongyang can act.
Targeted diplomatic engagement with North Korea, conducted in close coordination with Seoul, can probe constraints on the most destabilizing forms of cooperation – such as nuclear and advanced missile technology transfers – while recognizing that denuclearization remains a longer-term objective rather than a near-term negotiating outcome. On the Russia front, progress toward resolving the conflict in Ukraine would likely diminish Pyongyang’s battlefield relevance and reduce incentives for sustained military cooperation. Together, these efforts reinforce the credibility of allied deterrence by constraining the operational freedom of CRINK without provoking uncontrolled escalation.
President Xi appears to expect Putin and Kim to act as his reliable wingmen in his “unstoppable” campaign to reunify China and Taiwan. History, however, shows he is asking for a Mercedes Benz on a rickshaw budget. North Korea committed “boots on the ground” to support Russian operations in Ukraine, while China’s contributions to its partners have been indirect, cautious, and limited – more a spectator than a participant. Xi’s assumption that he can leverage Russia and North Korea to advance a Taiwan contingency underscores fundamental reality: an unreliable partner will inevitably find himself aligned with other unreliable partners. By combining diplomatic signaling, sanctions enforcement, and exposure of illicit networks, the United States and its allies can impose reputational and operational costs, degrade the effectiveness of CRINK’s covert channels, and reinforce a free and open Indo-Pacific.
A Free and Open Indo-Pacific, Despite the CRINK
The CRINK alignment, centered on the Russia-North Korea partnership, now represents the most immediate and operationally consequential threat to a free and open Indo-Pacific. For the U.S. and its allies, the Korean Peninsula is not simply a secondary concern but a linchpin for shaping Beijing’s calculations in any Taiwan contingency. As Secretary of War Pete Hegseth put in his deliberately blunt formulation, deterrence ultimately rests on a simple premise: adversaries who FA must be prepared to FO. USFK, alongside other forward postured elements within the strategic triangle in the Indo-Pacific, provides that visible, forward-postured mechanism to enact that guidance against Beijing miscalculation.
The Moscow-Pyongyang axis – battle-tested, overt, and operationally relevant – has turned the axis of upheaval or CRINK into a cross-theater lever, with Beijing riding along like a hopeful third wheel hoping to reap the rewards without doing the heavy lifting. Despite the tenuous ties across all CRINK partners, the U.S. cannot ignore the advancement of Russia-North Korea collusion. That said, the U.S. could exploit the transactional nature of Russia-North Korea cooperation through sanctions enforcement, transparency measures, and targeted diplomacy. Xi may assume he can rely on these partners, yet his expectations outpace his contributions; an overconfident Chinese Communist Party risks being undone by the very partners it counts on. By combining posture, integration, and policy, the U.S. and its allies can impose real costs on potential aggressors, reinforce alliance credibility, and uphold the NSS’ top priority: deterring Chinese aggression and preserving a free and open Indo-Pacific.
Tags: CRInK, Russia - North Korea Relations
About The Authors
- Christopher Lee
- Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Lee is an Indo-Pacific foreign area officer. He holds an undergraduate degree from the United States Military Academy and graduate degrees from Columbia University and UCLA.
- View all posts
- Ben Blane
- Lieutenant Colonel Ben Blane is a field artillery officer with multiple operational deployments and experience with multidomain formations throughout the Indo-Pacific. He holds an undergraduate degree from the United States Military Academy and graduate degrees from Columbia University and John Jay College. He is a research fellow with the Modern War Institute.
15. China’s Redlines Aren’t Where You Think They Are
Summary:
The article argues China’s Taiwan redlines are primarily political, not the mere presence or use of U.S. military power. Reviewing the First, Second, and Third Taiwan Strait Crises, it claims Chinese escalation tracked perceived threats to the CCP’s political narrative and objectives, such as moves implying Taiwanese sovereignty, rather than routine U.S. naval activity. In 1954–55 and 1958, PRC actions were tied to fears the ROC might attack the mainland, while Beijing avoided direct clashes with U.S. forces. In 1995–96, missile tests and exercises responded to Lee Teng-hui’s sovereignty messaging and elections. Applying this to today’s “Fourth Crisis,” the article contends the United States has maneuver space to invest naval and amphibious power around Taiwan, deter invasion, and maintain stability so long as it avoids threatening China’s preferred political status quo.
Comment: A battle of narratives. If China escalates mainly when political narratives are threatened, what operational signals would deter invasion while minimizing actions Beijing can frame as a challenge to sovereignty claims? Taiwan, the US, and the international community must effectively compete in the narrative space. Not seeking the "superior" narrative, but the one that will support our interests and create the condition we seek. Are we capable?
Brian Krieg says U.S. force presence has produced loud condemnation but not military response, while political gestures trigger escalation. How should strategists and planners balance deterrent deployments with diplomatic messaging to avoid handing Beijing a pretext to “test” U.S. resolve? If we accept peace through strength we must take decisive action to demonstrate strength and resolve. And then we can adopt the JFK adage, "Never negotiate out of fear, but never fear to negotiate."
China’s Redlines Aren’t Where You Think They Are
CNO History Essay Contest—Third Prize
(Rising Historian Category)—Sponsored by the U.S. Naval Institute
The Taiwan Strait Crises show what U.S. planners risk getting wrong.
By Lieutenant Colonel Brian Kerg, U.S. Marine Corps
February 2026 Proceedings Vol. 152/2/1,476
usni.org
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2026/february/chinas-redlines-arent-where-you-think-they-are
The First, Second, and Third Taiwan Strait Crises were rife with escalatory risk. Operations spanned amphibious assaults, desperate defense of outlying islands, tense standoffs that risked U.S. capital ships, coercive Chinese missile launches, and even nuclear brinkmanship between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Given the scope and scale of China’s pressure campaign against Taiwan today, the world is arguably in the throes of a Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis.1 Moreover, the options to block China’s attempts to strangle its democratic neighbor are tightly limited. Specifically, some analysts have concluded that deploying U.S. military power to deter Chinese aggression could accelerate a Chinese attack across the strait to seize Taiwan.2
But a closer analysis of the historical crises and modern China’s strategic behavior reveals that this interpretation is off the mark. It incorrectly assumes China’s redlines vis-à-vis Taiwan are based on the use of military power itself, when China instead responds aggressively only when its preferred political narrative and political objectives are placed at risk. By reviewing each crisis in detail, and distilling the core issues that drove each conflict, policy-makers and military planners can develop operational approaches that more freely use U.S. military power to safeguard against a Chinese invasion and maintain stability in the Indo-Pacific.
The First Taiwan Strait Crisis
Gunners of the ROC First Field Army practice under supervision of a U.S. military advisor in December 1954. U.S. Naval Institute Photo Archive
The 1954–55 First Taiwan Strait Crisis was an armed conflict between the nationalist Republic of China (ROC)—Taiwan—and the communist People’s Republic of China (PRC). The object of the fight was several ROC-held islands near the Chinese mainland.
The U.S. Seventh Fleet had been tasked to ensure the stability of the Taiwan Strait prior to the crisis.3 The fleet had a dual mission: to prevent the PRC from invading Taiwan, and to prevent the ROC from attacking across the strait. Project National Glory, ROC President Chiang Kai-shek’s plan to return to the mainland and defeat the communists, was still within reach given the balance of power at the time. This made Chiang’s nationalist ambitions a source of instability.4
Following the 1952 election of Dwight D. Eisenhower, however, the new President ended the policy to hold Taiwan in check, which he said, “in effect, [made] the United States Navy . . . a defensive arm of Communist China.”5 The ROC military started building up its forces on the islands of Kinmen and Matsu, an operational stone’s throw from China. In September 1954, the PRC began shelling the islands. Two U.S. advisors on Kinmen were killed.6
In December 1954, the United States and the ROC signed a mutual-defense treaty. This alone did not deter PRC aggression; in January 1955, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) seized the ROC-held Yijiangshan Island. Shortly thereafter, Congress approved the Formosa Resolution, authorizing the President to defend Taiwan and its possessions. While the U.S. Navy did not conduct offensive operations, it did help ROC troops evacuate the Tachen Islands, which the ROC would have been unable to hold should the PLA attack.
Notably, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Chairman Mao Zedong explicitly directed that the PRC not become ensnared in a fight with U.S. forces. The United States, too, wanted to avoid a fight with PLA forces but ostensibly was prepared to launch nuclear strikes, something the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended and Eisenhower threatened. In April 1955, PRC Premier Zhou Enlai expressed his country’s intent to negotiate with the United States to end the conflict, and, in May, PLA shelling of Kinmen and Matsu ceased.7
While the seizure of Taiwan and the ultimate defeat of the ROC remained PRC objectives, the perceived threat of an attack on the Chinese mainland contributed to the PRC’s rationale to attack. The PRC had demonstrated a similar reaction a few years earlier when, in 1950, it leapt into the Korean War, in part because United Nations forces attacked toward the Chinese border on the Yalu River while routing the North Korean Army. While the buildup of Kinmen and Matsu could have been justified as a ROC defensive measure, misperceptions and miscalculation could just as easily have begun a conflict.
U.S. nuclear brinkmanship may have pressured the PRC to stop its aggression, but it also led Mao to begin China’s nuclear program to shield the country from such intimidation in the future.
The risk of becoming embroiled in a fight with China and the danger to U.S. interest in the ROC’s survival led to the maturation of alliance mechanisms between the United States and Taiwan. Not only did the crisis yield a mutual-defense treaty, but the United States also established the U.S. Taiwan Defense Command (USTDC), a subunified command with committed leaders, authorities, and forces for the defense of Taiwan.
Finally, it is clear the PRC’s objective was something Mao and the CCP wanted, but only if they could avoid war with the United States, while the United States was clearly willing to risk war with the PRC to protect the status quo.
The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis
Conflict emerged again in 1958, this time with significantly higher stakes. The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis saw bloody naval and amphibious operations, a significant commitment of U.S. forces to Taiwan, and the threat of Soviet intervention.
F-86s from the ROC Air Force in 1958, shown with then-top-secret AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles, which gave ROC forces air superiority over the Taiwan Strait during the second crisis. Taiwan Ministry of Defense
Once again, the ROC built and fortified military installations on Kinmen and Matsu, and the PRC resumed shelling them.8 The PRC also sought to seize ROC-held territory, launching an amphibious landing on Dongding Island, the southernmost island of Kinmen, on 24–25 August 1958. The landing force was repelled, but it signaled a significant escalation over the previous crisis.
Once more, the Joint Chiefs advised the use of nuclear weapons if necessary but sought more conventional means with which to defend Taiwan. They directed creation of contingency plans for Taiwan’s defense and sought to coordinate actions from Washington through Vice Admiral Roland Smoot, the USTDC commander. However, communication problems plagued coordination efforts, exacerbating the challenges inherent in rapidly evolving dilemmas half a world away.9
Eisenhower directed the reinforcement of Seventh Fleet. USTDC’s combat power was further strengthened by deployment of U.S. Air Force fighters, a Marine Corps air control squadron, and an Army Nike missile battalion to Taiwan. Dogfights between ROC and PRC aircraft raged throughout September, with ROC fighters vastly outperforming their PLA counterparts through the advantage bestowed by secretly provided U.S. air-to-air missiles.
Kinmen remained the center of gravity with the PLA continuing its shelling and establishing a blockade. The ROC Navy ran the blockade again and again, landing ROC Marines on Kinmen to keep the island supplied. Escalation spiked when Seventh Fleet ships escorted ROC supply convoys within three miles of Kinmen.10
The Soviet Union threatened intervention. The United States called the Soviets’ bluff, though the threat from a nuclear-armed adversary in the midst of this conflict created the first serious nuclear crisis.11
Once again, the PRC’s desire to prevent war with the United States decisively influenced the conflict’s development. To avoid striking U.S. vessels, the PLA refrained from firing on any convoys in which Seventh Fleet ships were observed.
The conflict turned into a stalemate when the PLA ran out of artillery shells. The PRC and ROC soon came to a sort of absurd gentleman’s agreement wherein shelling continued, back and forth, on odd and even days, using largely nonlethal shells full of propaganda leaflets and targeting carefully to ensure no troops would be harmed.12
Exceptions occurred only in response to perceived political—not military—escalation. The first occurred when U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles traveled to Taipei to meet with Chiang. The PRC responded by resuming standard artillery bombardment of Kinmen. Another, more violent, barrage occurred when Eisenhower visited Taipei in June 1960. The PRC fired nearly 100,000 artillery rounds on Kinmen, yielding 66 ROC Army casualties as well as the death and injury of 21 Taiwanese civilians.13
Otherwise, the agreed-on odd/even day leaflet shelling continued until 1979, when the United States established formal diplomatic relations with the PRC and severed them with the ROC.
A crisis does not really end until the fundamental political differences are decided. The mutual threat the PRC and the ROC posed to one another’s political existence was not resolved by either the First or Second Taiwan Strait Crises. Each merely pushed the matter down the road.
The political objectives remained core to the conflict, but the variables influencing it shifted in favor of one side or the other. Relative PRC strength grew, but the U.S. commitment to Taiwan was stronger in the wake of each crisis, demonstrated by nuclear brinkmanship, increased U.S. forces in Taiwan, and the provision of U.S. military technology—even at the risk of its premature exposure to adversaries. (Indeed, the PRC recovered one undetonated U.S. AIM-9 missile fired by ROC aircraft and reverse engineered it.)
Similarly, the risk of horizontal and vertical escalation only grows as conflicts continue and interests between aligned and allied parties intertwine. The United States kept the use of nuclear weapons on the table and may have employed them had Kinmen fallen and the island of Taiwan itself had been at risk of capture. Similarly, the threat of Soviet nuclear intervention created an entirely new level of strategic pressure with which the United States had to contend.
Sustainment was a core challenge for both sides, albeit in different ways. It was the critical requirement for ROC forces on Kinmen, and resupplying Kinmen via naval forces became the ROC campaign’s core operational task. The PRC, meanwhile, burned through artillery stocks to keep pressure on Kinmen but ran itself dry.
And, once again, the PRC’s core interests—and disinterests—conflicted. The PRC chased the contradictory objectives of defeating the ROC while avoiding direct conflict with U.S. forces. This escalation risk—driven not by strategic nuclear forces, but by conventional naval forces—tied the PRC’s hands.
The Third Taiwan Strait Crisis
The USS Independence (CV-62) underway in the western Pacific in March 1996. The United States deployed multiple carrier battle groups during the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis. U.S. Navy
By the time of the third crisis (1995–96), the ROC had ceased to be an existential threat to the PRC.14 It was therefore a perceived attack on the political status quo rather than military actions that triggered the crisis.
ROC President Lee Teng-hui intended to visit his alma mater, Cornell University, in June 1995 to deliver a speech on the democratization of Taiwan. The United States had not granted a visa to a Taiwanese president since 1979; thanks to congressional pressure, however, Lee received one. The speech was especially sensitive for cross-strait relations, because Lee uttered words anathema to the CCP: “Taiwan is a country with independent sovereignty.”15
This premise is obvious, yet anathema to the CCP’s contention that Taiwan is a rebel province. The CCP perceived the speech as a threat to the United States. One China policy, which affords diplomatic recognition to the PRC, but not the ROC.
In response, the PLA launched missiles into waters north and west of Taiwan; PLA Navy and amphibious forces assembled in the vicinity of the Taiwan Strait; and the PLA Air Force conducted sorties near Taiwan. While appearing to gear up for war, PRC officials went to both Washington and Taipei to reassure all parties that no invasion of Taiwan was intended.16
The PRC’s true intentions were unclear, but the United States responded with a show of naval strength. The Navy pushed two carrier battle groups toward Taiwan and sent carriers and amphibious ships through the strait. Putting ships of this value directly into the recent missile impact areas was a game of chicken with the highest stakes. PLA munitions striking a U.S. ship would almost certainly have triggered a war.
The crisis ebbed briefly before flaring again in early 1996, as Taiwan’s first free and open presidential elections approached. The PRC intended to intimidate Taiwanese voters and discourage them from electing Lee. From January to February, the PRC again assembled a massive force, concentrating nearly 100,000 troops along the Taiwan Strait for military exercises. Additional missiles were fired, landing between 20 and 30 miles from Keelung and Kaohsiung, two of Taiwan’s key ports, disrupting commercial shipping.
Again, the United States sent battle groups near Taiwan and more ships through the strait.17 Ultimately, no actual fighting occurred. The pressure on the electorate appeared to backfire: Lee was elected by a strong majority, an endorsement for both Taiwanese democracy and sovereignty.18
While the third crisis did not cross the threshold of armed conflict, many of the phenomena that defined the prior crises nevertheless reappeared. The core cause of PRC escalation was fundamentally political. Missile tests and military exercises were a clear response to Lee’s speech affirming Taiwanese sovereignty.
In addition to the absence of even low-level conflict, another key difference from earlier crises was the absence of U.S. nuclear threats. However, by this time the PRC itself was a mature nuclear power with an impressive arsenal. Nuclear intimidation is far more effective against a nonnuclear foe.
Notably, while the United States no longer had formal obligations to defend Taiwan, cross-strait stability remained an interest of such value that the United States risked war. And, once again, the PRC chose not to cross swords with U.S. forces, demonstrating that direct conflict with the United States would have been contrary to the CCP’s agenda.
Winning the Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis
Today, cross-strait relations between China and Taiwan are reaching a new boil. Aggravated by then–Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s August 2022 visit to Taipei, China has continued a pressure campaign that seeks to strangle Taiwan into political submission.19
China’s primary sticks have been exercises, simulated blockades, and air operations that increase in scope, scale, and complexity and amount to rehearsals for a potential invasion.20 Indeed, the normalization of these evolutions makes it ever more difficult to distinguish between an exercise and preparation for a real blockade or invasion. Other elements of gray-zone warfare reinforce the danger: cutting Taiwan’s undersea communication cables, unrelenting narrative warfare, and clandestine penetration of Taiwanese society.
Looking at any of these tactics in isolation, policy-makers and military planners could be forgiven for thinking their options limited. Operational factors favor China in its own backyard, especially given the incredible advantage the PLA has achieved in naval power, shipbuilding capacity, and overmatch in precision munitions. Moreover, fears of antagonizing China often hamstring recommendations for a more assertive U.S. military posture regarding Taiwan’s defense. Paralysis by analysis is reinforced by a commitment to strategic ambiguity.
But this ignores the core themes of the crises and fails to appreciate the modern CCP’s core interests and operating principles. These point to two key factors U.S. planners should be mindful of: One political objective—unifying with Taiwan—continues to be supreme. But another—China’s national rejuvenation and rise to global hegemony—is equally important. A war with the United States would make the second unreachable, even if such a conflict brought Taiwan under China’s control.
China’s redlines are political, not military. While the first and second crises involved ROC military buildup as contributors to conflict, this was because they were part of Chiang Kai-shek’s plan to attack across the strait and alter the political order. Once the military balance favored China enough that this became impossible, only assertions about and recognition of Taiwanese sovereignty have brought about Chinese escalation.
The Pelosi visit instigated a vigorous Chinese military response.21 However, the presence of U.S. forces in Taiwan has led to no Chinese response at all.22 In addition, frequent passages through the Taiwan Strait—waters China falsely claims as its own—lead to loud condemnation, not a military response that might endanger U.S. Navy vessels operating near Taiwan.
This reveals the essential idea: There is significant maneuver space for the United States to make military—particularly naval—investment in and around Taiwan without risking escalation.
In short, the past teaches us that the path to maintain stability in the Taiwan Strait is twofold: Avoid threatening the political status quo vis-à-vis China; but invest U.S. forces in Taiwan such that a Chinese attack risks war with the United States. By timely, thoughtful application of naval and amphibious forces, a Chinese invasion can be deterred, and peace can prevail.
usni.org
16. Failure of Economic Statecraft Against Parasitic Hybrid Actors in the MENA Region
Summary:
Min Ha (Charles) Kim argues that economic statecraft often fails against hybrid actors like Hezbollah and the Houthis because of “Parasitic Resilience.” Sanctions and blockades, he contends, weaken host states and legitimate economies while empowering illicit paramilitary networks that monopolize black markets and public goods. He contrasts Hezbollah’s “offshore” adaptation, shifting into illicit finance via Al-Qard Al-Hasan and transnational crime, with the Houthis’ “onshore” model, capturing state revenue nodes like Hodeidah port, imposing “Khums,” and taxing telecoms. He measures failure through operational tempo and revenue diversification, arguing both groups sustained or expanded capability despite sanctions, and that meaningful degradation came only through kinetic strikes, decapitation, and political losses. He warns similar sanction-proofing is spreading to other groups.
Comment: A view of MENA from Seoul. Graphics at the link.
Failure of Economic Statecraft Against Parasitic Hybrid Actors in the MENA Region
by Min Ha (Charles) Kim
|
02.05.2026 at 06:00am
https://smallwarsjournal.com/2026/02/05/failure-economic-statecraft/
Photo by Timothy Koster Unit: Combined Joint Task Force - Operation Inherent Resolve, DVIDS, USCENTCOM
This article argues that traditional economic statecraft fails against hybrid actors such as Hezbollah and the Houthis (Ansar-Allah) due to the concept of “Parasitic Resilience.” It demonstrates how these groups adapt to sanctions and blockades by creating new forms of illicit revenue network, requiring a shift from economic statecraft to kinetic degradation.
Introduction
The reliance on economic statecraft has long been a staple of Western foreign policy, serving as the primary non-kinetic tool to deter hostile actors. To understand the recent failures of these measures, one must first understand the logic that sustained them: the belief that economic deprivation will compel rational actors to alter their behavior to avoid further cost. Historical cases suggest that the conventional application of sanctions often failed for a variety of reasons, ranging from a lack of cooperation from sanctioning states to stubborn leadership that views concessions as a loss of reputation. Despite this, sanctions remained as the only coercive action that was both active enough to be effective, and passive enough to prevent escalation.
In the modern security landscape, sanctions fail because hostile actors have adapted to the liberal international order, able to create their own insulated economies that external forces cannot feasibly damage. While conventional groups in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regions, such as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and al-Qaeda (AQ) have been considerably weakened, groups such as Hezbollah and the Houthis remain potent. They persist not because of economic and political support from their sponsors, but because they have evolved into modernized “hybrid actors”.
For over two decades, despite being the most heavily sanctioned entities on Earth, Hezbollah and the Houthis have managed to expand their arsenals and project regional power until their gradual decline starting late 2024. Sanctions did not achieve any major deterrence against Hezbollah’s operations, nor did they stop Houthi attacks in the Red Sea. Rather, it was the surgical paramilitary operations and political overturning of their allies that started their decline.
Literature Review
The existing studies on sanctions generally split between two schools, neither of which accounts for the unique structure of modern hybrid actors.
The “Pain-Gain” model, led by Hufbauer, Schott, and Elliot, posits that sanctions succeed when economic costs force the target to comply. This model assumes that the target is a “rational state” that would concern itself with its GDP and public welfare. However, this framework disintegrates when applied to ideological non-state actors, where core security interests are rarely conceded due to economic pain. For hybrid actors like the Houthis, economic pain is merely used as a rallying tool for the civilian population against “foreign aggression.”
The “Authoritarian Resilience” model, led by Peksen and Drezner, focuses on how autocratic regimes survive sanctions. They argue that dictators, through control over the state’s logistical hubs, can redistribute exposed resources to their inner circles, using the general population as an insulative shield. This is seen as the most common reason sanctions against aggressive terror sponsor states fail, especially seen from the Saddam Hussein regime and the Assad regime. However, this framework fails to explain the cases in which a subsection of the state can feed off the weakened government and expand its internal proxy network.
The core gap in current literature is the separation of terrorist financing and state sanctions. There is extensive documentation on how groups like Hezbollah launder money, but these are often framed as individual tactical deviations rather than structural adaptations to economic statecraft. There is also a theoretical gap regarding how sanctions on host states strengthen the parasite.
Parasitic Resilience
To answer the question of how these groups survive, this paper proposes the theory of “Parasitic Resilience,” suggesting that when conventional sanctions weaken the host state’s formal economy, they destabilize the legitimate middle class, granting advantages to illicit paramilitary actors. These actors utilize extreme wealth and military force to monopolise the black market, and with no other safe or stable platform to interact economically, the general population turns to the black market. In this scenario, I argue that sanctions do not degrade the target, instead destroying the host and leaving the target as the sole controller of public goods.
To test the hypothesis of Parasitic Resilience, I utilize a comparative analysis of two primary cases: Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis (Ansar-Allah) in Yemen. These cases are chosen due to their two distinct evolutionary paths of sanction-proofing.
Measuring Sanctions Failure
To measure the failure of sanctions, this analysis tracks operational tempo and revenue diversification. The data is drawn from official international sources such as the United Nations Panel of Experts on Yemen, the United States Treasury Department (OFAC), the Washington Institute, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Service (ACLED).
Figure 1. Income Diversification
Figure 2. Munition Stockpile Growth
Figure 3. Operational Tempo vs. Sanctions: vertical lines indicate sanctions to each group; escalation scores are measured relatively in accordance to volume, threat, and consistency of attacks.
Case Study 1: Hezbollah and the Offshore Model
Following the US withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, Iran’s funding to the group got sharply cut from $700 million USD annually. This shock was compounded by the Lebanese Lira crash of 2019, which led to the currency losing over 90% of its value. According to the Pain-Gain model, this sequence of economic devastations should have choked Hezbollah’s operational capability, but this was not the case.
Hezbollah Adaptation
Rather than capitulating, Hezbollah rapidly shifted from a state-subsidized model to a transnational criminal enterprise. As illustrated in Figure 1 (Income Diversification), this adaptation occurred in two primary vectors. First, Al-Qard Al-Hasan (AQAH). Hezbollah increased the movement of its illicit finance through their central banking system, which operates outside of the SWIFT network and effectively immunizes the group’s finances from US banking sanctions. The SpiderZ hack in 2020 revealed that AQAH held nearly $500 million in deposits and had issued over $3.5 billion in loans, functioning as a gold-backed cash economy immune to the Lira’s hyperinflation. When the Lebanese banking sector froze depositor accounts, AQAH maintained liquidity, drawing in users from the Shia community affected by these sanctions. This created a cycle where pressure on Lebanese banks drove the general population back into the influence of the sanctioned entity.
Second, the industrialization of drug trafficking. Hezbollah streamlined the Captagon production and distribution process along the Syrian-Lebanese border. By 2021, this industry alone generated an estimated $5.7 billion in net revenue annually, in which Hezbollah plays a major role. Hezbollah also capitalizes on South American drug rings in the Tri-Border Area, assisting cartels in evading crackdowns by providing security on cocaine operations and laundering an estimated $300-$500 million annually through trade-based schemes. Through these means, they are effectively shielded from financial strains put on Iran and Syria.
Deterrence Failure Against Hezbollah
The failure of sanctions against Hezbollah was demonstrated in the 2023-2024 conflict against Israel. Despite decades of severe sanctions, Hezbollah expanded its arsenal to an estimated 150,000 rockets and anti-tank guided missile systems. The group’s ability to sustain high intensity strikes against northern Israel throughout 2024 proved that financial isolation did not equate to military degradation. The eventual decline in such capability came not as a result of economic statecraft, but of kinetic decapitation and the loss of its political allies. Furthermore, the strengthening of the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) with US aid has begun to challenge Hezbollah’s narrative as the sole defender of Lebanon, forcing a political pivot where the group increasingly seeks to present itself as a legitimate political party rather than a radical Islamist militia to maintain survival.
Case Study 2: The Houthis and the Onshore Model
The Houthis were targeted by severe sanctions and blockades through UN Resolution 2216. Their primary regional rival, Saudi Arabia, emplaced strict inspections on imports, attempting to cut the group off from arms trades. Additionally, the Central Bank of Yemen was relocated to Aden to deny the Houthis access to state foreign reserves.
Houthis Adaptation
Unlike Hezbollah, the Houthis focused on seizing and controlling the previously state-controlled income systems. As detailed in Figure 1, by controlling the Hodeidah port, the entry point for 70% of Yemen’s food and fuel, the Houthis monetized the humanitarian crisis. The annual income from customs duties and transit fees exceeded $1.8 billion USD in 2019, and this continues to increase as other sea-based entry points remain dangerous and costly.
In 2020, the Houthis introduced the “Khums” tax, which grants 20% of all Yemen-born natural resource wealth for the “Ahl al-Bayt” (Hashemite elites). Disguised as a religious tax, this predatory system enabled the group to legally feed on the country’s economy, effectively using the general population as an economic insulation. They also extracted over $100 million annually from the telecom sector by taxing Sana’a-based mobile networks.
Deterrence Failure Against Houthis
In the Houthis’ case, the failure of sanctions was displayed by the increase in attack frequency during the Red Sea crisis of 2023 to 2024. As shown in Figure 2. Munitions Stockpile Growth, despite facing multiple designations, including the Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) relisting in 2024, the group launched over 190 maritime denial operations that disrupted global trade. Utilizing cheap precision guided munitions to intercept multi-billion dollar shipment networks proved to be incredibly effective, allowing the Houthis to sustain this campaign for just a fraction of their monthly port revenue. Their eventual degradation only came as a result of multiple US-aligned kinetic strikes against military infrastructure. Similar to Hezbollah, the Houthis have also pulled back from purely radical Islamist rhetoric, increasingly positioning themselves as the legitimate state representative.
Comparative Analysis and Counterarguments
Both groups defeated sanctions through distinct mechanisms. Hezbollah adopted an Offshore model, relying on the agility of global illicit networks. On the other hand, the Houthis utilized an Onshore model, capturing state infrastructure to shield themselves.
Critics often raise counterarguments against the ineffectiveness of sanctions, and the strengths of the structure that the two groups formed. Supporters of economic statecraft argue that while sanctions may fail to completely defeat these groups, they are effective in limiting their expansion rate. However, as seen in Figure 2, Hezbollah’s operational capability increased alongside sanction intensity. The continuous development and proliferation of cheap long-range guided munitions, as well as lack of enforcement on their overseas revenue greatly undermine sanctions as weakening solutions.
Another argument often brought up is how dispersing sources of revenue open up vulnerabilities in a wider range of sectors, especially in the case of international networks. While there are continuing efforts to track and shut such proxies down in the form of drug enforcement agencies and Interpol, local bureaucracies and apologetic sentiments often deem such efforts ineffective.
The success of these models is now influencing other groups. In the Sahel, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) is utilizing the Houthi’s strategy of capturing roads and taxing logistics to generate significant illicit revenue. Local branches of IS, AQ, as well as central African groups such as the M23 are moving to create their own states and internal borders, disrupting the effects pipeline of international economic statecraft. This suggests a dangerous trend where non-state actors are evolving into sanction-proof proto states, rendering traditional statecraft obsolete.
Conclusion
The trajectory of Hezbollah and the Houthi movement between 1990 and 2025 offers a stark rebuttal to the prevailing neoliberal confidence in economic statecraft. The international community has operated under the assumption that financial isolation was a reasonable substitute for kinetic engagement, that if the state-level sponsors could be pressured, their proxies would wither. This research demonstrates that such assumptions are not only outdated but could be dangerous when applied to modern Hybrid Actors.
The eventual degradation of Hezbollah and the Houthis in late 2025 was not achieved by bankers, but by soldiers. It required the repeated decapitation of leadership entities and saturation attacks to achieve what twenty years of economic statecraft could not. This finding serves as a critical warning for future conflicts against groups like JNIM and M23. While once moderately useful against conventional state actors, the continued usage of conventional economic tactics will only serve to destabilize the host states and allow the actual offenders to prosper. The era of passive financial warfare is over; money is no longer a vulnerability to exploit, but a weapon that the entire world has learnt to use.
Tags: Economic Statecraft. Sanctions Effectiveness, Hybrid Actors, Illicit Finance, non-State armed groups, Parasitic Resilience, Sanctions Evasion, Terrorist Financing
About The Author
- Min Ha (Charles) Kim
- Min Ha (Charles) Kim is a graduate student of International Cooperation at Seoul National University specializing in non-state actors, unconventional warfare, and precision guided munitions. His research focuses on the intersection of illicit finance and paramilitary operations.
17. From Conflict to Troubled “Peace”: Lessons From Colombia’s Counterinsurgency
Summary:
Luke Goodwin argues Colombia’s counterinsurgency success came from pairing security operations with public diplomacy, institutional reform, and expanded state presence, not military pressure alone. He contends the hardest phase followed battlefield gains, when insurgent groups fragmented and adapted into hybrid criminal and narcotics networks. The article traces roots in la Violencia and the rise of FARC and ELN, alongside cartels and the AUC, then describes Colombia’s evolution toward targeted raids, rural engagement, infrastructure and crop-substitution programs, and information campaigns that eroded insurgent legitimacy. It highlights U.S. support, especially Plan Colombia and security force assistance, but notes Washington’s counternarcotics focus created friction. It stresses strategic missteps, notably state links to the AUC, and concludes these lessons apply to U.S. counternarcotics and security assistance in the Caribbean by integrating military action with governance, justice capacity, and regional partnerships.
From Conflict to Troubled “Peace”: Lessons From Colombia’s Counterinsurgency
by Luke Goodwin
|
02.05.2026 at 06:00am
https://smallwarsjournal.com/2026/02/05/from-conflict-to-trouble/
U.S. and Colombian Army Soldiers conducting an assault operation during Exercise Southern Vanguard 23 at Tolemaida Military Base on Nov. 14, 2023 (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. 1st Class Alan Brutus)
This article argues that Colombia’s long-running counterinsurgency success was not the result of military pressure alone, but due to the integration of security operations with public diplomacy and institutional reform aimed at addressing the underlying drivers of violence. It further contends that one of the most challenging aspects of a counterinsurgency campaign emerges after major combat operations, as insurgent organizations fragment and adapt into transnational criminal and narcotics networks. Drawing on this experience, the article demonstrates how U.S. policymakers can apply these insights to contemporary counternarcotics and security assistance efforts in the Caribbean by pairing military operations with governance support, regional partnership-building, and targeted investment in local security and justice institutions.
Introduction
The decades-long counterinsurgency campaign conducted by the Colombian military is often cited as a model for what should be done to combat irregular armed groups. Colombian forces faced the complex challenge of fighting several insurgent groups while initially receiving limited and inconsistent support from Bogotá. Although the conflict was initially rooted in deep historical grievances, its trajectory has shifted over time. This evolution reflects the growing influence of internal and external actors seeking to steer the campaign in ways that align with their personal objectives. Throughout Colombia’s campaign, the United States provided extensive financial and material assistance while pressing Colombia to prioritize counternarcotics operations. Despite these competing pressures, Colombian authorities successfully targeted the most capable insurgent organizations and ultimately brought key actors to the negotiating table. The final stage of the conflict has nevertheless revealed significant difficulties in ending a counterinsurgency campaign. One of the largest challenges has been when insurgent groups fragment, some elements remain unwilling to surrender profitable illicit enterprises and instead persist in committing acts of violence.
This article will advance three interrelated claims. First, Colombia’s counterinsurgency campaign succeeded not solely because of improved military capacity, but because security operations were consistently paired with institutional reform and efforts to extend state presence into contested areas. Second, the Colombian case demonstrates that the most difficult phase of a counterinsurgency emerges after battlefield success, when fragmented insurgent groups transform into hybrid criminal organizations sustained by narcotics revenues. Finally, the case demonstrates that US security assistance is most effective when it prioritizes partner capacity in security and justice institutions alongside regional coordination, rather than narrowly focusing on kinetic operations or drug interdiction.
Origins of the Colombian Conflict
The origins of Colombia’s internal conflict can be traced to la Violencia, a decade of political violence lasting from 1948 to 1958. Discontent with the power-sharing agreements designed to end the violence led to the formation of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN). These groups would take up arms against the government in Bogotá and would frame their campaigns in ideological and socioeconomic terms. The insurgency would be a long and complicated affair with the growth of other non-traditional actors, including drug cartels and right-wing paramilitary organizations such as the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). The conflict was characterized by a combination of military and police operations into insurgent strongholds and widespread violence against civilian populations. FARC and ELN would frequently conduct high-profile kidnappings and assassinations, including the abduction of a presidential candidate and a sitting senator. At the same time, the US expanded its support for the Colombian government, investing billions of dollars to modernize the Colombian military and National Police and reduce the flow of illicit narcotics. This emphasis on drug interdiction blurred the distinction between political insurgency and organized crime, as groups like FARC and AUC relied heavily on the narcotics trade. By the turn of the twenty-first century, increased pressure from the Colombian military and the continued support for the Colombian government from the US would see the beginning of peace negotiations.
Operational and Political Approaches to Counterinsurgency
The Colombian counterinsurgency strategy evolved into a multifaceted effort that combined direct military action with political and social initiatives aimed at restoring state legitimacy. The Colombian Army primarily focused on a mix of targeted raids against insurgent strongholds and leadership, alongside a public diplomacy campaign aimed at the rural population sympathetic to the insurgent groups. The Colombian Army’s primary tactic of direct action was launching targeted raids into territory controlled by FARC and the ELN. This aggressive strategy began in 1964 with Operation Marquetalia, which was designed to occupy the principal zone of resistance and capture key leadership. While these initial campaigns would be unsuccessful, the Colombian military and National Police would maintain a steady tempo in these raids and would steadily deplete FARC leadership. This success was aided by FARC’s key vulnerabilities, especially its reliance on a conventional apparatus to support its operations. Dr. Thomas Marks of the National Defense University argues that “base areas and mobility corridors resulted in a dual center of gravity vulnerable to Colombian military attack: the insurgent units themselves and their sources of sustenance.” This increased pressure on key FARC leaders would be a critical factor in bringing the group to the negotiating table in the 2010s.
The Colombian government has prioritized engagement with rural communities as a deliberate strategy to erode popular support for FARC and the ELN. A lack of personal security and the absence of state presence in rural areas have necessitated a strategy of public engagement. This has included stationing military and police units in towns to provide greater security and investing billions in infrastructure and agricultural projects. These agriculture projects have subsidized farmers and eased their transition to alternative agricultural products, and away from the cultivation of coca plants. Although these initiatives were introduced during the conflict, they have endured into the present to address these drivers of armed violence.
In parallel to rural initiatives, the Colombian government has conducted an information campaign against FARC and the ELN that has contributed to growing public opposition to these groups’ political objectives. This campaign has been reinforced by the brutal actions committed by the insurgent organizations, which have further undermined their legitimacy. A 2001 report by the Council on Foreign Relations observed that “various nationwide movements have brought together millions of Colombians to protests against rampant violence and kidnapping.”
Institutional Reform and Military Adaptation
Another critical factor of Colombia’s counterinsurgency success was the military’s willingness to acknowledge institutional shortcomings and implement comprehensive reforms. During the 1990s, Colombian military leaders recognized that existing structures were insufficient to confront increasingly capable insurgent forces. These reforms targeted several key weaknesses, including recruitment, training, and unit performance. This recognition of key failings, especially during a period when both the FARC and the ELN were growing stronger thanks to the expanding illicit drug market, was important for regaining institutional stability. These reforms have continued into the present, with the need now to scale down from a higher-intensity conflict to the lower-intensity operational tempo of general security operations. The current concern regarding institutional reforms is making sure that the Colombian military and National Police properly align with the overall peace process and the re-establishment of the Colombian justice system as the primary driver against the cartels. These efforts by the Colombian military to reform their military in response to the needs of the conflict, along with the speed and scale of these reforms, are unique. Comparing these reforms with those attempted by the US military during the Global War on Terror illustrates how bureaucratic resistance, an entrenched officer corps, and interservice competition can hinder institutional reform. This comparison thereby underscores the significance of Colombia’s adaptive capacity and the importance of being able to quickly understand key institutional failings.
The Role of the United States
US involvement in Colombia dates to the 1960s, and has included economic assistance, military aid, and advisory support. US involvement initially began during the Cold War and reflected concerns that Latin American allies might fall to communist revolutions, particularly in the aftermath of the Cuban Revolution. The initial partnership centered on the Alliance for Progress aid program, launched in 1961 to promote democracy, economic development, and suppress emerging communist organizations. However, the most consequential phase of US support was Plan Colombia. This program was instituted in 2000 to “combat guerrilla violence, strengthen Colombia’s institutions, and stem drug production and trafficking”. Beyond the financial support, the US would provide direct support through security force assistance missions led by the Department of Defense. Additional efforts included the establishment of the Lancero School in Colombia, in part modeled on US Army Ranger training, and educational exchanges that would allow Colombian officers to study in the United States. Finally, the US Army Special Operations Forces would be deployed to Colombia with the mission to train and support the Colombian military and National Police forces. US Army SOF would also assist in creating an integrated structure between the army and police forces to create a unified force to target the insurgent groups.
While the US wished for Colombia to defeat the insurgents, it primarily wished for the flow of illicit narcotics out of Colombia to cease. This focus on counternarcotics drove much of the funding and the provision of support from the US government, including bleeding over into agencies that are not usually responsible for counternarcotic operations. This is most clearly illustrated by United States Southern Command. USSOUTHCOM conducts all US military operations in Latin America, and in the FY2026 budget, the Department of Defense requested $350.1 million for “counterdrug programs”. This emphasis on counternarcotics for the US and the increased presence of the US military in operations targeting drug traffickers in the Caribbean has led to increased tensions between Colombia and the US.
Strategic Missteps and the Paramilitary Problem
Despite operational successes, Colombian counterinsurgency efforts were undermined by several strategic missteps. The most damaging was the state’s tacit and, at times, direct cooperation with the AUC. Originating from local self-defense groups formed by wealthy landowners, the AUC consolidated in 1997 and developed close relationships with elements of the Colombian military. The Colombian military and AUC would have such a close operating relationship with the Colombian military that “one report from Human Rights Watch titled Paramilitaries: the Sixth Division – the Colombian army having only five divisions”. These paramilitary groups conducted their campaign against the guerrillas with extreme brutality, and assassinations and intimidation of civilian and guerrilla leaders were common. The AUC would also engage in several criminal activities to raise funds, including kidnappings and drug smuggling. The AUC’s actions rose to such prominence in the international community that the US designated the AUC as a foreign terrorist organization from 2001 until 2014. Although the Colombian government eventually severed ties with the AUC and oversaw its partial demobilization, earlier cooperation proved counterproductive. The inability to exercise effective oversight over AUC would damage state legitimacy, complicated post-conflict reconciliation, and reinforced cycles of violence that outlasted formal demobilization. This cycle of violence has been driven by various successor organizations that have begun appearing in the post-conflict void.
Peace and Persistent Challenges
Initial negotiations between FARC and the Colombian government began in 2012, with a final peace agreement to be finalized in 2016. This agreement has focused on illegal crop eradication, transnational justice, and rebel disarmament, along with the implementation of the peace deal. It also focuses on bringing FARC members and clearing the land mines that had been planted by both the Colombian government and the guerrillas. The ELN has remained active, although it’s greatly diminished. It continues to clash with the Colombian military and National Police, and its longstanding drug operations have drawn renewed international attention amid recent US interdiction operations in the Caribbean.
Relevance for Contemporary Irregular Conflict
Colombia’s counterinsurgency campaign remains relevant for many policymakers and military professionals confronting irregular threats today. The current American operations in the Caribbean targeting drug trafficking networks are closely linked to Colombia’s historical role as one of the largest production and trafficking hubs of coca. While Colombia has been overshadowed by the Venezuelan regime in these actions, there is still a great deal of tension between the two administrations. Many of the contemporary criminal and insurgent networks can trace their origins to Colombia’s armed groups, displaying the persistence of hybrid political-criminal actors. If the US is serious in its desire to combat these irregular actors effectively, it must understand the history of Colombia’s campaign to combat insurgencies and drug traffickers. Examining current US counternarcotics operations in the Caribbean, the Colombian experience highlights three priorities for effective policy. Fostering cooperation between military and judicial forces, maintaining state presence beyond military deployments, and recognizing the limits of purely kinetic or counternarcotics-focused strategies.
Conclusion
The Colombian conflict is a demonstration of how effective a patient and multi-pronged counterinsurgency operation can be. The success of this operation was contingent on improving relations with the rural population and the willingness of the Colombian military to institute reform when it wasn’t institutionally strong enough to defeat a guerrilla force. US support demonstrates the effectiveness of high-quality training provided through security force assistance operations. It also demonstrates how adequate resources can improve the operational capabilities of military and police units engaged in counterinsurgency. While there were missteps and diverging interests between internal and external actors, the campaign was effective enough to bring the major leaders to the table to negotiate an end to the conflict. While the road to peace is still a long one, the Colombian government displayed that it was able to tackle multiple insurgent groups within a single conflict.
Tags: Colombia, counterinsurgency, counternarcotics, irregular warfare, Security Force Assistance, Transnational Organized Crime
About The Author
- Luke Goodwin
- Luke Elsworth Goodwin is a graduate student in Security Policy Studies at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, specializing in transnational threats and unconventional actors. His research primarily focuses on irregular warfare, European security issues, and transnational organized crime.
18. Night Vision at a Crossroads: When Technology Outpaces the Neurobiology of Close Combat
Summary:
Alan Kearney argues night-vision modernization is reaching a mismatch between fusion-driven displays and human neurobiology in lethal close combat. He says elite operators report fusion systems excel in deliberate, low-stress conditions but become harder to use when stress collapses cognitive bandwidth. Under threat, adrenaline and cortisol responses narrow perception, reduce working memory, and push the brain toward speed, clarity, and pattern recognition, not complex interpretation. Fusion overlays can therefore create cognitive friction at the worst moment, while simpler, latency-free analog intensifiers may align better with stress physiology. He argues future design should be physiology-aware, dynamically simplifying information based on the operator’s state, and warns against procurement cultures that equate more digital complexity with overmatch.
Comment: Today's military is so much more sophisticated and advanced than when I served. Yesterday I listened to a discussion between military professionals and business leaders that simply amazed me at the level of sophistication of technological advances that have occurred and what we will see in the future.
But I found this a fascinating excerpt. Not only does "culture eat strategy for lunch," (Drucker) does it eat technology too? (apologies for the attempt at humor).
Another subtle influence shaping modern soldier interfaces is cultural rather than technical. Digital design paradigms—persistent overlays, dense symbology, constant augmentation—are increasingly familiar due to gaming and other virtual environments. These paradigms work well for users who are seated, safe, calm, and cognitively available.
Combat removes all of that.
The gaming interface model assumes attention is the limiting factor. Combat physiology makes survival the limiting factor. Importing this aesthetic into soldier systems risks designing for a mind that does not exist in a firefight.
Night Vision at a Crossroads: When Technology Outpaces the Neurobiology of Close Combat - Modern War Institute
mwi.westpoint.edu · Alan Kearney · February 4, 2026
https://mwi.westpoint.edu/night-vision-at-a-crossroads-when-technology-outpaces-the-neurobiology-of-close-combat/
A few months ago, during a closed-door seminar involving senior officials in the United States defense community, I raised a concern about the direction of night-vision modernization. I argued that fusion-driven visual systems and digital awareness ecosystems may be advancing faster than the human brain can reliably use them in moments of extreme danger.
What followed was instructive. Several officials noted that they were already hearing similar concerns from elite special operations forces and combat aviators: These systems perform exceptionally well in deliberate, low-stress conditions, but become harder to use at the edge of consciousness, when life-threatening decisions must be made instantly.
The issue is not that the technology is poor. On the contrary, it is extraordinarily sophisticated. The problem is that it is increasingly misaligned with how the human brain functions under the stress of lethal environments.
This is not a marginal technical critique. It is a structural challenge emerging at the intersection of human physiology, combat psychology, and defense modernization. Unless the trajectory changes, Western militaries risk fielding systems that excel in demonstrations and controlled testing, yet underperform in close combat—not because they fail technically, but because they do not align with human biology when it matters most.
The tension between advancing technology and human limits points to a broader design challenge. This can be understood as a problem of augmented performance physiology. In this view, effectiveness depends not on adding capability, but on how systems interact with the human body and brain as our physiological state shifts under stress.
The Promise—and Pressure—of Fusion
Modern soldier visual systems are moving decisively toward fusion. Thermal sensing, low-light intensification, digital overlays, navigation cues, and networked information are increasingly combined into a single visual field. Under controlled conditions, these systems improve detection, expand awareness, and enhance understanding of the battlespace.
From a program perspective, fusion appears to represent inevitable progress; maximum information presented to operators at the tactical edge, in real time, should provide overmatch against an adversary. Yet operational feedback suggests a more complicated reality. As information density increases, the usability of these systems can degrade under stress rather than improve. As fusion architectures expand beyond individual devices into persistent, networked ecosystems supporting dismounted operations, the consequences of misalignment with human physiology grow more severe—not less.
The Friction Point: The Brain Under Threat
When a soldier encounters sudden danger, cognition does not remain calm or analytical. The body transitions instantly into survival mode through two tightly coupled biological systems. The sympathetic–adreno–medullary system triggers an immediate surge of adrenaline and noradrenaline, accelerating heart rate, narrowing focus, and biasing perception toward immediate threats. Shortly thereafter, the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis releases cortisol to sustain vigilance and energy availability. Together, these systems compress cognitive bandwidth, reduce working memory, narrow perception, and shift the brain away from interpretation toward rapid pattern recognition.
In this state, the brain prioritizes clarity over richness, simplicity over complexity, and speed over precision.
It wants clean edges, unambiguous motion cues, and the shortest possible path from perception to action. This physiological reality is where many fusion-based systems struggle.
A fused display may present thermal contours, intensified imagery, depth cues, symbols, route markers, and other overlays simultaneously. Technically, this is a remarkable achievement. Physiologically, at the moment of danger, it can be counterproductive.
Operators report that layered imagery becomes harder—not easier—to use under conditions of intense stress, simply because the brain’s stress response actively reduces its capacity to integrate complex visual information. The system functions as engineered. The soldier functions as biology dictates. The mismatch is the problem.
Imagine a mountain training exercise at dusk. A patrol advances toward a suspected observation point. At extended range, a fused imaging device performs flawlessly, revealing a faint thermal silhouette invisible to the naked eye.
As the patrol advances, the terrain and failing light compress engagement distances far faster than anticipated, turning a long-range observation problem into a close-range contact scenario. As the threat shifts from distant possibility to immediate contact, physiology takes over. Heart rate surges. Breathing shortens. Focus narrows. Vision tunnels. What had been a richly informative display minutes earlier now demands interpretation at the precise moment the brain has abandoned interpretation entirely.
A simpler analog image—single-spectrum, latency-free—would have required no cognitive reconciliation. It would have been processed faster, because it aligned with what the brain had become in that instant. In close combat, speed is clarity.
This is why many elite units retain traditional image-intensifier systems for close engagements. These devices deliver a continuous, unambiguous image that aligns with human neurobiology under stress. There is no perceptual dissonance, no layered truth to reconcile, and no cognitive friction. The analog system is not inferior. It is biologically coherent.
There is nothing inherently wrong with fusion technology. The problem lies in how it has evolved. In aviation, interface design advanced in lockstep with pilots. Cockpit layouts, symbology, and automation were shaped over decades by direct pilot experience, physiological research, and iterative feedback. The result was technology that adapted to human limits. Many modern soldier-worn visual systems followed a different path. They matured largely in laboratories, engineering programs, and demonstrations, only later being imposed on the human brain under combat stress.
In effect, the technology evolved first. The soldier is now being asked to adapt. There are sincere efforts underway to correct this through warfighter-centered design and adaptive interfaces. But unless those efforts begin with a realistic understanding of what the human brain becomes under intense stress—not in controlled testing, but in moments of existential threat—design intent risks being overtaken by biology. Aviation learned long ago that interface design begins with physiology. Ground combat systems have not yet fully absorbed that lesson.
Where Fusion Excels—and Where It Falters
Fusion is transformative for activities in which there is time not only for sensing, but also for processing: reconnaissance, surveillance, perimeter defense, mounted operations, and deliberate observation. When cognitive bandwidth is available, richer information improves understanding.
Fusion struggles when time collapses: during close combat, rapid movement, and unexpected contact. Unlike aviation interfaces used by highly selected and continuously trained aircrew, ground combat systems must perform across a wide range of ability, experience, and stress tolerance—including the median soldier operating under extreme environmental, cognitive, and physical load. This distinction appears consistently in operational feedback, even when it is underrepresented in program documentation.
The Cultural Bias Toward Digital Complexity
Another subtle influence shaping modern soldier interfaces is cultural rather than technical. Digital design paradigms—persistent overlays, dense symbology, constant augmentation—are increasingly familiar due to gaming and other virtual environments. These paradigms work well for users who are seated, safe, calm, and cognitively available.
Combat removes all of that.
The gaming interface model assumes attention is the limiting factor. Combat physiology makes survival the limiting factor. Importing this aesthetic into soldier systems risks designing for a mind that does not exist in a firefight.
Toward a Physiology-Aware Future
The central risk is not technological ambition, but engineering detached from biology. The next real advance will not come from adding more data to the display. It will come from presenting less—but more appropriate—data based on the operator’s physiological state. Future systems must interpret not only what the soldier sees, but what the soldier is becoming in that instant, dynamically simplifying the visual field without requiring conscious interpretation. Achieving this is extraordinarily difficult—but anything less will continue to collide with human limits. If the objective is to measurably improve combat effectiveness today, the most reliable gains may come not from additional layers of fusion, but from advanced situational-awareness training paired with lightweight, high-performance analog systems that align with human biology under stress.
Modern defense procurement increasingly absorbs the logic of the technology sector: Define a future, declare it inevitable, and build momentum until resistance becomes institutional risk. When belief attaches itself to capability narratives, it becomes harder to ask whether the human being who must fight with the system is actually better off.
There are few experiences that change a person’s beliefs faster than combat, where tools that fail to deliver are quickly abandoned in favor of whatever still works under pressure.
Technology will continue to advance rapidly. Human physiology will not. The question facing modern militaries is whether they choose to design around that reality—or relearn it the hard way.
Alan Kearney is a retired army commandant with thirty-seven years of service in the Defence Forces, Ireland. He has operational experience in Lebanon and Afghanistan, and specialist expertise in NATO-aligned explosive ordnance disposal, counter-IED, CBRNE defense, and counterterrorism training across Europe and the United States. He currently works in the international defense sector, leading research, capability development, and business engagement in night-vision technology, human performance, soldier survivability systems, and counter-UAS solutions.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.
Image credit: Sgt. Griffin Payne, US Army
mwi.westpoint.edu · Alan Kearney · February 4, 2026
19. The Limits of Russian Power
Summary:
Michael Kimmage argues Russia looked flexible and influential before the 2022 Ukraine invasion, but the war has narrowed Moscow’s options and exposed hard limits. Europe and the United States became adversaries, and Russia grew more dependent on China while devoting most military capacity to Ukraine. Moscow adapted through sanctions evasion, a shadow oil fleet, and closer ties with Iran and partners in Africa, yet it proved unable to protect clients or shape events from Nagorno-Karabakh to Syria. Kimmage contends POTUS’ revisionist, deal-driven activism has not strengthened Putin. Instead it highlights Russia’s constraints, pushing Putin to double down in Ukraine and possibly escalate.
Excerpts:
As Russia struggles to assert itself globally, Putin has become even more obsessed with Ukraine. The situation on the battlefield is sustainable for Moscow. Russia’s frontlines are holding, and its forces are making gradual territorial progress, but Moscow is far from winning. Despite the flurry of Ukraine-related diplomacy, peace talks have gone nowhere. Trump’s position on the war continues to oscillate. Meanwhile, Europe is discovering its agency and will not tolerate a peace plan tantamount to a Ukrainian surrender. Assisted by Europe, Kyiv will refuse to yield preemptively to Russia.
However miserable the conflict is for Russia, Putin is not in the mood to make concessions. He has reoriented the economy and structured global relationships to fight this war, which has already lasted longer than the Soviet campaign against Nazi Germany. Aware that the war’s outcome will be the ultimate referendum on his presidency, he may even consider escalating, including beyond Ukraine’s borders. In January, following claims that European countries had made progress on agreeing to security guarantees for Kyiv, Russia fired a type of ballistic missile at Ukraine that is nuclear-capable and has a range that violates the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which the United States quit in 2019. The missile landed 40 miles away from the Polish border.
The war may well be entering a more dangerous phase. Inspired, perhaps, by Trump’s seizure of tankers linked to Russia in the Caribbean and North Atlantic, European countries are doing more to harass Russia’s shadow fleet, which is already under attack from Ukrainian drones. Russia might escalate by striking Ukraine’s supply routes in eastern Europe or by attacking the U.S.-owned satellites that provide targeting information to Kyiv. Putin may push harder to make Ukraine uninhabitable—to impose financial burdens on its supporters and to threaten further refugee flows into Europe—even if he can’t win.
Though Europe and the United States would be wise to re-establish a coordinated process for handling the war, transatlantic friction will likely hinder such efforts. Europe should therefore step up its support for Kyiv, while readying itself for Russian escalation in and around Ukraine. Most important, U.S. and European leaders should not rush any talks to end the conflict. They must keep in mind the power their countries hold. Russia is neither invincible nor surging ahead. It is merely one of many countries disadvantaged by the anarchic world order Trump has unleashed in his second term.
The Limits of Russian Power
Foreign Affairs · More by Michael Kimmage · February 5, 2026
Why Putin Isn’t Thriving in Trump’s Anarchic World
February 5, 2026
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/russia/limits-russian-power
Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, December 2025 Alexander Kazakov / Sputnik / Reuters
MICHAEL KIMMAGE is the director of the Kennan Institute and the author of Collisions: The Origins of the War in Ukraine and the New Global Instability.
HANNA NOTTE is Director of the Eurasia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and Nonresident Senior Associate with the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
On the eve of invading Ukraine in 2022, Russia enjoyed a decent global position. It had a strong partnership with China; extensive economic ties with Europe; a working relationship, however fraught, with the United States; and an informal network of partners with which to do business. Russia dominated few countries (other than Belarus) but also had few real enemies and could exercise influence beyond its neighborhood. More than a rising or declining power, Russia was a protean power.
Then Russia invaded Ukraine. In response, Europe and the United States immediately became Moscow’s adversaries. The Kremlin, having lost much of its diplomatic influence in Europe, became much more reliant on China. The war, meanwhile, has absorbed Russia’s attention and virtually all of its military capacity, making it hard for Moscow to steer events farther afield. As a result, the Kremlin could do little as some of its allies, including Bashar al-Assad in Syria and Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela, fell. The war itself has not gone particularly well, either. After four years of fighting, Ukraine remains in control of roughly 80 percent of its territory.
But Moscow is hardly prepared to cut its losses. Unless U.S. President Donald Trump can persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the fighting—an unlikely scenario—Russia will probably try harder to subjugate Ukraine, not because the battlefield decisively favors Moscow but because Putin needs to hold the line somewhere. He is poised to respond to Russia’s geopolitical limits by recommitting to its war. The humanitarian catastrophe he has already inflicted on Ukraine, depriving it of heating and electricity amid freezing conditions, may soon get even worse.
ON THE SIDELINES
Putin has long overestimated what Russian hard power alone can achieve. This problem first manifested itself in Ukraine in 2014. Having incited a revolution, Viktor Yanukovych—Ukraine’s president from 2010 to 2013 and a Kremlin ally—fled the country. Putin could have responded to Yanukovych’s ouster by cooperating with Yanukovych’s successors. Instead, he opted for military force, invading Crimea in Ukraine’s south and the Donbas in its east. Russia seized the former and established two breakaway regions in the latter, but in the process it inadvertently undermined organic pro-Russian sentiment in Ukraine. After 2014, Kyiv strengthened ties with Washington and Europe, which is exactly what Putin was hoping to prevent. In 2022, the limits of Russian hard power became even more evident. Although large military forces invaded Ukraine from several directions, they could not take its three largest cities, including the capital, and were soon pushed back along multiple axes. The Kremlin, which had banked on a quick and total victory, was stuck in a long slog.
Ukraine’s successful resistance forced Russia to adapt its foreign policy. To evade export controls, Moscow procured restricted goods through intermediaries in Central Asia and the South Caucasus. It started selling much more oil to India, often at steep discounts. To sidestep U.S. and European energy sanctions, Russia cobbled together a “shadow fleet”—a mass of aging tankers that typically carry bogus insurance and use opaque business structures to hide their true owners. China became Russia’s primary source of industrial goods and the biggest buyer of its fossil fuels. For Moscow, the decision to forge deeper relations with China was practical as well as strategic. The Kremlin hoped to lead the so-called global South with Beijing and to accelerate the decline of the West. Whereas China can use its massive economic clout to win favor in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, Russia can capitalize on its skills in subversion and on the former Soviet Union’s positive reputation in parts of the postcolonial world.
After years of hedging in the Middle East between Iran and Israel, Russia began favoring Iran and its anti-Western partners in 2022. It tightened defense cooperation with the Islamic Republic over Israel’s protestations. On several occasions in 2024, Putin rolled out the red carpet in Moscow for representatives of Hamas and the Houthis. Russia’s relationship with Israel did not fully unravel—the two sides continued to coordinate their military activities to avoid clashes in Syria, for instance—but it frayed considerably.
These shifts masked a more negative and enduring reality for the Kremlin. Russia had lost much of its capacity to protect its partners and its interests beyond Ukraine. In 2023, Russian peacekeepers stood by as Azerbaijan seized the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh from Armenia, Russia’s traditional ally. As Israel fought and weakened the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and even Iran itself, Russia watched from the sidelines. Russia was once again a bystander when, in December 2024, local rebels swept away the Assad regime in Syria, a dynasty Moscow had been fighting for years to preserve.
TRUMP BUMP OR SLUMP?
In 2024, the Kremlin celebrated Trump’s reelection. At the start of Trump’s second term, many observers predicted that his disdain for international law, apparent embrace of spheres of influence, and affinity for what Russia calls traditional values (such as an aversion to LGBT rights) would advantage Moscow. That has not been the case. Now that the United States has embraced revisionism, Russia’s inability to project power beyond Ukraine has become more obvious. In the summer of 2025, the United States joined Israel in the air campaign that damaged Iran’s military and nuclear infrastructure. In January, Trump extracted Maduro in a sleek, overnight military operation that Putin could only dream of. For all his complaints about Kyiv, the U.S. president has yet to abandon Ukraine, although he has been less generous with assistance than was President Joe Biden.
Trump has also repeatedly taken the initiative in Russia’s backyard. He has showered Central Asian leaders with attention and deemed himself the mediator in chief between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In January, the United States and Armenia announced an implementation framework for the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, a trade corridor in the South Caucasus. Trump has also invited Russia to join his Board of Peace, a new conflict-settlement body, without granting Russia special status. Trump expects Putin to defer to his leadership role.
Putin is not in the mood to make concessions.
Russia is hardly out the picture regionally or globally. Moscow retains influence in the Middle East and has increased its clout in western Africa by deploying its Africa Corps, a paramilitary group, on behalf of Sahelian juntas. Russia does not rely on Iranian or Venezuelan support to prosecute its war against Ukraine. China and North Korea remain committed partners, and Russian state media has been celebrating Trump’s degradation of the transatlantic alliance, most recently with his threats to take Greenland.
But Moscow has yet to gain any advantages from the tensions between Washington and European capitals. Europe is increasing its own support for Ukraine, and NATO remains a functioning institution with which Russia must reckon. Putin cannot assume that Trump’s foreign-policy adventurism will be confined to the Western Hemisphere and the Middle East. It could easily and suddenly make itself felt on Russia’s doorstep. 2025 was a bad year for Russia, and 2026 may be even worse. Moscow’s global position is ebbing because of Trump.
PUTIN’S WHITE WHALE
As Russia struggles to assert itself globally, Putin has become even more obsessed with Ukraine. The situation on the battlefield is sustainable for Moscow. Russia’s frontlines are holding, and its forces are making gradual territorial progress, but Moscow is far from winning. Despite the flurry of Ukraine-related diplomacy, peace talks have gone nowhere. Trump’s position on the war continues to oscillate. Meanwhile, Europe is discovering its agency and will not tolerate a peace plan tantamount to a Ukrainian surrender. Assisted by Europe, Kyiv will refuse to yield preemptively to Russia.
However miserable the conflict is for Russia, Putin is not in the mood to make concessions. He has reoriented the economy and structured global relationships to fight this war, which has already lasted longer than the Soviet campaign against Nazi Germany. Aware that the war’s outcome will be the ultimate referendum on his presidency, he may even consider escalating, including beyond Ukraine’s borders. In January, following claims that European countries had made progress on agreeing to security guarantees for Kyiv, Russia fired a type of ballistic missile at Ukraine that is nuclear-capable and has a range that violates the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which the United States quit in 2019. The missile landed 40 miles away from the Polish border.
The war may well be entering a more dangerous phase. Inspired, perhaps, by Trump’s seizure of tankers linked to Russia in the Caribbean and North Atlantic, European countries are doing more to harass Russia’s shadow fleet, which is already under attack from Ukrainian drones. Russia might escalate by striking Ukraine’s supply routes in eastern Europe or by attacking the U.S.-owned satellites that provide targeting information to Kyiv. Putin may push harder to make Ukraine uninhabitable—to impose financial burdens on its supporters and to threaten further refugee flows into Europe—even if he can’t win.
Though Europe and the United States would be wise to re-establish a coordinated process for handling the war, transatlantic friction will likely hinder such efforts. Europe should therefore step up its support for Kyiv, while readying itself for Russian escalation in and around Ukraine. Most important, U.S. and European leaders should not rush any talks to end the conflict. They must keep in mind the power their countries hold. Russia is neither invincible nor surging ahead. It is merely one of many countries disadvantaged by the anarchic world order Trump has unleashed in his second term.
Foreign Affairs · More by Michael Kimmage · February 5, 2026
20. Strength Over Peace: Venezuela, Iran, and the Dicey Politics of Military Intervention
Summary:
Friedman argues POTUS sells himself as a war-ender, yet has acted in a strikingly hawkish way, including attacks abroad and the Caracas raid to seize Nicolás Maduro. He says the key domestic driver is not whether voters love the policy, but whether the action makes a president look strong. Fast, effective, limited operations can raise approval even when the public doubts the merits. Failed or prolonged interventions reverse the effect and make presidents look reckless or weak, as Somalia and Afghanistan show. Venezuela may be a short-term political jolt, but it could become a long-term trap if aims expand.
Excerpts:
Using military force to project strength thus carries both benefits and risks, and whether the tradeoff ultimately works in a president’s favor depends on whether the intervention decisively achieves its stated objectives. In the case of Venezuela, it is not clear whether those conditions will be met. Trump promised to get rid of Maduro, and he did so in a dazzling display of military power. But Trump has also gestured at broader ambitions, including reshaping Venezuela’s government and extracting oil revenues, which seem less likely to succeed. The president has threatened to strike again if Caracas does not comply with U.S. demands, which suggests his administration might entangle itself in a more complex, extended conflict that could fail to produce a decisive outcome. Trump, in turn, would look weak.
For now, however, Trump appears unconcerned. If anything, he seems emboldened. In addition to menacing other Latin American governments, Trump has deployed what he calls a “massive armada” to the Persian Gulf and is threatening to strike Iran if it does not cease nuclear enrichment, give up its advanced missile programs, and halt its support for militant groups. It is easy to see why Trump might be confident that this kind of swashbuckling behavior will produce the desired results. Over his five years in office, the president has built a growing track record of using overwhelming force to accomplish limited aims in ways that may have helped his political fortunes: killing the Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in 2020, degrading Tehran’s nuclear reactors in 2025, and now decapitating Venezuela’s government. He may well be riding the sugar high of the Venezuela operation’s success.
But there is no guarantee that future military interventions will play out on similarly rapid timescales with similarly low costs. And if they don’t, Trump will not only further erode his claim to being a president who opposes wars of choice. He could also sacrifice his reputation for being a strong leader—which has been one of his primary political assets.
Strength Over Peace
Foreign Affairs · More by Jeffrey A. Friedman · February 5, 2026
Venezuela, Iran, and the Dicey Politics of Military Intervention
February 5, 2026
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/strength-over-peace
Looking at a damaged apartment building after the United States struck Venezuela, Catia La Mar, Venezuela January 2026 Gaby Oraa / Reuters
JEFFREY A. FRIEDMAN is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth College and author of The Commander-in-Chief Test: Public Opinion and the Politics of Image-Making in U.S. Foreign Policy.
Venezuela, Iran, and the Dicey Politics of Military Intervention
Jeffrey A. Friedman
American President Donald Trump wants to be known as the U.S. leader who ends wars—the “president of peace,” as he puts it. He campaigned in 2016 as someone who would put a stop to endless overseas entanglements and, in 2020 and 2024, as one of the few modern American leaders who didn’t start a conflict. But Trump’s behavior over the last year has been remarkably hawkish. Within just the last two months, he has bombed two countries and sunk multiple ships in the Caribbean. He is now massing American naval forces near Iran, which he attacked in June. And on January 3, he had American troops fly into Caracas in the dead of night, grab Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, and take them to New York City to face criminal charges.
The domestic political consequences of Trump’s hawkish pivot are not yet clear. His actions in Venezuela, for instance, have drawn condemnations from Democrats and also some Republicans who embraced Trump’s promise to forgo foreign wars. Polls taken shortly before and after the attack on Venezuela show that fewer than 40 percent of Americans thought the move was a good idea. But this does not mean that voters are overwhelmingly critical of the decision, either. A Reuters survey, for example, found that Americans were almost evenly divided between those who supported the attack, those who opposed it, and others who remained unsure.
History nevertheless offers some guideposts for anticipating how both the Venezuela operation and Trump’s other foreign adventures will ripple through American politics and shape the president’s legacy. Interventions that make U.S. presidents look strong tend to boost an administration’s domestic approval—even in cases in which voters doubt the value of those actions on their merits. By contrast, when military interventions make the White House look weak and reckless, they tend to hurt. That means operations that are effective, relatively brief, and technically impressive tend to be political assets, whereas operations that drag on and incur costs without realizing key objectives become hindrances.
For Trump, the domestic consequences of his actions could therefore depend on what happens next in Venezuela and beyond. If the White House is finished attacking Caracas and the new Venezuelan government does as Washington asks, the capture of Maduro may prove politically helpful. If future interventions play out similarly, they could also work to Trump’s advantage. But invasions and assaults are dangerous gambits for presidents. And Trump, perhaps emboldened by his success in Caracas, may embark on bigger, more complex, and thus more fraught operations. If he does, Americans could sour on them—and him. It is a fact that most recent American presidents have discovered, at some point or another.
SHOCK AND AWE
U.S. political analysts often claim that ordinary voters care little about foreign policy. But scholars have found that Americans do have views about military conflicts and that public opinion tends to follow some consistent trends. Americans, for example, are more likely to support the use of force when it is designed to stop interstate aggression by other countries, as was the case with the 1990-91 Gulf War, when a United States–led coalition of countries pushed Iraqi forces out of Kuwait. By contrast, voters tend to be more skeptical of wars whose purpose is to change other countries’ political systems. They are less supportive of interventions that Washington launches by itself, without any kind of international cooperation or approval. And they are more suspicious when a president enters a conflict without authorization from Congress, or when political elites are divided over what they think.
But the ways Americans evaluate the merits of military interventions is just one part of how these events shape presidential politics. The more important question, in many situations, is how military interventions affect presidents’ personal images—and specifically whether they make presidents seem like strong leaders. President Bill Clinton’s 1995 intervention in Bosnia provides a case in point. Polls consistently showed that a minority of voters supported using military force to stop Serbian atrocities in Bosnia. But Clinton’s adviser, Dick Morris, believed that doing so would help the president anyway by making him seem tough. A different Clinton aide, George Stephanopolous, later recounted that Morris explicitly told Clinton he should “bomb the shit out of Serbia to look strong.” Clinton listened, striking the country and sending in thousands of American troops. And Morris was proved correct: the president’s approval rating rose. Clinton, according to the journalist Bob Woodward, later mused that “while 60 percent of the public had opposed the deployment of U.S. troops to Bosnia, public approval of his foreign policy went up, not down, after he ordered the deployment.” The episode, Woodward added, caused Clinton to conclude that “toughness and decisiveness were appreciated even if people disagreed” with the substance of his choices.
For presidents to seem powerful, however, they need to do more than just launch an attack. The attack must achieve its aims. For Clinton, the strikes on Bosnia did; they forced Serbian fighters to withdraw from the city of Sarajevo. President Ronald Reagan had similar success in his 1983 invasion of Grenada, which deposed a military junta that had recently toppled and executed the country’s prime minister. The political stakes in that case were low—it is doubtful that most Americans had even heard of Grenada before the United States invaded it. The risks, meanwhile, were high—hundreds of Americans attended medical school on the island, and the Grenadian regime could easily have taken them hostage. And the mission’s prosecution was so sloppy that it led Congress to overhaul the Defense Department to ensure better cooperation among the different military services. But Grenada’s army was such a small and weak target that the United States trounced it anyway. Reagan’s approval ratings subsequently jumped. In fact, U.S. success there is generally thought to have helped restore Americans’ confidence in their country’s ability to use military force after the Vietnam War.
Presidents typically hold their best political cards at the start of wars.
But plenty of other military interventions have dragged on and ended poorly, damaging presidents’ personal images. That includes another under Clinton. The president ordered U.S. forces to Somalia in August 1993 to capture the head of the Somali National Alliance, a militia that was preventing the United States from delivering food aid that could stave off the country’s famine. But Washington failed, and during the operations, Somali militias killed 19 U.S. soldiers in Mogadishu. In response, American support for the intervention in Somalia cratered, and Clinton’s approval ratings fell. The issue for Clinton was not the American casualties, which were similar in number to those incurred in Grenada and the victorious 1989 invasion of Panama under U.S. President George H.W. Bush, but that the war was unsuccessful. These events are consistent with broader research showing that Americans are willing to bear substantial costs in fighting foreign wars, but only if they appear to be achieving important objectives.
The war in Afghanistan provides the most recent major example. The U.S. military suffered very few casualties in Afghanistan after President Barack Obama stopped the United States’s combat mission in the country in 2014, 13 years after the initial U.S. invasion. But American involvement did not end there, and the conflict dragged on with no resolution in sight. It thus became a political albatross no president could salvage. Although Obama and Trump, in his first administration, took heat for carrying on the conflict, Americans reacted even more harshly when President Joe Biden pulled troops out in 2021. A majority of voters may have said at the time that the decision to withdraw was the right one, but the sight of Taliban forces storming Kabul as American troops fled made Biden look weak. His approval ratings quickly declined and never bounced back.
SUGAR HIGH
The politics of military interventions frequently shift over time. Presidents typically hold their best political cards at the start of wars, when patriotic Americans often rally around the flag—as happened during the initial years of the invasion of Afghanistan. The outset of wars is also when the White House has the greatest ability to shape public opinion, given presidents’ access to the bully pulpit and the fact that journalists and opposition groups often need time to marshal independent information and construct critical narratives. Americans also tend to be awed by the sheer might of the U.S. military, which is on clearest display during an operation’s opening days. But as time goes on, those advantages fade. Public support often follows close behind.
The effect that military interventions play in presidential politics, in other words, resembles that of high-sugar energy drinks. In the short run, they can deliver a useful jolt, but in the long term, they can lead to a crash. President George W. Bush, for instance, benefited from the 2003 invasion of Iraq when running for reelection in 2004. The president contrasted his pledge to “stay the course” with calls by John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, to move toward a withdrawal, which made Kerry seem like a weak flip-flopper because he had originally voted to authorize the war. Bush and his advisers believed this contrast was one of the main reasons he won. But by the middle of Bush’s second term, it was obvious to most Americans that the war was not heading in a positive direction. The president’s approval ratings steadily slipped as more U.S. troops died in the never-ending conflict. Democrats retook Congress in 2006, and Bush’s political standing never recovered.
Using military force to project strength thus carries both benefits and risks, and whether the tradeoff ultimately works in a president’s favor depends on whether the intervention decisively achieves its stated objectives. In the case of Venezuela, it is not clear whether those conditions will be met. Trump promised to get rid of Maduro, and he did so in a dazzling display of military power. But Trump has also gestured at broader ambitions, including reshaping Venezuela’s government and extracting oil revenues, which seem less likely to succeed. The president has threatened to strike again if Caracas does not comply with U.S. demands, which suggests his administration might entangle itself in a more complex, extended conflict that could fail to produce a decisive outcome. Trump, in turn, would look weak.
For now, however, Trump appears unconcerned. If anything, he seems emboldened. In addition to menacing other Latin American governments, Trump has deployed what he calls a “massive armada” to the Persian Gulf and is threatening to strike Iran if it does not cease nuclear enrichment, give up its advanced missile programs, and halt its support for militant groups. It is easy to see why Trump might be confident that this kind of swashbuckling behavior will produce the desired results. Over his five years in office, the president has built a growing track record of using overwhelming force to accomplish limited aims in ways that may have helped his political fortunes: killing the Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in 2020, degrading Tehran’s nuclear reactors in 2025, and now decapitating Venezuela’s government. He may well be riding the sugar high of the Venezuela operation’s success.
But there is no guarantee that future military interventions will play out on similarly rapid timescales with similarly low costs. And if they don’t, Trump will not only further erode his claim to being a president who opposes wars of choice. He could also sacrifice his reputation for being a strong leader—which has been one of his primary political assets.
Foreign Affairs · More by Jeffrey A. Friedman · February 5, 2026
21. Command Responsibility at Home: Governors, the Guard, and Domestic Readiness
Summary:
Governors command their National Guard at home, yet Washington can still shape what “ready” means by tying training, timelines, and equipment to federal standards. Humpal argues the bigger story is not the Supreme Court’s procedural check on a Chicago-area deployment, but an August 2025 National Guard Bureau directive for state quick reaction forces focused on civil disturbance. What starts as a floor can become a default, narrowing state flexibility and shifting political risk to the statehouse when deployments go wrong. He urges governors to act like commanders, set mission priorities, bound crowd-control roles, harden policy in law, and protect public trust.
Command Responsibility at Home: Governors, the Guard, and Domestic Readiness
warontherocks.com · February 5, 2026
Jesse Humpal
February 5, 2026
https://warontherocks.com/2026/02/command-responsibility-at-home-governors-the-guard-and-domestic-readiness/
Late last year, the Supreme Court blocked an attempted National Guard deployment into the Chicago area — but months earlier, far from the headlines, a federal memo was already reshaping what Guard “readiness” means at home. The Supreme Court’s order was procedural, not a final merit ruling. But it delivered a rare, immediate check on a Guard deployment that Illinois state officials argued violated the legal limits on federal power over state forces.
The Chicago case matters but the more consequential development occurred months earlier, largely outside public view. In August 2025, the National Guard Bureau directed each state to establish a National Guard “quick reaction force” for civil-disturbance operations, standardizing timelines, curriculums, and equipment that, once treated as the minimum for readiness, can quietly become permanent.
Governors, as commanders-in-chief of their state National Guards when operating in State Active Duty or Title 32 status, bear the ultimate accountability for domestic deployments. Federal directives that redefine readiness around civil-disturbance missions and equipment do more than standardize training: They can narrow state flexibility and pull governors into a federally authored template. Over time, that shift can create mismatched priorities that undermine public trust and complicate local partnerships, particularly when Guard forces operate alongside civilian law enforcement.
Governors should not treat the quick reaction force as a technical training matter or a partisan dispute, but as a problem of federalism and risk management. Proactive state policy, ideally codified in statute or executive guidance, can define mission priorities, narrow and bound civil-disturbance roles, and set clear conditions for Guard support to civil authorities. Without that clarity, federal standards will harden into defaults, leaving states to manage the consequences.
Nothing in the recent quick reaction force guidance required new legislation. It relied on existing authorities that already shape Guard training and equipping, as earlier guidance has for counter-drug missions, cybersecurity support, and overseas mobilizations. But this directive carries a distinct consequence: It reshapes the baseline for what “ready” means for domestic employment, effectively placing governors on the hook for missions and timelines written in Washington. If a Guard deployment goes wrong, public anger, litigation, and political fallout will land at the steps of statehouses — not the Pentagon.
Much of the coverage framed the Chicago story as a debate over civil unrest. The deeper issue is federalism and the Guard’s dual purpose. Guard forces remain under a governor’s control unless they are formally federalized under the Constitution’s “calling forth the militia” authority and implementing statutes. In state status, it is the governor — not the federal government — who determines domestic missions, training priorities, and employment rules.
BECOME A MEMBER
The Legal Structure Favors the Actor Who Moves First
The Supreme Court’s decision in Perpich v. Department of Defense (1990) affirmed that the federal government may train and deploy Guard units for national purposes without gubernatorial consent. In practice, that gives Washington leverage to push standardized requirements onto states when those requirements are tied to federal funds, equipment, or readiness assessments.
When Guard units remain under state authority, however, governors hold sweeping control. They can determine how forces are organized, trained, and equipped; what missions they prioritize; how they integrate with state and local emergency management and law enforcement; and what limits apply to any domestic activation. Those powers are reflected in state law and, for Title 32 forces, in the basic command relationship: state command with federally supported training and resourcing.
This balance works only when both levels of government actively do their part. Federal authorities will always shape national-level readiness through funding, equipping, and mobilization requirements. States, however, must translate those inputs into policy for domestic employment: which missions are primary, what guardrails apply to civil-disturbance support, and how the Guard integrates with civilian agencies. The federal government has an enormous procedural advantage, so without deliberate state policy governors default into reacting to federal templates rather than shaping their own state-centric plan.
That is how administrative drift can happen. A federally directed quick reaction force becomes normalized. Capabilities that already exist for public-order support become more widely resourced, standardized, and exercised as a default rather than an exception. Timelines written in Washington shape expectations in state and local agencies. And the Guard’s public identity can shift from a primarily state-focused flexible emergency management partner to a federal military force increasingly associated with domestic security functions.
All of this would remain legal. The question is whether it is wise.
Governors Should Act Like Commanders, Not Customers
Many governors treat the Guard as a specialized emergency resource, calling on it when hospitals overflow, when fires grow too large, or when roads are buried in snow, without directing what the force should prioritize and train for year-round. That model overlooks important responsibilities of command: deciding what a military force is for, what it should be ready to do first, and what it should do only under narrowly defined conditions.
Military commanders do not merely deploy troops — they decide what those troops are asked to prepare for. Once a mission becomes the training default, it becomes the institutional default. Quick reaction forces built around formations, shields, and nonlethal crowd-control tools will refine those skills until they feel routine. If governors want their Guard to excel in wildfire aviation, cyber incident response, medical surge support, and infrastructure protection, those should be standing missions. Conversely, civil-disturbance support should be clearly bound and focused on public safety — protecting civilians and responders from immediate harm and activated under explicit rules rather than treated as a primary readiness benchmark.
There is precedent for states to proactively shaping the guard for potential federal activation. California built “Task Force Rattlesnake” to integrate Guard units into wildfire response. Multiple states developed Guard cyber assistance teams after ransomware attacks on hospitals and local governments. These missions built public trust because they matched the Guard’s traditional role as a partner to civil authorities rather than a coercive instrument in domestic politics.
Federal law and longstanding practice authorize the Guard to support civil authorities during disorder, including under federalization authorities in extreme cases. The question is not whether civil-disturbance missions exist — the key is balance.
Supporters of a standardized quick reaction force make fair points: speed, interoperability, and a common “floor” for training can help governors respond to riots, mass violence, or cascading emergencies that overwhelm local capacity. A quick reaction force can also reduce ad hoc decision-making by ensuring units have pre-trained leaders, equipment, and communications plans. But those benefits depend on policy. Without state-defined mission priorities and guardrails, the same standardization that improves speed can also institutionalize a posture that governors did not choose. While supporters highlight these benefits, critics argue the quick reaction force concept is a dangerous step toward easier federalization for suppressing domestic unrest, fusing state Guards into a tool for national control. Governors should counter this by defining their own policies.
Without State Policy, Crisis Improvisation Becomes the Rule
The United States has already seen the consequences of unclear Guard policy. During the 2020 unrest in Minneapolis, state and local leaders issued conflicting instructions about Guard authority, coordination with police, and use-of-force standards. A legislative review described inconsistent guidance and limited integrated planning with civil authorities, producing slow mobilization, unclear chains of command, and elevated risks for civilians and soldiers.
Courts can block specific deployments, but judicial rulings remain a temporary patch, not a structural fix: reactive, fact-bound, and dependent on litigation posture. The Supreme Court’s December order in the Illinois case underscored the point. The judiciary can hold the line case-by-case, but it cannot supply the state policies governors need to prevent federal templates from hardening into “readiness” norms. In Portland, Oregon, a federal judge issued an injunction in early November 2025 blocking a National Guard deployment while she assessed the administration’s asserted legal basis — and later issued a final order permanently barring the deployment. The details differ by case, but the pattern is consistent. Courts intervene only after the deployment decision has already become a crisis.
When policy is absent, improvisation can fill the vacuum. And improvisation under political pressure often rewards visible, coercive action over slower de-escalatory options. For instance, during the 2014 Ferguson, Missouri protests, an absence of clear state guidelines led to a heavily militarized police response with armored vehicles and tear gas, escalating tensions instead of prioritizing de-escalation through community dialogue. Similarly, in the 2020 Portland protests, federal agents’ ad hoc tactics —unmarked vans and aggressive crowd control — amplified violence, as later investigations revealed.
The time to decide the Guard’s role is before the template hardens.
A State-Level Policy Framework for De-Risking the Guard
A credible state policy framework — ideally enacted through state statutes for durability across presidential administrations for domestic Guard employment — rests on five principles grounded in existing law and recent experience. While the federal quick reaction force imposes a uniform standard, this proposal empowers each state to customize its own, avoiding irony by prioritizing federalism over top-down control.
The first principle is mission design. Governors should issue written guidance that the Guard’s primary state missions are wildfire suppression, flood response, cyber incident assistance, medical surge capacity, and critical infrastructure resilience. Civil-disturbance missions should be defined narrowly and framed in support terms — perimeter security, evacuation routes, logistics, and medical aid — with any crowd-control role specified only under explicit conditions and legal constraints. Under Title 32 training authorities, governors may direct training curriculums that reflect these priorities.
The second principle is disciplined civil–military coordination. Habitual training relationships between Guard units and local police should be established and led by civilian instructors specializing in de-escalation, communications, and constitutional rights. Colorado’s 2020 law restricting certain uses of chemical agents and requiring detailed reporting provides a model for integrating civil-rights protections into Guard policy. The goal is a shared operating picture with distinct roles, not a state-federal merged force.
The third principle is interstate alignment. The Emergency Management Assistance Compact, approved by Congress in 1996, allows governors to exchange Guard resources during disasters. It also allows states to pre-agree on mission limits. Governors should negotiate a regional compact specifying that Guard deployments across state lines will occur only for life-safety missions and that any support for public-order operations must be explicitly authorized in writing by both governors. These agreements should also establish common standards for documentation, use of force, and the public release of after-action reviews.
The fourth principle is parallel capacity. Federal law allows states to create State Defense Forces that cannot be federalized. Even a small unit focused on cyber assistance, logistics, shelter operations, and basic medical support provides resilience when federal mobilizations draw heavily on the Guard. Parallel forces strengthen governors’ hands by ensuring that some emergency capacity always remains under state control.
The fifth principle is accountability through law. State legislatures can require timely public reporting of Guard deployments, establish clear thresholds for activations, mandate civilian oversight, and codify life-safety priorities. Transparency is not a burden — it is a prerequisite for public trust.
The Moment to Act Is Now
Chicago shows the judiciary can sometimes stop a National Guard deployment. The quick reaction force guidance shows how Washington can still rewrite a domestic default setting without deploying anyone at all.
The quick reaction force memorandums were legal, but legality is not the standard by which state governors should measure risk. Administrative precedents settle quickly. Once the Guard’s posture shifts toward rapid domestic coercive capability, it will not shift back without political cost.
Governors have only a short period to articulate policy before the federal default becomes the national norm. They do not need confrontation, but clarity. They need to define missions, training standards, oversight mechanisms, and partnerships before federal guidance fills the void. And they need to act collectively — across party and state lines — before the institution they command evolves into something they never debated or approved.
The Guard remains one of the most trusted public institutions in America precisely because it has anchored itself in local community, not national politics. The citizen-soldiers who rescue neighbors from fires, staff shelters in winter storms, rebuild washed-out roads, and restore hospital communications after cyberattacks embody the Guard’s historic purpose. Domestic coercion is the edge of that mission, not its core.
If governors want to keep it that way, they should begin acting like commanders-in-chief now, not when the next federal memo arrives. That means acknowledging the legitimate case for speed and interoperability while still insisting that states define mission priorities, thresholds, and guardrails for domestic employment. State policy and statutes are how governors keep the Guard trusted, mission-effective, and aligned with the communities it serves.
BECOME A MEMBER
Jesse Humpal is an active-duty Air Force officer and assistant professor at the U.S. Air Force Academy. He can be followed @jessehumpal on X.
The views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Air Force Academy, the Air Force, or the Department of Defense.
**Please note, as a matter of house style, War on the Rocks will not use a different name for the U.S. Department of Defense until and unless the name is changed by statute by the U.S. Congress.
Image: Pfc. Azavyon McFarland via DVIDS
warontherocks.com · Joseph Wehmeyer · February 5, 2026
22. Sun Tzu in the Supply Chain: The New Face of Economic War With China
Summary:
Welter and McWeeney argue the United States is already in a sustained economic conflict with China, fought through supply chains, technology capture, and market coercion rather than open combat. They claim Beijing blends state direction with nominally private actors to steal or absorb innovation, scale fast with subsidies, undercut rivals, and then control key nodes such as drones, batteries, and critical minerals. They say COVID-era shortages exposed U.S. dependence and forced a strategic pivot toward investment controls, industrial policy, and tighter public private coordination. A counterpoint is that many outcomes also reflect corporate choices and globalization incentives, not a single master plan.
Comment: If economics is a warfighting domain, who is the commander?
Sun Tzu in the Supply Chain: The New Face of Economic War With China
warontherocks.com · February 5, 2026
Tim Welter and Margaret McWeeney
February 5, 2026
https://warontherocks.com/2026/02/sun-tzu-in-the-supply-chain-the-new-face-of-economic-war-with-china/
Editor’s note: This article is the first in an 11-part series examining how the United States should organize, lead, and integrate economic statecraft into strategy, defense practice, and the broader national security ecosystem. Prior installments can be found at the War by Other Ledgers page.
The United States loses upwards of $225-$600 billion each year to stolen trade secrets, pirated software, and counterfeit goods, mostly through activities orchestrated by China’s government.
Right now, the two countries are locked in a struggle that looks nothing like the wars of the past. The stakes are existential with prosperity and national security on the line, not to mention global influence. This is an economic war, and it’s being fought according to principles that date back more than two millennia.
Economics is no longer just a lever of national power — it is an operational domain of warfare and economic statecraft provides an effective means to operate in that domain. Defined broadly, economic statecraft is the use of economic tools — trade policy, investment controls, and sanctions — to achieve strategic objectives.
The United States and China are engaged in a protracted economic conflict, and America’s approach to dealing with it is evolving. The Chinese Communist Party’s primary goal to stay in power drives its wielding of economic tools to sink U.S. industries and gain market advantages — a reality American policymakers are actively grappling with. Military commanders and national security professionals should understand the dynamics of economics if they expect to gain advantage, deter, and win, if necessary, on the modern battlefield.
The timeless maxim attributed to Sun Tzu — “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting” — has found new life in the 21st century. In 1999, two People’s Liberation Army officers published Unrestricted Warfare, a book that argued for a broader conception of war. Their thesis: Modern conflict transcends the battlefield. Financial systems, trade networks, and information flows can be weaponized in a broader societal approach to war to achieve strategic aims without firing a shot.
While Unrestricted Warfare is not official Chinese doctrine, its influence is undeniable. It echoes through Beijing’s policies and ambitions, both hidden and unhidden. China’s Belt and Road Initiative, for example, binds dozens of countries into a web of infrastructure and trade relationships, while Made in China 2025 outlines a path to dominate high-tech sectors, from AI to advanced manufacturing. Ambitious military modernization has complemented these efforts, ensuring that economic power translates into geopolitical leverage. These pursuits are not mere economic plans — they are instruments of China’s national power, wielded to secure its rise and reshape global norms in its favor while keeping the communist regime in power.
It’s All About the Party
For the Chinese Communist Party, economic dominance is not a byproduct of growth. It is a deliberate strategy pursued vigorously across a wide spectrum, from coercion and obfuscation to seemingly innocuous compliance with global norms, always with the survival of the Party’s rule at the forefront. Since 2006, the Party’s successive five-year plans have prioritized science and technology innovation, self-reliance, and global competitiveness. The goal is clear: reduce dependence on foreign powers, control critical supply chains, and position China as the world’s preeminent economic and technological force.
Contrast this with the United States: For decades, Washington viewed economic engagement with China as a win-win proposition. American policymakers assumed that integrating China into the U.S. and other global markets would liberalize its politics and create mutual prosperity. By failing to understand Chinese culture and strategy and mirror-image its assumptions, America underestimated the Chinese Communist Party’s resolve to maintain power and pursue its goals. As Zachary Karabell observed in Superfusion , the United States helped create the China it now faces. While both countries certainly prospered and hundreds of millions of Chinese were raised out of abject poverty, Beijing’s path exploited the openness of U.S. and global markets along the way. The consequences of this misreading become clear when China’s leverage of U.S. and allied systems is examined across certain sectors.
In the 1990s, Chinese researchers became deeply embedded in Western academic and research ecosystems, particularly in telecommunications, leveraging open scientific norms to absorb innovation and transfer it to state-linked firms. Open access to academia enabled trade-secret theft, coerced technology transfer, and standards manipulation. Backed by massive state support, political top cover, and protected domestic markets, Chinese firms could scale quickly, underprice competitors, and dominate global markets while excluding foreign rivals domestically. U.S. markets were aggressively undercut and collapsed in the melee, with domestic manufacturing in key strategic areas — solar panels, lithium-ion batteries, wind energy components, and electric vehicles — caught in the crossfire. As a result, in a relatively short time, China gained notable competitive advantages militarily, economically, and technologically on the global stage. The commercial drone industry illustrates how this strategy unfolds.
U.S. Drone Market Shot Down
China absorbs foreign technological advances, converts them into industrial capability, and leverages state support to dominate markets. Their pattern of behavior tends to exclude U.S. competitors and uses new market advantage to threaten U.S. security. The erosion of U.S. advantage in drones and its subsequent exclusion, provides an example.
In the early 2000s, the United States and its allies led drone innovation, driven by dual-use military research, academic robotics programs, and a hobbyist and startup ecosystem. Chinese firms exploited this open environment through academic exchange, appropriation of publicly funded research, and reverse engineering, enabling the transfer of critical knowledge from Western universities and firms into China’s industrial base.
At the industry and state level, China translated this appropriated knowledge into market capture, through firms such as DJI, which came to dominate more than 70 percent of the global commercial drone market by the late 2010s. These advantages allowed Chinese firms to underprice and outscale U.S. competitors, consolidate control over drone manufacturing, software ecosystems, and data platforms, and ultimately lock American firms out of both the Chinese market and key global supply chains.
This model of intellectual property appropriation, rapid scaling, and market exclusion — done largely through nominally nonstate firms — generated two main durable strategic advantages for China at relatively low cost. First, it introduced significant vulnerabilities for the United States across critical mineral and component supply chains, including rare earth elements, lithium-based batteries, specialty magnets, sensors, and electronics essential to unmanned systems. Chinese dominance across multiple nodes of these supply chains enables leverage over pricing, availability, and downstream manufacturing, increasing U.S. exposure to disruption in both commercial and defense sectors. Second, because drones play a central role in intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and precision-strike operations, China’s leadership in drone technologies and in the critical minerals and components confers potential battlefield advantages. China is reported to be expanding its drone deployment capacity, with low-cost systems increasingly proliferating across conflict zones. In some cases, drones provided by the People’s Liberation Army to local partnered forces have subsequently entered into the hands of hostile actors, including terrorist groups, elevating the risk of threats to U.S. personnel, infrastructure, and assets overseas. The drone sector thus demonstrates how adversarial economic statecraft can undermine U.S. national security, transforming what begins as commercial competition into concrete threats to both economic resilience and military security. This pattern ripples across many sectors critical to U.S. national security.
America Reconciles with China’s Reality
The 2018 National Defense Strategy marked a significant pivot for the United States from the decades-long post-9/11 focus on counterterrorism, acknowledging “great power competition” as the new defining challenge of the era. A competition, however, implies a level playing field and shared rules — not the rules China was playing by. A systemic shock would make the imbalance unmistakable.
Indeed, it took the global shortages of medical equipment and pharmaceutical ingredients during the COVID-19 pandemic to highlight the grave risks created by heavy U.S. reliance on Chinese manufacturing hubs and key supply chains. The pattern of structural dependence, however, long predated the pandemic and is particularly evident in critical mineral supply chains — including rare earth elements, lithium, cobalt, and graphite — and is combined with state-backed overseas investment, multi-year contracts, and downstream-processing dominance. These dynamics are further reinforced through infrastructure finance (including inside the United States) and development projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative. Regardless, the pandemic initiated a sudden and stark realization of the supply chain chokeholds China had on the United States and its willingness to leverage that advantage, serving as a catalyst for a broader strategic reckoning.
The Biden administration’s 2022 National Defense Strategy generally echoed the competitive sentiment of its 2018 Trump predecessor, transcendent of political party lines. The rhetorical repetition reflected wider realization and rare consensus among policymakers and others about the real threats China posed: not competition, rather, a war fought in boardrooms, with supply chains, and in research labs. A war where victory means shaping the future of technology, trade, and global governance. In other words, economics as a domain of warfare — sometimes also called gray zone aggression, hybrid warfare, or adversarial economic statecraft — is experiencing a contemporary resurgence with unique 21st century attributes. The question then becomes how the United States should organize to fight in that domain.
Carl von Clausewitz proposed that the aim of war is to disarm the enemy. Today, disarmament occurs without kinetic force. Entire U.S. industries, including those with critical military relevance, have vanished under the weight of Chinese manufacturing dominance. Key technologies, strategic materials, and infrastructure have been captured, not by force of arms, but by force of economics. Jobs have disappeared. Supply chains have fractured. Vulnerabilities have multiplied. Across multiple industries and domains, China has demonstrated a recurring, evident pattern that threatens American prosperity, including attracting foreign capital and expertise, coercive or illicit acquisition of intellectual property, leverage over infrastructure, coercive regulatory pressure, state–private–criminal blending, and disruption. These developments underscore why economics should be treated as a core function of modern warfare.
This is classic Sun Tzu in action: Know your enemy, know yourself, and you need not fear the outcome of a hundred battles. Beijing studies America’s strengths — and its weaknesses. What Americans view as strengths, such as relatively open U.S. markets and a fragmented political system of representative democracy, has been exploited with precision by China, along with vulnerabilities from reliance of the U.S. economy and military strength on global supply chains. As such, if you control your adversary’s access to critical technologies, rare earth minerals, or global markets, you have effectively neutralized their ability to act strategically — militarily or economically — presenting existential threats. This is the essence of contemporary economic warcraft: enduring, non-kinetic, and deeply integrated into daily geostrategic activity with consequences that can rival or exceed those of traditional warfare.
The Path Ahead: Economic Statecraft
The deliberate exercise of economic statecraft offers a way forward. This includes industrial policy, manifested recently by U.S. investment in publicly traded companies like Intel and critical minerals firms to protect resources and technologies important to national security. Wielding these tools effectively requires more than tariffs and export bans. It demands sound strategy, coherent doctrine, clear authorities, and robust public-private partnerships.
Successive annual defense authorization bills have included meaningful legislation like the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors Act of 2022, giving intent and direction on economic statecraft from Congress, supported by the House Select Committee on Competition with China, the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, and others in the policy ecosystem. The Trump administration has issued parallel guidance in executive orders and in the recent 2025 National Security Strategy. The strategy highlights the economy as the foundation of U.S. global posture supported by a strong, well-equipped, and ready military. And while the peace-through-strength-equals-deterrence approach is not new, how to operationalize it given the complexities of modern geopolitics, tightly woven global supply chains and markets, and unprecedented information hyperconnectivity, is yet to be coherently addressed. The limiting factor is not policy ambition, but institutional design. The next step, therefore, lies in fixing structural weaknesses within the U.S. system while holding true to national values.
The United States lacks a dedicated authoritative body at the strategic level to proactively identify and analyze economic threats to vital supply chains, and to prioritize and share those findings appropriately across industry, academia, the business sector, the federal government, and then partner with parties from across those areas to act on those threats with relevant authorities, speed, and effectiveness. A central challenge is not a lack of data, but a lack of analytic integration across space and time. This fragmentation obscures patterns, delays attribution, and leaves policymakers and agencies reacting to individual events instead of disrupting activity at its source.
The United States also lacks a systematic, integrated framework for understanding and addressing China’s holistic military-civil fusion approach to statecraft. While effective work is being done to counter economic-based threats, be it at Treasury, Commerce, or the Department of Defense, the approach is piecemeal. Without such a framework and an entity to referee, responses will remain reactive, episodic, and disparate across the U.S. government, and detached from a broader unifying strategy.
These gaps have direct implications for military readiness and deterrence.
The Military Challenge
Vigilance by U.S. military commanders should therefore span beyond air, sea, space, land, and cyber to identify indications and warnings of economic vulnerabilities to military operations and capabilities. At risk is unfettered access to supply chains that enable military missions at the speed and capacity required for modern conflict and ultimately lend to prosperity, security, and credible deterrence around the globe. Meeting the challenge will require breaking old molds and building new skill sets, partnerships, and ways of thinking.
Complicating the challenge, full-time career military members and their civilian counterparts typically do not have the expertise in global markets, financial services, acquisitions processes, and proficiency in statecraft and military strategy to engage effectively in economic statecraft planning or operations. Hence, identifying and nurturing such talent is an imperative that may require sourcing from uncommon areas where it does exist (and/or investing intentionally in the development of those skills). For example, certain individuals across the reserve components might possess the right expertise by having one foot in the civilian financial services, corporate risk, or business intelligence sector and the other in military logistics, acquisitions, or counterintelligence.
Service members should also be prepared to collaborate with America’s partners and allies on economic statecraft activities, especially those with whom the United States shares significant economic and military ties. Operators should be able to recognize, comprehend, and address methods of economic warfare to safeguard shared supply chains essential to interoperability and core military missions, irrespective of the origin of the threat.
Working with private sector partners is equally vital for military and other national security professionals. Industry is fundamentally in the driver’s seat when it comes to successfully addressing adversarial economics. Business leaders should be incentivized to proactively identify risk indicators within their industries and to educate their workforce on highlighting and mitigating economic-based risks to military missions. A successful economic statecraft campaign relies heavily on decisions and actions made by private sector actors, not just the government. Attuned to the situation or not, U.S. firms are crucial front-line actors in economic warfare.
Economics has been weaponized on a global scale, driving it to be an active domain of statecraft with strategic, operational, and tactical dimensions. Durable partnerships should be mobilized between government and industry, at home and abroad, to secure technologies and supply chains critical to national security while preserving the values we aim to defend. America’s greatest strength has always been its ability to innovate — to harness imagination and enterprise for the common good. That strength is still intact and should be directed with purpose. Economic warfare will be won by recognizing the battlefield for what it is, and by mobilizing the full spectrum of national power — economic, technological, and political — to secure our future prosperity and security.
Tim Welter, Ph.D., is a senior research fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies where he started and leads the Global Competition Project. Leveraging experience from Capitol Hill, the Pentagon, industry, and academia, his research is primarily focused on national security policy development and implementation, and economic statecraft.
Margaret McWeeney, Ph.D., is a research analyst at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies and International Center for Terrorism Studies. Her research focuses on hybrid warfare and nonstate actor security threats.
warontherocks.com · Madeline Field · February 5, 2026
De Oppresso Liber,
David Maxwell
Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy
https://apstrategy.org/
Executive Director, Korea Regional Review
https://www.upi.com/Korea-Regional-Review/
Editor-at-large, Small Wars Journal
https://smallwarsjournal.com/
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
Phone: 202-573-8647
email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com
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