Quotes of the Day:
The Unknowable Unknown
Before it begins, genocide is not easy to wrap one's mind around. A genocidal regimes intent to destroy a group is so hideous and the scale of its atrocities so enormous that outsiders who know enough to forecast brutality can rarely bring themselves to imagine genocide. This was true of many of the diplomats, journalists, and European Jews who observed Hitler throughout the 1930s, and it was certainly true of diplomats, journalists, and Cambodians who speculated about the Khmer Rouge before they seized power. The omens of imminent, mass violence were omnipresent but largely dismissed.
– Samantha Power
“War is an ill thing, as I surely know. But 'twould be an ill world for weaponless dreamers if evil men were not now and then slain.”
― Rudyard Kipling
"Justice is conscience, not a personal conscience but the conscience of the whole of humanity. Those who clearly recognize the voice of their own conscience usually recognize also the voice of justice."
– Alexander Solzhenitsyn
1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, APRIL 22 (PUTIN'S WAR)
2. UKRAINE INVASION UPDATE 24
3. Russian War Crimes in Ukraine | SOF News
4. Putin’s Struggles in Ukraine May Embolden Xi on Taiwan by Hal Brands
5. Fact Sheet on U.S. Security Assistance for Ukraine
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10. Foreword—How to Evaluate the Modernized Russian Military’s Performance in Ukraine
11. FAA apologizes for Capitol parachutists incident that led to evacuation
12. Opinion | Can Sanctions Really Stop Putin?
13. Russia's ailing command: 'Bloated and slouching' Putin is seen gripping a table amid cancer battle rumours
14. He Was a Penniless Donor to the Far Right. He Was Also a Russian Spy.
15. Calling all weapons makers: Pentagon seeks new ideas to arm Ukraine
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18. Russia Tried to Hold Ukraine’s Internet Hostage, Then SpaceX Stepped In
19. Pro-CCP inauthentic social media accounts shift focus to the Quad
20. ‘Voice of April’: Chinese netizens get creative to keep censored film on social media
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22. What I learned in Ranger School helped me through a mental health crisis
23. U.N. Slapped Down Latest Taiwan Outreach Effort, Citing Chinese Talking Point
24. US firm purchases former Navy shipyard in Subic Bay, Philippines
25. Starlink fought off Russian jamming attack faster than the military could
1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, APRIL 22 (PUTIN'S WAR)
RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, APRIL 22 (PUTIN'S WAR)
Mason Clark, George Barros, Kateryna Stepanenko, and Karolina Hird
April 22, 5:30pm ET
A briefing by the Russian Deputy Commander of the Central Military District on April 22 reiterated standing Russian objectives in eastern and southern Ukraine and did not announce any new operations. Deputy Commander of the Central Military District Rustam Minnekaev gave a speech to the annual meeting of the Union of Defense Industries on April 22 that has been misinterpreted as the announcement of a new Russian campaign.[1] Minnekaev said Russian forces began a new phase of the war two days ago, an unsurprising confirmation of the new phase of the Russian offensive announced by both Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ukrainian officials on April 19.[2] He stated the primary objective of Russian forces is to capture the entirety of the Donbas region and southern Ukraine to provide a land bridge to Crimea; as ISW has previously assessed, Russian forces seek to capture the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts and retain control of the Kherson region.
Minnekaev stated that Russian control of southern Ukraine provides Russia a future capability to conduct an offensive toward Transnistria, rather than announcing an imminent Russian offensive toward Moldova. Minnekaev said Russian control of southern Ukraine will provide “another way out to Transnistria,” the illegally Russian-occupied strip of territory in Moldova, where he falsely claimed ”there are also facts of oppression of the Russian-speaking population.” We do not read this as a statement of intent to conduct a major offensive operation toward Moldova. An offensive toward Moldova would likely have been phrased around securing a “land corridor” [сухопутный коридор] to Moldova, much like the Russian land corridor to Crimea. Even if Russian forces did seek to resume major offensive operations toward Mykolaiv and on to Odesa, they are highly unlikely to have the capability to do so.
Key Takeaways
- A briefing by the Deputy Commander of the Central Military District restated the standing Russian objectives in the current phase of the war: capturing the entirety of the Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts and defending Russian positions in southern Ukraine against Ukrainian counterattacks.
- Ongoing purges of Russian general officers for failures in Ukraine will likely further degrade Russian command and control.
- Russian forces seek to starve out the remaining defenders and civilians in Mariupol’s Azovstal Steel Plant and are unlikely to allow trapped civilians to leave.
- Russian forces conducted localized attacks and reconnoitered Ukrainian positions south of Izyum and did not make any advances.
- Russian forces secured minor gains in continuing daily attacks on the line of contact in eastern Ukraine.
- The Kremlin is setting conditions to create proxy republics in Zaporizhia and Kherson oblasts to cement Russian control over these regions and conscript Ukrainian manpower.
Ukrainian Military Intelligence reported on April 22 that several Russian officers have been fired or imprisoned for failures in Ukraine.[3] The Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) reported that Russian authorities arrested the Commander of the Black Sea Fleet Admiral Osipov and are investigating Black Sea Fleet Chief of Staff Vice Admiral S. Pinchuk, likely for the loss of the Moskva. The GUR additionally reported the commander of the 6th CAA, the commander and deputy commander of the 1st Guards Tank Army, and the commander of the 22nd Army Corps have all been removed from their posts for unsatisfactory performance. Purges of Russian officers are unlikely to improve Russian capabilities, as replacement commanders will likely be less experienced and under intense pressure to achieve likely unreasonable objectives set by the Kremlin.
We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because those activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting. We will continue to evaluate and report on the effects of these criminal activities on the Ukrainian military and population and specifically on combat in Ukrainian urban areas. We utterly condemn these Russian violations of the laws of armed conflict, Geneva Conventions, and humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports.
ISW has updated its assessment of the four primary efforts Russian forces are engaged in at this time:
- Main effort—Eastern Ukraine (comprised of two subordinate supporting efforts);
- Supporting effort 1—Kharkiv and Izyum;
- Supporting effort 2—Southern axis;
- Supporting effort 3—Sumy and northeastern Ukraine.
Main effort—Eastern Ukraine
Subordinate Main Effort—Mariupol (Russian objective: Capture Mariupol and reduce the Ukrainian defenders)
Russian forces continued to bombard the Azovstal Steel Plant and besiege the remaining Ukrainian defenders.[4] Several Ukrainian government sources reported on April 22 that Russian forces have abandoned direct attacks on Azovstal but continue to shell the facility and have repeatedly refused Ukrainian requests to open humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians.[5] Russian and DNR forces continued to consolidate their control of key buildings in Mariupol and are likely setting conditions to set up an occupation government.[6] Several videos circulated on social media of unspecified Russian forces departing Mariupol, but ISW cannot confirm at this time which Russian forces have departed the city or their likely destination.[7] Russian forces seek to starve out the remaining defenders and civilians in Azovstal and are unlikely to allow trapped civilians to leave. The Russian Ministry of Defense stated on April 22 that it will only begin a humanitarian pause in Mariupol when Ukrainian forces “raise white flags” and surrender and claimed that they will run out of food and supplies within two weeks.[8]
Subordinate Main Effort—Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts (Russian objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)
Russian forces continued local attacks along the line of contact in eastern Ukraine (continuing to focus on Rubizhne, Popasna, and Marinka) on April 22 and made minor gains around Slovyansk, capturing the town of Lozova.[9] Russian forces additionally consolidated their recently captured positions to prepare for further assaults.[10] The military situation did not substantially change in the last 24 hours, and Russian forces are continuing to conduct localized attacks while feeding in additional reinforcements instead of pausing to prepare for a wider offensive. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that additional unspecified elements of the 41st Combined Arms Army (CAA) (previously withdrawn from the Chernihiv axis) deployed to eastern Ukraine on April 22.[11]
Supporting Effort #1—Kharkiv and Izyum: (Russian objective: Advance southeast to support Russian operations in Luhansk Oblast; defend ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to the Izyum axis)
Russian units from the 6th CAA and Baltic and Northern Fleets (the Ukrainian General Staff reported up to seven battalion tactical groups (BTGs), though we cannot independently confirm this number, and these units are likely heavily degraded) continued to partially block Kharkiv and shell the city.[12] A pro-Russian telegram channel reported that Russian forces repelled a Ukrainian counterattack on Kozacha Lopan, north of Kharkiv and just 5km from the Russian border.[13] ISW cannot independently confirm this report, but, if confirmed, it likely indicates Ukrainian efforts to conduct counterattacks north of Kharkiv to the Russian border, possibly threatening Belgorod.[14]
Russian forces conducted localized attacks and reconnoitered Ukrainian positions south of Izyum on April 22 and did not make any advances.[15] Ukraine’s Special Operations Command claimed it destroyed a bridge being used by Russian forces at an unspecified location near Izyum on April 22.[16] The Ukrainian General Staff reported elements of the 1st Tank Army, the 20th and 35th CAAs, the 68th Army Corps, and unspecified airborne troops (many of whom remain highly damaged from fighting around Kyiv and in northeastern Ukraine) are concentrated on the Izyum axis.[17] Social media imagery depicted additional Russian forces concentrating in Belgorod Oblast in Russia on April 20.[18]
Supporting Effort #2—Southern Axis: (Objective: Defend Kherson against Ukrainian counterattacks)
Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks on Ukrainian positions west of Kherson and towards Zaporizhia in the last 24 hours.[19] The Ukrainian General Staff reported elements of Russia’s 19th Motor Rifle Division (of the 58th CAA) deployed to the Zaporizhia front, likely to support offensive operations to the north intended to encircle Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine, though Russian forces remain highly unlikely to make significant headway in these offensive operations.[20]
The Kremlin is additionally setting conditions to create proxy republics in Zaporizhia and Kherson oblasts to cement Russian control over these regions and conscript Ukrainian manpower. Ukrainian Ministry of Defense spokesperson Colonel Oleksandr Motuzyanyk reported on April 22 that Russian forces are preventing Ukrainian citizens from leaving these regions and are preparing to conscript military-age men.[21]
Supporting Effort #3—Sumy and Northeastern Ukraine: (Russian objective: Withdraw combat power in good order for redeployment to eastern Ukraine)
There was no significant change in this area in the past 24 hours.
Immediate items to watch
- Russian forces will likely continue attacking southeast from Izyum, west from Kreminna and Popasna, and north from Donetsk City via Avdiivka.
- Russian forces will attempt to starve out the remaining defenders of the Azovstal Steel Plant in Mariupol and will not allow trapped civilians to evacuate.
- Russian forces will likely increase the scale of ground offensive operations in the coming days, but it is too soon to tell how fast they will do so or how large those offensives will be. It is also too soon to assess how the Russians will weight their efforts in the arc from Izyum to Donetsk City.
2. UKRAINE INVASION UPDATE 24
UKRAINE INVASION UPDATE 24
Institute for the Study of War, Russia Team
with the Critical Threats Project, AEI
April 22, 2022
The Ukraine Invasion Update is a weekly synthetic product covering key political and rhetorical events related to renewed Russian aggression against Ukraine. This update covers events from April 15-21. All of the ISW Russia’s team’s coverage of the war in Ukraine—including daily military assessments and maps, past Conflict Updates, and several supplemental assessments—are available on our Ukraine Crisis Coverage landing page.
Key Takeaways April 15-21
- Russia and Ukraine are unlikely to resume negotiations in the coming weeks. Both sides await the outcome of Russia’s ongoing offensive in eastern Ukraine. Kyiv likely assesses that its military has the potential to push Russian forces back to their pre-February 24 positions and is unlikely to engage in negotiations until that outcome occurs or becomes significantly less likely.
- The Kremlin is increasingly describing the war in Ukraine as a war with NATO to the domestic Russian audience to explain slower-than-intended operations and mounting casualties.
- The Kremlin likely intends to create one or more proxy states in occupied southern Ukraine to cement its military occupation and set conditions to demand permanent control over these regions.
- Russian and Belarusian officials seek to frame Western sanctions as predominantly harming European economies while playing up the efficacy of their sanction-mitigation efforts.
- The Kremlin is failing to deter NATO expansion and failing to disrupt Ukraine's military alignment with the West.
- The Kremlin remains unlikely to use a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine in this phase of the war.
Key Events April 15-21
Negotiations:
Russia and Ukraine are unlikely to resume negotiations in the coming weeks. Both sides await the outcome of Russia’s ongoing offensive in eastern Ukraine as they attempt to build leverage for future negotiations.[1] Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced that the second phase of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began on April 19 and that its objective is the “complete liberation” of the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, which are claimed by Russia’s proxies in eastern Ukraine.[2] Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on April 17 that he “[doesn’t] trust the Russian military and Russian leadership” to not attempt to take Kyiv again if they win the battle for eastern Ukraine and re-emphasized that Ukraine is unwilling to give up its territory to end the war.[3]
Growing reports of Russian atrocities are bolstering Ukraine’s political will to fight and make the resumption of higher-level negotiations increasingly unlikely. Zelensky told CNN on April 17 that “there comes a time when no one wants to talk. Our society does not want us to continue negotiations.” Zelensky emphasized the link between Russian atrocities in Bucha, Volnovakha, Borodyanka, and Mariupol and Ukraine’s unwillingness to negotiate. Ukrainian negotiator Mykhailo Podolyak said on April 20 that Russian atrocities against Ukrainian civilians make it difficult for Ukraine to approach negotiations “unemotionally.”[4] Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba emphasized on April 17 that the “only level of contact” between Russia and Ukraine is the negotiating team made up of parliamentarians and “representatives of various institutions.”[5] Kuleba warned that Mariupol may become a “red line” for Ukraine if Russian forces kill the remaining Ukrainian defenders in the city. Zelensky said the Kremlin rejected a Ukrainian proposal to hold a “special round of negotiations” with Russia to arrange the evacuation of remaining civilians and defenders from Mariupol on April 20.[6]
The Kremlin claims that Ukraine is sabotaging the peace negotiations, likely to justify Russia’s continuing invasion to its domestic population. Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on April 18 that “unfortunately, the Ukrainian side is not demonstrating much consistency on agreed-upon issues. Their position is changing frequently.”[7] Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on April 20 that “there is no trust” in the negotiations, which she described as an inconsistent “circus.”[8] Zakharova implied that the West is controlling the Ukrainian government and that Kyiv cannot negotiate on its own behalf. She also described negotiations as a “diversionary maneuver” by Kyiv.
Kremlin Narratives
The Kremlin continued to reframe its invasion of Ukraine as a war of Western aggression against Russia to justify its ongoing invasion—and mounting casualties—to the Russian domestic audience. Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova claimed on April 20 that the United States and NATO are “handling processes” in Ukraine and that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “cannot be viewed as an independent politician.”[9] Zakharova claimed on April 19 that the United States has been preparing to “incite” aggression in eastern Ukraine for eight years.[10] Russian State Duma Committee on International Affairs Chairman Leonid Slutsky accused the United States and the United Kingdom of using Ukraine as a “springboard” to justify further confrontation with Russia on April 17.[11] Russian Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin falsely claimed on April 15 that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confessed to intentionally setting conditions to start a war with Russia by purchasing arms and attempting to join NATO prior to Russia’s invasion, reiterating the longstanding Kremlin claim that all Ukrainian arms purchases are inherently offensive toward Russia.[12] Zakharova claimed on April 20 that NATO trained foreign and Ukrainian “neo-Nazis” to use civilians as human shields and to torture prisoners with suspected pro-Russian sympathies.[13] Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev framed foreign volunteers in Ukraine as Western Nazi mercenaries fighting for money on April 19 and warned that they too would be subject to “denazification” when captured.[14] The Investigative Committee of Russia claimed that Western states had armed and prepared Ukrainian forces for war with Russia on April 20.[15] The Kremlin likely seeks to more easily explain Russian military losses to the Russian population by downplaying Ukrainian autonomy and framing the war as being conducted against NATO.
The Kremlin continues to falsely blame Ukrainian forces for planning or conducting “provocations” in areas where Russian forces intend to commit or have already committed atrocities. The Kremlin likely seeks to introduce doubt into future attributions of war crimes and to diminish global support for Ukraine by blaming Ukrainian forces for crimes already committed by Russian forces. The Kremlin likely also intends to negatively portray Ukrainian forces to the Russian population to maintain domestic support for the invasion.
- Russian officials claimed on April 15 that Ukrainian forces regularly use civilians as human shields and that Ukrainian forces plan to carry out an attack on the Lozova train station in Kharkiv Oblast to provoke retaliation from Russia.[16] Russian forces conducted a missile attack on a refugee-filled train station in Kramatorsk and blamed Ukrainian forces on April 8.[17]
- The Russian proxy Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) claimed on April 15 that Ukrainian special forces intended to stage a terror attack on an April 16 rally in the city of Luhansk.[18] LNR officials claimed that Ukrainian forces organized the rally. No such attack took place.
- Russia’s Ministry of Defense claimed on April 19 that Ukrainian forces were planning several independent attacks on civilians across Ukraine including shooting civilians that surrender in Mariupol; shelling civilians in Zaporizhia, Odesa, Sumy, and Kharkiv Oblasts; and executing Russian civilians in Odesa.[19] Such false claims indicate that Russian forces may have killed civilians in some named areas and intend to blame Ukraine for their deaths. No fighting has taken place in Odesa since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24; the Kremlin likely intends claims regarding Odesa to further Kremlin claims of a Ukrainian genocide against Russians.
- Russian First Deputy Representative to the United Nations Dmitry Polyansky claimed that Russian forces did not know there were civilians in the Azovstal steel plant prior to April 18 and argued that “radicals and Neo-Nazis" placed civilians in the plant to be used as human shields on April 19.[20]
- The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed on April 20 that Ukrainian “neo-Nazis” have been using schools in Kherson as headquarters since February 24.[21] The Kremlin will likely amplify any reports of Ukrainian forces operating near civilian infrastructure to justify Russian targeting of Ukrainian civilians.
- The LNR claimed on April 20 and 21 that Ukrainian nationalists are planning to attack churches with Tochka-U missiles along the frontlines near Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporizhia, and Kharkiv on April 24, Orthodox Easter.[22]
- Ukraine’s Odesa Regional Military Administration Spokesperson Sergei Bratchuk claimed on April 18 that Russian forces are planning to strike at Kherson with multiple rocket launchers as part of a false flag operation to justify an upcoming Russian “referendum” to create a Kherson People’s Republic.[23]
The Kremlin remains unlikely to use a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine during this phase of the war. The Kremlin likely assesses that the use of a nuclear weapon would trigger greater NATO involvement in the war, making the Russian use of a nuclear weapon a net loss for Russia. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denied that Russia would use nuclear weapons in Ukraine and claimed that Russia is only considering using conventional weapons in statements on April 19 that Kremlin-run media outlets subsequently heavily promoted.[24] Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on April 20 that Russian law enforcement should investigate anyone who spreads disinformation about Russia considering the use of nuclear weapons and reiterated Lavrov‘s statement that Russia will only use conventional weapons in Ukraine.[25] State-run media outlets circulating her statement emphasized Russia’s signatory status on nuclear control treaties.[26] Two US officials “familiar with recent intelligence assessments” told CNN on April 20 that the United States has not seen any indicators of Russian preparations to use nuclear weapons.[27] The United States and its allies would almost certainly publicly warn of any indicators that the Kremlin was preparing to use a nuclear weapon in Ukraine. The Kremlin likely seeks to avoid such a massive escalation that would likely lead to direct NATO involvement and instead seeks to frame itself as nonaggressive. The Kremlin will likely rely on conventional and possibly chemical weapons capabilities to achieve its objectives in Donbas. While we cannot completely rule out the Russian use of a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine, the Kremlin is highly unlikely to use one during this phase of the war.
Russian Domestic Opposition and Censorship
Kremlin censorship of Russian and international media seeks to maintain its narrative that Russian forces are only targeting Ukrainian military personnel and key strategic infrastructure, not Ukrainian civilians. Russian state censorship body Roskomnadzor further restricted access to independent publications and international coverage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in the past week.[28] Roskomnadzor is particularly targeting international reports of Russian war crimes, as such reporting could undermine the Kremlin’s false framing that Ukraine is responsible for all civilian deaths in Ukraine. The Kremlin has likely ordered intimidation tactics to be used against opposition journalists, activists, and concerned citizens within Russia to deter any realistic coverage of the Russian invasion.[29] The Russian Ministry of Defense classified information on the relatives of Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine on April 20 (which was previously available through civilian institutions due to the families of deceased personnel receiving state benefits), citing security risks.[30] Limiting the publication of such data will enable the Kremlin to disguise the full scope of Russian losses from the Russian public.
Russian Reactions to Sanctions:
Russian and Belarusian officials seek to frame Western sanctions as predominantly harming European economies while playing up the efficacy of their sanctions mitigation efforts. Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed on April 18 that the “economic blitzkrieg” of Western sanctions failed to destabilize the Russian economy.[31] Putin additionally claimed that anti-Russian sanctions have caused a decline in the standard of living throughout Europe.[32] Russian Security Council Deputy Head Dmitry Medvedev claimed on April 16 that Western sanctions against Russia could cause hyperinflation in Europe and an influx of Ukrainian refugees would cause a “crime wave.”[33] European Commission Head Ursula von der Leyen stated on April 17 that the Russian state’s bankruptcy is only “a matter of time.”[34] Both Russia and Belarus continued to frame sanctions as opportunities for their economies. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin asserted on April 16 that sanctions provide a “window of opportunity” for Russia’s youth to “rebuild and find new ways of development.”[35] Belarusian Prime Minister Roman Golovchenko stated on April 16 that Belarus has taken “systemic” measures to reduce inflation including introducing state-regulated prices for non-food items for the first time.[36]
Belarus:
N/A
Russian Occupation:
The Kremlin likely intends to create one or more proxy states in occupied southern Ukraine to cement its military occupation and set conditions to demand permanent control over these regions. Russian proxy Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) head Denis Pushilin claimed on April 20 that residents of the Russian-occupied Rozovsky district in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia Oblast independently convened a meeting and voted unanimously to join the DNR.[37] Residents were likely forced to hold such a meeting; ISW could not confirm the location or participants in videos of the meeting. Ukrainian military sources reported on April 21 that Russian forces are preparing to conduct a “referendum” to create a “Kherson People’s Republic” on April 27.[38] The Kremlin will likely conduct additional “referendums” in occupied parts of eastern Ukraine to set conditions to annex more of the country, either into Russia or into its preexisting proxies. The Kremlin will likely use such faux republics to appoint Russian proxy leadership and will use those structures to forcibly mobilize or otherwise exploit local populations. Ukrainian intelligence claimed on April 20 that the Kremlin is planning to forcibly mobilize Ukrainian men from both Kherson and Zaporizhia oblasts to fight for Russia.[39] Russia has already begun to create a heavily pro-Russia information environment in occupied parts of Ukraine, limiting Ukrainian media in favor of Russian outlets and broadcasts.[40]
The Kremlin may be recruiting additional mercenaries to fight in eastern Ukraine and reportedly already has as many as 20,000 mercenaries (both Russian and international) in eastern Ukraine. An anonymous European official told The Kyiv Post on April 19 that Russia has between 10,000 and 20,000 mercenaries from Syria, Libya, and the Russian private military company Wagner Group fighting on its behalf in eastern Ukraine.[41] The official said that the mercenaries are predominantly infantry. The majority of these mercenaries are likely Russian, and the Ukrainian government reported that at most several hundred Libyan mercenaries are engaged in fighting around Popasna in eastern Ukraine.[42] Meanwhile, hundreds of Ethiopians queued in front of the Russian Embassy in Addis Ababa on April 19.[43] The Russian Embassy denied allegations, circulated by Ukrainian outlets, that it was recruiting Ethiopian mercenaries to fight in Ukraine.[44]
Drivers of Russian Threat Perceptions:
The Kremlin is failing to deter NATO expansion and failing to disrupt Ukraine's military alignment with the West. Russian Ambassador-at-Large and Chairman of the Committee of Senior Officials of the Arctic Council Nikolai Korchunov warned Sweden and Finland against joining NATO on April 17 and claimed that the expansion of NATO would be to the detriment of “traditionally non-aligned blocs” by leading to mutual distrust.[45] Finland’s parliament debated its accession to NATO on April 20 and will likely ask to join the alliance in the coming weeks.[46]
Meanwhile, US and Western military support continued to reach Ukraine’s armed forces to bolster their operations in Donbas, demonstrating the continued efficacy of the pro-Ukraine coalition. Russia issued a diplomatic demarche after US President Joe Biden announced an $800 million security package on April 14, claiming that US and NATO weapons shipments to Ukraine were worsening the war and would bring about “unpredictable consequences.”[47] The US security package arrived in Ukraine on April 18.[48] Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said that the aid package included aircraft parts that will enable the recommissioning of about 20 Ukrainian aircraft.[49] The United States announced a second $800 million security package on April 21 that includes 72 howitzers with accompanying vehicles and 440,000 rounds of ammunition; over 121 Phoenix Ghost Tactical Unmanned Aerial Systems tailored to Ukraine’s needs; and various field equipment and spare parts.[50] A senior US defense official told Reuters on April 20 that the United States has resumed training small numbers of Ukrainians on the use of the new artillery.[51] The weeklong trainings will take place outside Ukraine, likely in Poland.
European states also promised additional aid:
- Finland announced on April 21 that it will send unspecified additional defense material to Ukraine.[52]
- German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock announced that Germany would provide artillery training and maintenance to Ukraine on April 20.[53] She added that Germany had delivered anti-tank weapons, Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, and “other things that [they] didn’t talk about in public.”[54]
- Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederikson announced Denmark will more than double its current military aid to Ukraine during her April 21 trip to Ukraine. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced that Spain will send 200 tons of ammunition and other military supplies during the same trip.[55]
Foreign Involvement:
N/A
[4] https://nv dot ua/world/geopolitics/obmenyayut-li-medvedchuka-na-mariupol-chto-s-peregovorami-rossii-i-ukrainy-podolyak-video-intervyu-50235276.html
[8] https://meduza dot io/news/2022/04/20/doveriya-k-etim-lyudyam-davno-uzhe-net-mariya-zaharova-ob-ukrainskoy-delegatsii-na-peregovorah
[12] https://t dot me/readovkanews/31053
[15] https://iz dot ru/1323358/2022-04-20/predstavitel-pentagona-kirbi-ukraina-poluchaet-ot-drugikh-stran-samolety-i-zapchasti-ot-nikh
[16] https://riafan dot ru/23075970-minoboroni_rossii_kiev_sobiraetsya_ustroit_provokatsiyu_v_lozovoi
https://iz dot ru/1321465/2022-04-15/mo-rf-zaiavilo-o-planakh-vsu-nanesti-raketnyi-udar-po-vokzalu-v-lozovoi
https://russian dot rt.com/ussr/news/991049-kiev-provokaciya-lozovaya?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS
[19] https://russian dot rt.com/ussr/news/991552-vsu-boyatsya-plen-rasstrelyayut-svoi?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS; https://iz dot ru/1321917/2022-04-17/mo-zaiavilo-o-prikaze-kieva-rasstrelivat-vsekh-zhelaiushchikh-sdatsia-v-mariupole; https://tass dot ru/armiya-i-opk/14395197
[21] https://iz dot ru/1323349/2022-04-20/rossiiskie-voennye-obnaruzhili-shtab-podrazdeleniia-territorialnoi-oborony-v-shkole-khersona
[24] https://iz dot ru/1322891/2022-04-19/peskov-pereadresoval-minoborony-vopros-o-suti-vtoroi-fazy-spetcoperatcii
[25] https://iz dot ru/1323422/2022-04-20/zakharova-prizvala-rassledovat-feik-o-vozmozhnom-ispolzovanii-iadernogo-oruzhiia-na-ukraine
[32] https://riafan dot ru/23100246-putin_zayavil_ob_uhudshenii_urovnya_zhizni_evropeitsev_iz_za_antirossiiskih_sanktsii
[43] https://addisstandard dot com/newsalert-russian-embassy-in-addis-abeba-tells-ethiopians-it-doesnt-accept-applications-for-recruitment-in-the-armed-forces/
3. Russian War Crimes in Ukraine | SOF News
Russian War Crimes in Ukraine | SOF News
sof.news · Lark Escobar · April 23, 2022
By Lark S. Escobar.
Not all acts are permissible in war, and the horrors of the Russian invasion of Ukraine are more than just the normal or lawful incidents and targets (objectives) of violence in war. War crimes are grave, criminal violations of international humanitarian law, which can be grouped into three categories: crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Russia appears to be committing crimes in all three categories in Ukraine.
Crimes Against Peace
Russia invaded Ukraine on Thursday, February 24th, 2022, thus committing a crime against peace by waging a war of aggression. Although Russia is promulgating a narrative that it “had no other choice” and was forced to invade to “de-Nazi-fy” Ukraine and liberate it from “neo-Nazis” committing alleged human rights violations, there is no evidence to support these assertions. There are no media reports, NGO reports (like Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch), or United Nation reports to indicate that there was any such crisis in Ukraine or any legitimate basis for the Russian invasion.
War Crimes
The Russian forces appear to be committing further violations by their method of targeting. It is unlawful in war to target civilians, civilian infrastructure such as schools and hospitals, forcibly transfer or deport civilians, plunder public and private property, or engage in unnecessary destruction of cities, towns, or villages. There are a number of provisions that protect civilians including the principles of proportionality, necessity, and warning – in other words a military cannot target civilian infrastructure unless there’s a clear military necessity and when they do they should warn civilians so the area is cleared and loss of civilian life is mitigated.
Another war crime is that of perfidy, or pretending to be someone with protected status (chaplains, medics) in order to stage a surprise attack. It is possible that Russian forces, specifically the Chechnyan fighters, have committed this crime in Kyiv on February 27th, 2022. It is also a war crime to torture civilians, treat them poorly, or enslave them.
Crimes Against Humanity
Some of the most widely reported allegations of Russian crimes against humanity in Ukraine is those of rape and murder. Reports of gender-based violence including molestation and rape of victims including women and girls. Another suspected crime against humanity violation is that of forced deportation of Ukrainian civilians. Summary execution without due process and trials for civilians (essentially murder) is also a crime against humanity and has been alleged to have occurred in the town of Bucha just outside of the capital and also in Chernihiv and Kharkiv.
An Uncooperative Russia
These allegations are not exhaustive of all the reports of Russian atrocities, and other inhumane acts may be considered crimes against humanity, as well. In all cases, these crimes are challenging to prosecute – even when the individuals carrying out these crimes are being ordered to do so by their superiors. The International Criminal Court, or ICC, announced it began an investigation into these potential war crimes on March 2, 2022, but thus far Russia remains uncooperative and has not made clear efforts to mitigate these violations.
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About the author: Lark Escobar is a graduate student in the Fletcher School of International Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. She deployed to Afghanistan in 2010 and 2011 where she worked on training programs for the Afghan National Army (including the Afghan Air Force) and Afghan National Police. She has been involved in the Afghan Evac effort since mid-August 2021 and the Ukraine effort since late February 2022. https://www.linkedin.com/in/larksescobar/
4. Putin’s Struggles in Ukraine May Embolden Xi on Taiwan by Hal Brands
An important word of warning. Just say no to mirror-imaging.
Yet if Xi is as committed to unification with Taiwan as his public rhetoric and the PLA’s feverish preparations suggest, then “go fast” is at least as plausible a takeaway as “go slow.” American observers need to be wary of mirror-imaging — of assuming that our rivals perceive reality as we do. In supporting Ukraine, the world’s democracies may think they are convincing Xi not to invade Taiwan. They may simply be encouraging him to do it faster and better.
Putin’s Struggles in Ukraine May Embolden Xi on Taiwan
Conventional wisdom holds that the Western response to Russia’s invasion will tame China’s aggression, but the opposite is just as likely.
April 21, 2022, 3:00 PM EDT
One of the biggest questions of the Ukraine war concerns tensions half a world away: What lessons will China draw from the Russian invasion?
Western observers hope that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s faltering invasion of Ukraine will convince China to go slow — that it will discourage President Xi Jinping from undertaking an invasion of Taiwan. Yet there’s a real possibility that it could actually induce Beijing to go fast — to use force more harshly and decisively in hopes of avoiding the type of quagmire into which Moscow has stumbled.
Learning from other people’s wars is a time-honored tradition. In the early 20th century, Western observers scrutinized the Russo-Japanese war for hints about the dynamics of modern conflict. During the Cold War, lessons drawn from the Arab-Israeli wars strongly influenced Moscow’s and Washington’s preparations for a superpower showdown that, mercifully, never occurred.
Today, Chinese observers are surely scrutinizing events on the battlefield as well as the global response to Putin’s assault. There are two conflicting narratives about what they are learning.
The first, touted by high-ranking Pentagon officials and some other analysts, is that Ukraine offers a cautionary tale for Beijing. In this telling, Chinese officials now see how hard it is to conquer a country that is fighting for national survival. The People’s Liberation Army, which has not waged a significant conflict in more than 40 years, has likely been sobered by how poorly another autocratic military has executed the complex tasks associated with contemporary warfare.
Xi must also be stunned by the performance of U.S. intelligence, which deprived Putin of anything resembling strategic surprise and has thus given fair warning that China, too, might have any aggressive plans laid bare. The economic costs that the democratic world has imposed on Moscow, the unity it has summoned in response to an unprovoked attack, and the fact that the conflict is creating a larger, more invigorated North Atlantic Treaty Organization cannot escape Xi’s attention, either.
From this vantage point, a bloody war in Europe could help preserve the peace in Asia. It could force Xi’s government to revisit a whole range of assumptions about how well the PLA would perform under wartime stress and what consequences a war might bring down on Beijing.
This is certainly the lesson Western officials want Xi to draw — a desire that surely reflects some of the self-congratulation that has crept into the West’s assessment of its own performance. If the democracies have stunned themselves with their support for Ukraine, then surely Xi has been stunned as well.
Or perhaps China’s ruler is drawing a much different lesson.
Xi has presumably noticed that the U.S. and other democracies have given arms, training and money to Ukraine but refrained from joining the fighting. Beijing may not be impressed with the sanctions imposed on Moscow, given Europe’s reluctance to take more drastic steps, such as quickly halting purchases of Russian energy, that would inflict pain on its own citizens. The Chinese know, moreover, that their larger, more sophisticated economy would be far harder to strangle than Russia’s.
And maybe, in Xi’s view, Putin’s mistake was not his decision to invade Ukraine — it was that he conducted the invasion in such a bumbling, indecisive manner, giving the Ukrainians the chance to fight back and Washington and its allies the opportunity to make Moscow pay.
This interpretation might push Xi in a more dangerous direction. It could convince him that the key to winning a potential Taiwan conflict is to use overwhelming force — crippling missile barrages, coordinated cyberattacks, assassination and subversion campaigns, followed by a decisive, large-scale invasion — to break the country’s resistance before the U.S. and other nations can get in the way.
This conclusion would mesh well with a Chinese military tradition that has long emphasized surprise attacks, and with doctrinal writings that call for asserting control of a contest in its earliest moments. “Seize the battlefield initiative, paralyze the enemy’s war command, and give shock to the enemy’s will,” one of China’s authoritative military publications exhorts.
There is, unavoidably, some guesswork here. Even talented China watchers struggle to pierce the opacity of the regime and know what is in Xi’s mind. China’s lessons from Ukraine may evolve as the conflict does: Whether Russia ultimately succeeds or fails could be critical.
The two narratives sketched here aren’t even necessarily contradictory. Putin’s difficulties could give Xi pause about whether to invade Taiwan, while also pushing the PLA to be more forceful in how it conducts any prospective assault.
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Yet if Xi is as committed to unification with Taiwan as his public rhetoric and the PLA’s feverish preparations suggest, then “go fast” is at least as plausible a takeaway as “go slow.” American observers need to be wary of mirror-imaging — of assuming that our rivals perceive reality as we do. In supporting Ukraine, the world’s democracies may think they are convincing Xi not to invade Taiwan. They may simply be encouraging him to do it faster and better.
More From Bloomberg Opinion:
Ukraine War Is Depleting America’s Arsenal of Democracy: Hal Brands
China’s ‘Zero Covid’ Has Become Xi’s Nemesis: Niall Ferguson
Want more from Bloomberg Opinion? Terminal readers head to OPIN <GO>. Web readers, click here.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
To contact the author of this story:
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
5. Fact Sheet on U.S. Security Assistance for Ukraine
Fact Sheet on U.S. Security Assistance for Ukraine
Immediate Release
April 22, 2022
As of April 22, the United States has now committed more than $4 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden Administration, including approximately $3.4 billion since the beginning of Russia’s unprovoked invasion on February 24.
On April 21, the Department of Defense (DoD) announced the authorization of a Presidential Drawdown of security assistance valued at up to an additional $800 million tailored to meet critical Ukrainian needs for today’s fight as Russian forces launch a renewed offensive in eastern Ukraine. This authorization is the eighth drawdown of equipment from DoD inventories for Ukraine since August 2021.
As of April 22, United States security assistance committed to Ukraine includes:
- Over 1,400 Stinger anti-aircraft systems;
- Over 5,500 Javelin anti-armor systems;
- Over 14,000 other anti-armor systems;
- Over 700 Switchblade Tactical Unmanned Aerial Systems;
- 90 155mm Howitzers and 183,000 155mm artillery rounds;
- 72 Tactical Vehicles to tow 155mm Howitzers;
- 16 Mi-17 helicopters;
- Hundreds of Armored High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles;
- 200 M113 Armored Personnel Carriers;
- Over 7,000 small arms;
- Over 50,000,000 rounds of ammunition;
- 75,000 sets of body armor and helmets;
- 121 Phoenix Ghost Tactical Unmanned Aerial Systems;
- Laser-guided rocket systems;
- Puma Unmanned Aerial Systems;
- Unmanned Coastal Defense Vessels;
- 14 counter-artillery radars;
- Four counter-mortar radars;
- Two air surveillance radars;
- M18A1 Claymore anti-personnel munitions;
- C-4 explosives and demolition equipment for obstacle clearing;
- Tactical secure communications systems;
- Night vision devices, thermal imagery systems, optics, and laser rangefinders;
- Commercial satellite imagery services;
- Explosive ordnance disposal protective gear;
- Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear protective equipment;
- Medical supplies to include first aid kits.
The United States also continues to work with its Allies and partners to identify and provide Ukraine with additional capabilities.
The United States will continue to utilize all available tools to support Ukraine’s Armed Forces in the face of Russian aggression.
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6. Ukraine now has more tanks on the ground than Russia: US official says
Sounds good but....
Ukraine now has more tanks on the ground than Russia: US official says
- Western allies are sending heavier weaponry to Ukraine as Russia launches a new offensive.
-
A US defense official told The Washington Post that Ukraine now has more tanks than Russia does.
-
Russia is still feeling the losses it sustained earlier in the conflict, UK intelligence said.
"Right now, the Ukrainians have more tanks in Ukraine than the Russians do … and they certainly have the purview to use them," the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told The Post.
Insider was unable to independently verify this claim, and it is unclear exactly how many tanks both Russia and Ukraine have eight weeks into the war.
Earlier this month, a Pentagon official told The New York Times that the US will help with the transfer of Soviet-made tanks to the Donbas. The official declined to say how many tanks would be sent, or from which countries they would come.
European countries have also said they will provide heavy-duty weapons to Ukraine, including tanks.
In total, Ukraine's allies have sent more than $3 billion in military aid since Russia's invasion on February 24, the BBC reported.
On top of this, Russian troops are still losing military equipment.
Ukraine's armed forces said Friday that Russian troops had lost more than 800 tanks and more than 2,000 combat armored machines since the start of its invasion on February 24.
"In order to try and reconstitute their depleted forces, they have resorted to transiting inoperable equipment back to Russia for repair," the briefing said.
Ukrainian President Zelenskyy has been asking allies for months to send over weapons. In a speech on Tuesday, he said Ukraine would have already beaten Russia if it had been given more war supplies.
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7. Operation Z: The Death Throes of an Imperial Delusion
Excerpt:
This report is based on a wide range of sources. On the military front the report draws upon sustained though periodic engagements with Ukrainian combatants in the conflict and independent reporters observing the fighting on the ground, continual analysis of open source information from the war, and intermittent interviews with senior Ukrainian officials and officers during fieldwork in March and April. The diplomatic and economic analysis draws upon interviews with Ukrainian and Western intelligence officials, energy experts including former employees in Russia’s strategic industries, and diplomats and national security representatives from several NATO and non-NATO member states that have maintained links with Russia. The report also draws upon inspections by the authors of Russian military equipment recovered from the battlefield during fieldwork in April, and an extensive set of documents from inside the Russian government. Owing to the sensitivity of the methods by which these documents were obtained their sourcing is largely withheld, though the authors took steps to establish their veracity.
Operation Z: The Death Throes of an Imperial Delusion
Russia's military setbacks in Ukraine pose a new set of security challenges in Europe and beyond.
When Russian forces began to roll towards the Ukrainian border on the evening of Defender of the Fatherland Day, 23 February, Moscow was anticipating the capture of Kyiv within three days. Many outside observers – including the authors of this report – feared the destruction of the conventional Ukrainian military, even if they expected the fighting to last longer than Moscow had hoped. Moscow’s plan was for repressive measures to have stabilised control of Ukraine by Victory Day on 9 May. Instead, the Russian military was repulsed, suffering heavy losses, and is now embarking upon a limited offensive to try to secure Donetsk and Luhansk.
The war in Ukraine has generated a considerable volume of highly detailed analysis relating to the military progress of the campaign, the struggle for information, the cascading economic effects of high energy prices and supply chain disruption, and the geopolitical fallout as countries are increasingly called upon to pick a side. However, despite an emphasis in Western security concepts on the need for a whole-of-government approach, much of the analysis on the war in Ukraine has focused on narrow silos. This Special Report seeks to examine how the interconnected challenges confronting Moscow are reshaping Russian policy, and the risks Moscow’s potential courses of action pose as the war enters a new phase. The foremost conclusion is that Russia is now preparing, diplomatically, militarily and economically, for a protracted conflict.
This report is based on a wide range of sources. On the military front the report draws upon sustained though periodic engagements with Ukrainian combatants in the conflict and independent reporters observing the fighting on the ground, continual analysis of open source information from the war, and intermittent interviews with senior Ukrainian officials and officers during fieldwork in March and April. The diplomatic and economic analysis draws upon interviews with Ukrainian and Western intelligence officials, energy experts including former employees in Russia’s strategic industries, and diplomats and national security representatives from several NATO and non-NATO member states that have maintained links with Russia. The report also draws upon inspections by the authors of Russian military equipment recovered from the battlefield during fieldwork in April, and an extensive set of documents from inside the Russian government. Owing to the sensitivity of the methods by which these documents were obtained their sourcing is largely withheld, though the authors took steps to establish their veracity.
keywords
Regions and Country Groups
Research Groups
8. Inside the elite Ukrainian drone unit founded by volunteer IT experts: 'We are all soldiers now.'
A "whole of society" effort.
Excerpts:
"Now, we are all soldiers, but our roots are very different," Mykhailo, a board member and head of communications for Aerorozvidka, told Insider.
"Some of us have PhDs. Some have masters. Some are from the IT industry and many other industries. The main thing which unites us is a desire to win this war."
The unit was founded in 2014 in response to Russia's annexation of Crimea and Russian-backed groups launching a separatist insurgency in the Donbas region.
Inside the elite Ukrainian drone unit founded by volunteer IT experts: 'We are all soldiers now.'
Aerorozvidka's R-18 drone (L), destroyed Russian tank (R).
Aerorozvidka (L), Anatolii Stepanov / AFP via Getty Images (R)
- Aerorozvidka is an elite Ukrainian drone unit founded by volunteer IT experts.
- The unit custom-builds or modifies off-the-shelf consumer drones to bomb Russian tanks and armor.
- The unit is a key part of the Ukrainian resistance against invading Russian forces.
An elite Ukrainian drone unit founded by volunteer IT experts is becoming a crucial part of the resistance against invading Russian forces.
Aerorozvidka custom-builds or modifies off-the-shelf consumer drones to work in a military context and drop bombs on Russian vehicles under the cover of night.
"Now, we are all soldiers, but our roots are very different," Mykhailo, a board member and head of communications for Aerorozvidka, told Insider.
"Some of us have PhDs. Some have masters. Some are from the IT industry and many other industries. The main thing which unites us is a desire to win this war."
The unit was founded in 2014 in response to Russia's annexation of Crimea and Russian-backed groups launching a separatist insurgency in the Donbas region.
Tech-savvy volunteers came together to design machines for drone-based aerial reconnaissance to support the Ukrainian army.
Aerorozvidka's founder, an investment banker, and father of four, Volodymyr Kochetkov-Sukach, was killed in action in Donbas in 2015.
"The invasion began not months ago. It began in 2014," Mykhailo said.
Aerorozvidka now operates as a non-governmental organization that closely supports Ukraine's military.
The unit uses a range of drones, many of which are commonly available store-bought drones that they modify and militarize, including Chinese DJI drones and Autel drones, French Parrot drones, and more.
Its most prized drone is the octocopter R-18, which they build from scratch. It has a range of 4km, a 40 minute flight time, and can drop 5kg bombs.
Aerorozvidka's custom-built R-18 octocopter drone.
Aerorozvidka
Each R-18 costs $20,000 to build, making them much cheaper than anti-tank missiles such as NLAWs, or New generation Light Anti-tank Weapons, costing $40,000 per unit.
Unlike NLAWs, which are single-use, the R-18s can also be used repeatedly– unless they suffer damage by Russian fire.
The team has drones flying 20 hours of the day on reconnaissance or combat missions, Mykhailo said.
Aerorozvidka is divided into the drone team, the Delta team, and a cybersecurity team.
Delta is a NATO-supported web-based situation awareness system that creates a map of Russian targets using information from various sources, including agents on land and reconnaissance data from the drone team.
The unit also uses Elon Musk's Starlink satellite system, which helps ensure connectivity even if there are internet or power outages.
Aerorozvidka equipment.
Aerorozvidka
The unit carries out around 300 reconnaissance missions daily and has destroyed "dozens, possibly hundreds" of Russian vehicles, Mykhailo said.
Aerorozvidka typically carries out missions under cover of night because their drones' thermal imaging cameras give them an advantage. Equipped with night-vision goggles and sniper rifles, the drone soldiers would use quad bikes to move stealthily through the forests and get in position to attack the Russian forces.
Its most significant victory was helping to halt the 40-mile Russian convoy heading to attack the capital Kyiv.
'I think it's logical to say they are adapting. But they are still Russians'
The unit typically targets the most valuable vehicle in a convoy to make the most effective use of their limited bombs.
In this case, the team targeted vehicles at the head of the convoy, which succeeded in blocking the convoy and demoralizing Russian forces.
Currently, Aerorozvidka primarily operates in the Kyiv region but is expanding operations across Ukraine, with an anticipated renewed Russian offensive in the east and south of the country.
Mykhailo said that he could not disclose exactly how many people are part of the organization, but that there are "dozens."
The unit often shares videos of their missions on social media, occasionally set to the backdrop of music by Ukrainian rap artist Skofka.
A significant challenge facing Aerorozvidka is funding and supply issues. It relies upon crowdfunding and donations to get hold of much-needed components such as advanced modems and thermal imaging cameras.
Many US and Canada-made parts are subject to export controls prohibiting them from being sent to Ukraine.
Russian forces are slowly adapting and working out how to shoot down Aerorozvidka's drones, making the need for extra parts and funding crucial.
Despite the increase in counter-attacks, Aerorozvidka is confident that the unit will have continued success tormenting the Russian invaders.
"I think it's logical to say they are adapting. But they are still Russians," Mykhailo said.
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9. Army To Test Its Biggest Interactive Drone Swarm Ever Over Utah
Learning lessons from Putin's War in Ukraine?
Excerpts:
A tiered, secure network of surveillance and long-range strike capabilities will allow the Army to “shape” conditions before assaulting defended positions and ensuring its forces are striking military targets in highly complex environments like the urban combat being conducted by Russian forces in Ukraine, Rugen said.
“What's really on my mind, and you can see it play out in Ukraine, is our enemies fire on detect. We fire on identify,” he said. “We're already in kind of a latent position, because of our culture and our values and we're gonna hold to that. So we’ve got to speed it up and that's really what I'm very, very interested in. I want to be faster than them even though they're kind of cheating.”
Army To Test Its Biggest Interactive Drone Swarm Ever Over Utah
A mix of drones, most launched from aircraft, will swarm enemy positions and soften up the landing zone for a behind enemy lines air assault.
BY
APR 22, 2022 4:33 PM
The U.S. Army plans to launch a swarm of up to 30 small drones networked into a swarm later this month over the Utah desert as part of an international exercise. Deployed from an advanced echelon of a dual air-assault mission by helicopter-borne troops from the U.S. Army and allied participants, the swarm will be the largest group of interactive air-launched effects (ALEs) the Army has ever tested.
“I think what you're going to see is an expansive use of electronic warfare and an expansive use of our interactive drone swarm,” Maj. Gen. Walter Rugen, head of the Army’s Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team, told The War Zone in a recent interview. “We feel like we're going to be flying the largest interactive drone swarm ever in partnership with DARPA and our science and technology experts out of Aviation and Missile Command.”
An ALTIUS-600 is launched from a UH-60 Black Hawk at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona. Courtesy photo provided by Yuma Proving Ground
ALE is shorthand for a variety of unmanned systems launched from aircraft that can then be controlled by the aircraft crew or fly autonomously and feed information back to both the helicopter and networked ground troops.
The ALTIUS-600 model weighs between 20-and 27 pounds, depending on payload, has a range of 276 miles, and endurance of at least four hours. As well as the PILS, the drone can be launched from the Common Launch Tube (CLT) and the Reconfigurable Integrated-weapons Platform (RIwP). It can carry a variety of payloads to perform a range of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and signals intelligence (SIGINT) missions. ALTIUS also can be fitted with a warhead for offensive missions or employed as a counter-drone weapon using Lockheed Martin’s MoRFIUS, or Mobile Radio Frequency-Integrated UAS Suppressor. Area-I last year announced the ALTIUS-700, which has three times the carrying capacity of the -600 with five hours of flight endurance and customizable payloads that include surveillance, counter-UAS, electronic warfare, munitions and signals intelligence.
Block 1 Coyote drones, made by Raytheon, made their first flights in 2007, featuring a rear pusher prop, a set of pop-out wings and a pop-up twin-tail. These initial Coyotes were marketed as low-cost intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms, but ended up being somewhat of a testbed for a wide variety of applications including being air-launched by NOAA aircraft to gather data from inside hurricanes in 2017.
A Coyote on the tarmac at Avon Park Air Force Range in Florida, NOAA
Block 2 didn’t appear publicly until 2018 sporting a more missile-like appearance without wings and was specifically designed as a counter-drone system. A Block 3 version debuted last year developed for Navy unmanned vessels to launch from above and below the surface of the water.
ALEs carrying various sensing capabilities will be launched from aircraft, ground vehicles and by ground troops, then networked together as they fly toward an intended assault landing zone. The swarm will converge on the target area, sense enemy forces using infrared sensors and electronic warfare payloads that can detect signals emissions, fix their positions and feed that information back through the network to command posts and manned assault aircraft, Rugen said.
“We'll be launching them pretty much, you know, Monster Garage-style, anyway we can,” Rugen said. “Which again shows, in my mind, just the flexibility of our air-launched effects initiatives, because we can launch it from the air. We can launch it from the ground. We can launch from fixed-wing, rotary-wing, any type of ground vehicle.”
An ALTIUS is launched from an Area-I Pneumatically Integrated Launch System (PILS) during EDGE 21. Area-I photo
EDGE 22 is part of a series of rolling experimentation exercises hosted by the Army to evaluate new technologies and operational concepts. Rugen expects about 20 other Defense Department organizations to participate in 2022, including other program executive offices and CFTs, the Army’s ISR Task Force, and the Artificial Intelligence Integration Center and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). At least 50 technology objectives will be tested at the event, including how the U.S. sensor-to-shooter network can operate and intertwine with allied capabilities, which adds another layer of complexity. To identify potential network bottlenecks and speed up the decision-making process, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and the U.K. will attempt an air assault alongside the U.S. during the exercise.
EDGE pulls lessons from last fall’s Project Convergence 2021 (PC 21) exercise and paves the way for the upcoming PC 22 later this year.
During PC 21, two ALTIUS 600 drones were launched from and controlled by a UH-60 Black Hawk outfitted with DARPA’s autonomous brain called the Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System, becoming a second and third set of airborne sensors feeding reconnaissance and targeting data back over the secure network. Successful testing on smaller drone swarms has led to the planned multi-vehicle launch of up to 30 drones in support of a pair of air assaults on a defended landing zone behind enemy lines, Rugen said. The swarm will be used to sense, detect, identify and potentially strike enemy positions before manned helicopters arrive on scene.
“Our concept is generating decision dominance, converging our effects at the time and place of our choosing, then generating that overmatch in a very fast and agile way,” Rugen said. “Extending the network out there is going to be important to us.”
The idea is to quickly deploy swarms of spy drones and/or loitering munitions deep behind enemy lines to find and identify enemy forces. Networked together, the swarm can scan wide areas of terrain autonomously and feed video and targeting information to manned platforms holding beyond an enemy’s strike range. The DARPA last year tested a similar concept, though based on small-unit deploying swarms of drones for various missions related to urban combat rather than an air assault. The Army envisions larger unmanned platforms like the MQ-1C Gray Eagle as part of that stand-off equation, as well.
The plan is for each ALE to perform at least one of a set of defined reconnaissance and targeting mission sets listed as"detect, identify, locate, report," or DILR. Drones in the swarm will carry either passive or active capabilities. Payloads on passive drones include electro-optical or infrared imaging cameras or sensors capable of locating enemy electromagnetic emissions, including from communications systems and radars. Active elements of the swarm could carry electronic jamming equipment to interrupt an opponent’s sensing or communication capabilities, or a warhead to directly strike enemy positions.
This is the same general scenario seen in a video released in April by the Army’s Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation & Missile Center, seen below:
Once targets have been fixed and identified, some aircraft in the swarm can be employed as suicide drones to strike targets while others act as spotters for indirect fire or precision munitions launched from aircraft. Dividing missions and payloads among the drones in a swarm gives the networked group of drones more flexibility because each aircraft is not required to perform every mission. It also allows individual UAS to be smaller and cheaper because they do not have to carry both recon and strike equipment.
“In this case, that interactive swarm will generate overmatch where the penetration is needed,” Rugen said. “Once we conduct that penetration, we’ll be able to generate and set the conditions for two air assaults, vertical envelopments, one U.S. and one international.”
All of this is in service of providing the Army with a wider, more detailed view of future battlefields before manned aircraft and ground troops maneuver against enemy forces. ALTIUS has served as a test platform for what eventually will be a family of ALEs with a range of payload and swarming capabilities, which you can read more about in this detailed War Zone piece.
The Army has tested larger swarms of smaller drones, like this flock of 40 quadcopters at the National Training Center in California, but EDGE 22 will see the largest swarm of air-launched effects to date. U.S. Army Photo by Pv2 James Newsome
Essential to deploying drone swarms, and the larger Army concept of combined arms maneuver is a jam-resistant network sturdy and stealthy enough to operate in a denied or degraded communications environment, Rugen said. Drones themselves can be used as network repeaters to provide beyond-line-of-sight communication between forward-deployed forces and rear command posts.
A tiered, secure network of surveillance and long-range strike capabilities will allow the Army to “shape” conditions before assaulting defended positions and ensuring its forces are striking military targets in highly complex environments like the urban combat being conducted by Russian forces in Ukraine, Rugen said.
“What's really on my mind, and you can see it play out in Ukraine, is our enemies fire on detect. We fire on identify,” he said. “We're already in kind of a latent position, because of our culture and our values and we're gonna hold to that. So we’ve got to speed it up and that's really what I'm very, very interested in. I want to be faster than them even though they're kind of cheating.”
However the EDGE 22 experiment with drone swarming turns out, the Army will continue to push toward a highly mobile, networked battlefield. PC22 in the fall could see an even larger swarm performing more complex missions in service of that goal.
Contact the author: Dan@thewarzone.com
10. Foreword—How to Evaluate the Modernized Russian Military’s Performance in Ukraine
Charles Bartles is one of the most knowledgeable scholars about the "Gerasimov doctrine" and its myths. He is one of the most qualified to assess the war.
Excerpts:
This revolution in warfare has many implications of. As the means of sixth-generation warfare become more commonplace, the character of war would also change. In particular, traditional offensive and defensive actions conducted by large combined-arms formations would become less common, as large groupings of forces would become easy targets for reconnaissance-strike systems. The means of sixth-generation warfare would not only deter belligerents from massing large troop formations to conduct operations along a few axes but would also be able to simultaneously attack all axes of a theater of military operations. Sixth-generation warfare shifts the focus from large formations fighting in discrete battlefields to the massive use of precision-guided munitions to destroy the enemy’s means of conducting a retaliatory attack, such as their PGMs, key military installations (especially those pertaining to the enemy’s reconnaissance-strike systems), electrical power infrastructure, lines of communication, and economically vital assets.
It appears likely that Russia will not achieve all of its initial operational and strategic objectives for its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. And Russia may well have made a strategic blunder by underestimating the tenacity and resolve of the Ukrainian political establishment, military, and populace to resist this latest Russian aggression. However, this conflict, whatever its outcome, will provide NATO with a unique look at not only how Russia conducts a partial mobilization and large-scale combat operations, but also how Russia’s military modernization has progressed. An eventual thorough study will undoubtedly reveal that some Russian military modernization goals have succeeded, others failed, and many were/are still unrealized.
Foreword—How to Evaluate the Modernized Russian Military’s Performance in Ukraine
Russian Military Modernization and Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine
In recent years, there has been much interest in Russian military modernization due to Russia’s 2014 annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and activity in eastern Ukraine, more assertive behavior along its borders, successful bolstering of the Syrian regime, and short deployment to Kazakhstan in January 2022 to quell civil unrest. Given these successes, the Russian military has been proffered as an elite military force filled with Special Operations Forces who were the “polite people” or “little green men” seen on the streets in Crimea in 2014. Perhaps more colloquially put, since 2014, the Russian Armed Forces have been seen as ten feet tall. Understandably, interest in Russia’s military modernization is being piqued to new heights due to its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, euphemistically called a spetsial’naya voyennaya operatsiya (special military operation), which is unfolding as this introduction is being written.
The daily barrage of information about the campaign has created a situation wherein the specialized vernacular of the Russian military experts, terms such as “Battalion Tactical Groups,” can now be readily heard and seen in the mass media, YouTube, and a plethora of blog sites. The use of this terminology and the daily reporting of Russian military failures, including huge equipment losses, weak tactics, flagging morale, and broken logistics, often leads to conclusions and general feelings of certainty that the Russians are failing miserably. If these Ukrainian-friendly sources are taken at face value, one might conclude that all previous Russian military successes have been flukes, and in reality the Russian military is really only four feet tall.
Given the Russian propensity to study historical precedent, this underestimation does not seem wholly unfounded. Ukraine’s political leadership has fled the country before in times of duress, and considering President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s background as a comedian and actor along with his somewhat lackluster performance before the Russian invasion, the Russian failure to foresee Zelenskyy’s decision to stay and fight and his unlikely success as a wartime leader can be understood. Moreover, recent historical precedent of the failures of Western security assistance activities, might have led the Russians to believe that the vast sums of dollars, euros and pounds that were wasted propping up Afghan regime, were being equally wasted in Ukraine. Although the Russians were concerned about the defenders’ acquisition of certain weapon systems (such as the various antitank guided missiles), as a whole the quality and resolve of the Ukrainian military may have been perceived to be more at level closer to 2014 than they encountered in 2022.
All things being equal, if Moscow did accurately forecast the operational environment, the course of the campaign may have looked much different. Instead of attempting to achieve all objectives simultaneously to secure a “quick win,” a more traditional approach of prioritized objectives may have resulted in more Russian success. The point of this discussion is not to debate the shortcomings of the Russian military and/or its intelligence and planning failures, but instead to illustrate the point that causes of failure or success for military campaigns require more than casual observation. If the West reaches the conclusion that the Russian Armed Forces are inept from just casual observation, this could result in an underestimation of the Russian military akin to how Moscow underestimated the Ukrainians—a potential catastrophe in case the West ever becomes embroiled in a kinetic conflict with the Russian Federation.
Aside from operational security concerns on both sides of the conflict and the general “fog of war,” additional difficulties stem from understanding the lessons learned and the “big picture”—simply the scale and duration of the campaign. A military conflict of this size has not been seen in Europe since the Second World War, a complete accounting of the conflict to include its actions on at least five independent axes, phases, many battles, and all other aspects of modern warfare will probably take many years for scholars, analysts, and militaries to fully digest. In terms of analytical assessments, The Tanks of August is an excellent account of the 2008 Russo-Georgian War, but it is important to keep in mind that this conflict was comparatively much smaller in terms of personnel, geography and duration, lasting only five days. Due to the scope of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, and the availability of massive amounts of digital evidence that has surfaced and will continue to surface for years to come, it is doubtful that there will be a single text such as The Tanks of August that will be able to encapsulate Russia’s 2022 assault on Ukraine. Instead, one can expect many books, articles, thesis/dissertations, papers, etc., drafted about the various aspects of the campaign, in addition to a few works that will provide a general overview.
Perhaps the biggest obstacle in attempting to develop any all-encompassing “lessons learned” about Russia’s military modernization and performance in this campaign, at this stage, is the fact that the Russian military is a thinking and adaptable organization. As previously mentioned, there will be a formal review conducted at the end of the campaign, but the Russian General Staff almost certainly already started an impromptu process to make immediate changes, the results of which will presumably become more evident as the campaign transitions from being measured in weeks to months. Therefore, one should be mindful that some lessons learned may be applicable to the whole campaign, while others may just be applicable to certain phases, axes of advance, and/or particular units as the Russian military adapts to its environment, including a learning and adapting Ukrainian force.
Although it is too early for an assessment of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Roger N. McDermott’s Russia-s Path to the High-Tech Battlespace provides an important tool for those interested in studying Russian military modernization and how successful or unsuccessful these efforts have been as evidenced in Ukraine 2022. Many such assessments can be expected in the years to come, but McDermott’s contribution permits these assessments to measure Russian military modernization within the context in which it was developed and implemented. As will be described, McDermott couches Russian military modernization as Russian military theorists, planners, and force designers think about it. In particular, Russian military modernization follows the thinking of the late Major General Vladimir Slipchenko, one of Russia’s most prominent military theorists, whose theories can be readily seen in Russia’s military modernization.
Understanding the Context of Russian Military Modernization
Slipchenko’s analysis of the historical development of warfare posited that the world was now entering a new, sixth generation of warfare. The first appearance of this new generation of warfare was evidenced by the first use of over-the-horizon cruise missiles in the 1982 Falklands War, and came to be defined by the 1991 Gulf War and actions against Yugoslavia in 1999. Slipchenko noted that the deceive use of precision-guided munitions in these conflicts is what differentiated them from earlier generations of warfare. In Slipchenko’s view, the Western view that the tank, machine-gun, and aircraft were revolutionary military developments was unfounded, as he believed they were simply evolutionary improvements, paling in importance to PGMs.
Slipchenko postulated that the precision-guided munitions were in fact a revolutionary development, which would require major changes to the way warfare would be thought about and conducted. He believed that once fully realized, sixth-generation warfare would be characterized by the use of a combination of non-nuclear PGMs and informational means to achieve strategic objectives, without the need of a conventional ground force. Since the means used to conduct this type of warfare are long-distance and over-the-horizon in nature, Russians typically refer to sixth-generation warfare as “non-contact” warfare.
Left to right) Army General Makhmut Gareyev (1923–2019) former deputy chief of the USSR General Staff and president of the Russian Academy of Military Sciences; Dr. Jacob Kipp (1942–2021), former director of the Foreign Military Studies Office and deputy director of the School of Advanced Military Studies; and Major General Vladimir Slipchenko (1935–2005), a member of the Russian Academy of Military Sciences and author of “Future War” and numerous other publications. At a conference in Fort Leavenworth, KS, in the early 1990s, discussing future war.
This revolution in warfare has many implications of. As the means of sixth-generation warfare become more commonplace, the character of war would also change. In particular, traditional offensive and defensive actions conducted by large combined-arms formations would become less common, as large groupings of forces would become easy targets for reconnaissance-strike systems. The means of sixth-generation warfare would not only deter belligerents from massing large troop formations to conduct operations along a few axes but would also be able to simultaneously attack all axes of a theater of military operations. Sixth-generation warfare shifts the focus from large formations fighting in discrete battlefields to the massive use of precision-guided munitions to destroy the enemy’s means of conducting a retaliatory attack, such as their PGMs, key military installations (especially those pertaining to the enemy’s reconnaissance-strike systems), electrical power infrastructure, lines of communication, and economically vital assets.
Conclusion
It appears likely that Russia will not achieve all of its initial operational and strategic objectives for its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. And Russia may well have made a strategic blunder by underestimating the tenacity and resolve of the Ukrainian political establishment, military, and populace to resist this latest Russian aggression. However, this conflict, whatever its outcome, will provide NATO with a unique look at not only how Russia conducts a partial mobilization and large-scale combat operations, but also how Russia’s military modernization has progressed. An eventual thorough study will undoubtedly reveal that some Russian military modernization goals have succeeded, others failed, and many were/are still unrealized.
As opposed to the previously discussed Russian ideas of global sixth-generation war, the United States Army has adopted a wholly different Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) doctrine, one that is region focused. Since the US and Russia are pursuing dissimilar modernization strategies, the success of Russia’s military modernization efforts should not be assessed solely through a Western lens, as this was not the context in which they were developed. The chapters of Russia’s Path to the High-Tech Battlespace provide the necessary blueprint for a complete understanding and assessment.
In 1981, US Army General Donn Starry presented a new “AirLand Battle” concept, which focused on air support for land forces. This concept, and later doctrine, was the bedrock of US/NATO doctrine in later years of the Cold War and was validated by the Coalition’s great success in the 1991 Gulf War. General Starry developed this concept from his study of the 1973 Yom Kippur War. This six-month study started in 1977, years after the end of that conflict. Fortunately, General Starry benefitted from having enough time for all necessary information to come to light and sufficient situational understanding to conduct the study. A premature and/or hasty assessment of the 1973 Yom Kippur War might have led to much different conclusions than eventually reached, possibly without the required insights that were the foundations of the “AirLand Battle” concept. When the time comes for a similar type assessment of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s Path to the High-Tech Battlespace will certainly help provide such situational understanding.
Notes
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[1] Will Oremus, “In Putin’s Russia, ‘fake news’ now means real news,” Washington Post Online, 11 March 2022. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/11/russia-fake-news-law-misinformation/; Elahe Izadi and Sarah Ellison, “Russia’s independent media, long under siege, teeters under new Putin crackdown,” Washington Post Online, 4 March 2022. https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2022/03/04/putin-media-law-russia-news/.
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[2] Barbara Starr, Ellie Kaufman and Jeremy Herb, “Top US general in Europe says there ‘could be’ an intelligence gap in US that caused US to overestimate Russia’s capabilities,” CNN Online, 29 March 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/29/politics/tod-wolters-intelligence-gap-us-russia-ukraine/index.html; Max Boot, “Stop overestimating the Russian military and underestimating Ukrainians,” Washington Post Online, 28 March 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/03/28/stop-overestimating-russian-military-and-underestimating-ukrainians-one-month-war/; Fred Kaplan, “No, You’re Not Imagining It: Russia’s Army Is Inept,” Slate, 28 February 2022, https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/02/no-youre-not-imagining-it-russias-army-is-inept.html.
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[3] M. S. Barabanov, A. V. Lavrov, V. A. Tseluiko, Eds. R. N. Pukhov, The Tanks of August (Moscow, Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, 2010), pp. 144.
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[4] N. N. Tyutyunnikov, Military Thought in Terms and Definitions: In Three Volumes (Vol. 1) (Moscow, Russia: Pero., 2018), p. 129.
- Journal on Baltic Security, No. 1, Vol. 1, 2015, pp. 61–70, at p. 61, https://doi.org/10.1515/jobs-2016-0013 (accessed 14/10/2021).
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[7] S. G. Chekinov, “Prognozirovaniye tendentsiy voyennogo iskusstva v nachal’nom periode XXI veka [Predicting Trends in Military Art in the Initial Period of the 21st Century]”, Military Thought, Vol. 19, July 2010., 19-33.
- M. Gareev and V. Slipchenko, Future War (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Foreign Military Studies Office, 2007), pp. 14–15.
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[9] Gareev and Slipchenko, Future War, p. 17.
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[10] S. A. Modestov, “Strategicheskoye sderzhivaniye na teatre informatsionnogo protivoborstva [Strategic Deterrence in the Theater of Information Warfare],” Journal of the Academy of Military Sciences, Vol. 26, No. 1, 2009, p.35.
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[11] C. K. Bartles, “Getting Gerasimov Right” Military Review, January-February 2016, 36. https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Military-Review/English-Edition-Archives/January-February-2016/.
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[12] O. Falichev, “Hotspots of Science: General Staff Denoted Bases of Operation and Lines for Scientists”, Military-Industrial Courier, 27 March 2018, https://vpk.name/news/210325_goryachie_tochki_nauki.html.
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[1] The net effect of these laws results in little or no public discussion of the campaign, allowing only for reposting or rehashing of the aforementioned government pronouncements.
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[2] This, again, may well be true, but at this time it is difficult to determine what portion of Russia’s difficulties can be attributed to an “inept Army” as opposed to intelligence and planning failures at the operational and strategic levels. If the Russians did envision an operating environment in which they would encounter little resistance, they likely underestimated not only the total number of personnel required for such an endeavor but also the general scheme of maneuver and required support mechanisms.
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The Tanks of August.[3] The book is a collection of seven essays by prominent authors from the Russian defense and security community. The book meticulously lays out a timeline of the conflict, Russian and Georgian losses, post-war developments, and lessons learned. By almost all accounts, the book provides a critical and well-balanced assessment of the Russian military’s performance in the conflict. Although Russia’s “New Look” reforms were envisaged well before the 2008 Russo-Georgian War, the Russian military’s poor performance in the conflict likely was an impetus to execute those reforms or, at a minimum, lessened institutional resistance. A similar critical look at the Russian military’s performance will likely occur after active hostilities in the current operation cease.
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[4] In order to consider the future of strategy, operational art and tactics, they must first consider what the future of war will look like. This is accomplished by studying the lessons of past wars and factors that will cause war to change, and using this information to forecast what the future operating environment may look like.[5] The most important of these factors is technological development, which is essential for any long-term defense planning involving military doctrine and capability development.[6] Given the importance of technological development to military art, Russian military theorists have long been pondering the impacts of technological change and innovation. One of the best known of these Russian theorists is the aforementioned Major General Vladimir Slipchenko. Slipchenko was keenly interested in the technological developments that characterized the 1991 Desert Storm operation and the 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In his view, these conflicts were characterized by the increasing use of precision-guided munitions (PGM), the growing importance of the informational aspects of war—information/psychological operations; command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C4ISR), electronic warfare (EW), cyber warfare, and so on—as well as the decreasing importance of ground elements.
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[7] This view proffers that in over four thousand years of human history, there have been five generations of warfare: first generation—edged weapons; second generation—gunpowder weapons; third generation—rifled weapons; fourth generation—automatic weapons; fifth generation—nuclear weapons.[8] The transitions between these generations of warfare are not seen as a binary yes/no proposition. Instead, in step with this theory’s underpinnings in dialectical materialism, the world’s transition between generations of warfare was viewed as occurring on a spectrum. Belligerents could, and often do, use the means of more than one generation to varying degrees depending on a variety of factors (economy, technological level, etc.). In addition, belligerents could revert to older generations of warfare, or even skip generations of warfare depending on the situation.
- [9]
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[10] Due to the “reaches” of sixth-generation means of war, the geography of war would change from discrete regions to a singular global domain. Even the concept of victory itself would change. Furthermore, even the concept of victory would change. Previously, victory was often predicated upon defeating the enemy’s military, occupying their territory, destroying their economic means, and finally toppling their political leadership. Eventually, the means of sixth-generation will allow mass attacks directly on the enemy’s homeland. Victory in sixth-generation warfare will be determined not on some far-away battlefield, but on the home territories of the belligerents via non-contact means.
- [11]
- [12]
11. FAA apologizes for Capitol parachutists incident that led to evacuation
Looks like it was the FAA responsible, and not the Army or the Golden Knights. It is good of them to accept responsibility.
Good to know the US Capitol Police are on a hair-trigger for threats.
FAA apologizes for Capitol parachutists incident that led to evacuation
Axios · by Shawna Chen · April 23, 2022
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) apologized Friday for failing to provide advance notice about an aircraft "intrusion" that caused U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) to briefly evacuate the Capitol complex on Wednesday.
Why it matters: The plane, which the USCP initially deemed a "probable threat," was carrying members of the U.S. Army Golden Knights who parachuted into Nationals Park for an event. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi later called the FAA's "apparent failure to notify Capitol Police ... outrageous and inexcusable."
- Pelosi also noted that the "unnecessary panic caused by this apparent negligence was particularly harmful for Members, staff and institutional workers still grappling with the trauma of the attack on their workplace on January 6th."
What they're saying: "The FAA's initial review ... showed that we did not provide advance notification of this event to the U.S. Capitol Police," the federal transportation agency said in a statement.
- "We deeply regret that we contributed to a precautionary evacuation of the Capitol complex and apologize for the disruption and fear experienced by those who work there," the agency said, adding that it would continue to review "all aspects of this incident."
- "We value our partnership with the U.S. Capitol Police and other law enforcement agencies, and we are taking immediate steps to ensure that we always coordinate well in advance with other agencies to avoid confusion over future aviation events in the Washington, D.C., area."
The big picture: The sky above downtown Washington, D.C., is restricted airspace, and Capitol Police are on a hair-trigger for any security threats — particularly after 9/11 and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.
- The U.S. Army said in a statement after the incident that it was "reviewing all aspects of the event to ensure all procedures were followed appropriately to coordinate both the flight and the parachute demonstration."
- Pelosi said Congress would also review what went wrong.
Axios · by Shawna Chen · April 23, 2022
12. Opinion | Can Sanctions Really Stop Putin?
Sanctions don't work unless they are part of a holistic and comprehensive strategy. They are not a silver bullet. Sanctions do not equal strategy. They one one of the "ways" of strategy. But if there is not a sound strategy sanctions cannot be effective. And of course if sanctions are not aggressively enforced they will not work. And if the target of sanctions can evade them either by unilateral activities or with the complicity of other countries they will not achieve the desired effects.
Opinion | Can Sanctions Really Stop Putin?
The Editorial Board
Can Sanctions Really Stop Putin?
April 22, 2022
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The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
When Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine in February, trampling on the sovereignty of a neighbor, international sanctions were the best path forward for the United States and its allies to take. The ruthlessness and grave atrocities toward civilians that have ensued since only reinforce that call.
As of this week, those sanctions have made dents in both Russia’s economy and its ability to wage war in Ukraine. As foreign companies have withdrawn operations from Russia, Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, estimated that some 200,000 people there are at risk of losing their jobs, and there’s some evidence that the decision by Europe and the United States to restrict the export of microchips has already affected Russia’s ability to produce and repair tanks. The sanctions have also sent a vital message of support to the Ukrainian people.
It is undeniable that the United States and its allies were — and still are — right to use sanctions to try to end this war.
Yet as the Biden administration weighs the next phase of this conflict, Americans should be cleareyed about the limits of what sanctions are likely to achieve.
It’s too early to know how history will judge this unprecedented, sweeping effort to make Mr. Putin pay a price for his war. Nor can we predict the unintended consequences these sanctions may produce in the coming months or years. But there are lots of indications that the war — and the sanctions it triggered — could last a long time. As it is wise to have definite goals and an exit strategy when a country enters a military conflict, the same is true for waging economic warfare.
The West has turned to sanctions as a tool with growing frequency since World War II — in places as varied as South Africa, the Soviet Union, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea and Iran. It is relatively easy to apply sanctions, and they nearly always satisfy the domestic political need to “do something” short of military engagement.
Here’s the issue: Sanctions historically have not been particularly effective in changing regimes, and their record at changing dictators’ behavior is mixed at best.
Cuba, Venezuela and North Korea never bowed to American demands. Where there are success stories, they are modest: Crippling sanctions brought Iran to the negotiating table over its nuclear program, but that regime never stopped asserting its right to enrich uranium. The bite of sanctions eventually contributed to the end of white-minority rule in South Africa, but it was just one of many factors.
The Biden administration deserves credit for laying the groundwork for multilateral sanctions, which are the only kind that have the hope of success. The greatest effects seen so far from the sanctions have been by unplugging Russia, if only partially, from the international financial system through moves like freezing billions of dollars in assets overseas and taking some Russian banks off SWIFT, the global messaging system for financial transactions. These far-reaching punishments, unthinkable even a few months ago, displayed a new sense of cooperation among the United States and the other Group of 7 countries.
Sanctions alone — at least any sanctions that European countries would be willing to now consider — will not bring Russia to its knees any time soon. As long as Europeans still depend on Russian oil and gas, Russia will be able to depend on significant income from that relationship. The spat over whether gas deliveries will be paid in rubles, as Russia has demanded, only highlights the bind that European countries find themselves in.
The oligarchs who are losing their yachts and the people who are tightening their belts have little sway over the Kremlin. In Russia, with average citizens, Mr. Putin has grist for a loud “I told you so” about the West’s purported longing to bring down Russia.
Will the sanctions imposed by the Group of 7 nations truly isolate Russia? No. A number of countries, including Mexico, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and, most significantly, China, remain on friendly terms with Russia. The fact that this list also includes archrivals Pakistan and India, as well as Iran and Israel, illustrates Mr. Putin’s influence as an arms dealer and a power broker in South Asia and the Middle East.
The United States could tighten the economic screws on Russia by imposing secondary sanctions. U.S. officials already appear to be threatening as much in meetings and calls with officials in India and China. Secondary sanctions are a powerful tool to compel other countries to get in line with American policy. But the potential benefits need to be weighed against the risks and costs. The extraterritorial application of American laws can also incite deep resentment, even from European allies at times. Secondary sanctions should be used sparingly, and only after consultation with partners.
Sanctions can have other unintended consequences as well. They can actually end up strengthening a dictator’s grip on power by tightening state control over the economy. Private businesses can have a hard time weathering the storm of sanctions, but authoritarian regimes and their state-owned enterprises often find ways to circumvent them. Sanctions also provide dictators with a credible external enemy to blame for the misery of their people. Instead of pushing people to rise up against their rulers, sanctions often inspire a rally-around-the-flag effect. After Western sanctions were placed on Russia in 2014, in the aftermath of the annexation of Crimea, 71 percent of Russians saw them as an attempt to “weaken and humiliate Russia,” according to an independent poll.
So, while sanctions can hobble economies, they rarely compel the kinds of wholesale political changes that American officials would like to see. Research has shown that they produced some meaningful changes in behavior about 40 percent of the time. Change is unlikely to occur when sanctions are imposed without communicating the steps that must be taken for them to be rolled back.
All the more reason that the United States should have a clear plan for how and under what circumstances it would be appropriate to roll back these latest sanctions. Right now, this has been left deliberately vague to allow the Ukrainians to directly negotiate with Russia. It is laudable to give deference to Ukrainians whose lives are on the line in this terrible war. But creating clear goals and communicating benchmarks for sanctions relief are important factors in successful sanctions. Too often, sanctions are left in place for decades, without evaluation of whether or not they are achieving what they were put in place to do.
The United States and its allies have been wise in tightening the economic screws on Russia, so long as they bear no illusions about what this can and cannot achieve.
13. Russia's ailing command: 'Bloated and slouching' Putin is seen gripping a table amid cancer battle rumours
Speculation. Hard to make definitive assessments from photos and body language. Based on what I recall of photos of Putin, he always seems to have bad posture when sitting. (looks like a disgruntled teenager slouching in front of a high school teacher)
I would say one can only hope this is accurate but we must also be concerned with the implications if Putin is sick and nearing the end what happens to his decision calculus. And then we must be considering what comes next if and when he does drop dead.
Russia's ailing command: 'Bloated and slouching' Putin is seen gripping a table amid cancer battle rumours as he meets 'slurring' defence minister Shoigu - who needs to read from notes 'following heart attack'
- Vladimir Putin was seen gripping a table whilst slouching in chair during his meeting yesterday
- Putin claimed in meeting with Sergei Shoigu that Mariupol had been 'liberated' by Russia
- Shoigu also appeared to be struggling, with defence minister slurring his words and reading from a script
PUBLISHED: 05:44 EDT, 22 April 2022 | UPDATED: 20:54 EDT, 22 April 2022
Daily Mail · by Rachael Bunyan For Mailonline · April 22, 2022
A bloated Vladimir Putin has been seen gripping a table whilst slouching in his chair during a televised meeting with his defence minister amid rumours the Russian strongman is battling cancer.
In a rare live appearance, Putin claimed Russia had 'liberated' the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol, as he savagely ordered Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu to seal off all routes out of the Azovstal steelworks where defiant Ukrainians are holed up 'so that even a fly cannot pass through'.
But Putin's poor posture and his apparently bloated face and neck sparked speculation about the Russian leader's health, which has reportedly been in decline since his invasion of Ukraine.
Video showed Putin speaking to Shoigu whilst gripping the edge of the table with his right hand - so hard that it appears white - and tapping his foot consistently.
Shoigu does not appear to have fared any better in the eight weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, with the defence minister slurring his words and reading from his notes following an apparent heart attack.
A bloated Vladimir Putin has been seen gripping a table whilst slouching in his chair during a televised meeting with his defence minister Sergei Shoigu amid rumours the Russian strongman is battling cancer. Shoigu does not appear to have fared any better in the eight weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, with the defence minister slurring his words and reading from his notes following an apparent heart attack
But Putin's poor posture and his apparently bloated face and neck sparked speculation about the Russian leader's health, which has reportedly been in decline since his invasion of Ukraine
Anders Aslund, a Swedish economist and former adviser to Ukraine and Russia, said the video showed both Putin and Shoigu 'depressed and seemingly in bad health'.
'Shoigu has to read his comments to Putin and slurs badly, suggesting that the rumours of his heart attack are likely. He sits badly. Poor performance.'
Professor Erik Bucy, a body language expert from Texas Tech University, told The Sun Online: 'It's an astonishingly weakened Putin compared to the man we observed even a few years ago.
'An able-bodied president would not need to keep himself propped up with a hand held out for leverage and would not be concerned about keeping both feet planted on the ground.'
'This is not a portrait of a healthy Putin but one appearing increasingly feeble and barely able to hold himself upright at a small conference table,' Bucy added.
Putin's bloated face and neck has sparked claims he is undergoing steroid treatment, whilst reports have suggested Putin is 'constantly' accompanied by a doctor specialising in thyroid cancer.
Surgeon Yevgeny Selivanov, of Moscow's Central Clinical Hospital, has flown to the Russian leader no less than 35 times in Black Sea resort Sochi, his favourite place of residence.
The respected doctor's thesis - showing his area of medical expertise - was entitled: 'Peculiarities of diagnostics and surgical treatment of elderly and senile patients with thyroid cancer'.
'Shoigu has to read his comments to Putin and slurs badly, suggesting that the rumours of his heart attack are likely. He sits badly. Poor performance,' Anders Aslund, a Swedish economist and former adviser to Ukraine and Russia, said
Service members of pro-Russian troops, including fighters of the Chechen special forces unit, stand in front of the destroyed administration building of Azovstal Iron and Steel Works
Meanwhile Shoigu, who is in charge of the bloody invasion of Ukraine, has been noticeably absent from public view amid reports the defence minister and Putin's relationship has become strained after Russia's military operation in Ukraine has led to more than 20,000 Russian troops being killed.
Last week, a Russian-Israeli businessman claimed Shoigu suffered a heart attack, which he suspects was caused by foul play.
Leonid Nevzlin claimed Shoigu had been in intensive car after suffering 'a massive heart attack' which 'could not have occurred due to natural causes', suggesting Putin's longtime ally may have been the subject of an assassination attempt ordered by his boss.
Some have claimed Shoigu and Putin's poor health is due to the faltering invasion of Ukraine.
During the televised meeting, Putin hailed the 'liberation' of Mariupol as a 'success' for Russian forces, and ordered a siege of the Azovstal plant.
'There is no need to climb into these catacombs and crawl underground through these industrial facilities. Block off this industrial area so that not even a fly can escape,' Putin said.
The British Ministry of Defence said today: 'Putin's decision to blockade the Azovstal steel plant likely indicates a desire to contain Ukrainian resistance in Mariupol and free up Russian forces to be deployed elsewhere in eastern Ukraine.'
There are at least 500 wounded soldiers inside the plant needing medication and surgery including amputations, while a number of elderly civilians are also in need of urgent treatment.
'They have almost no food, water, essential medicine,' Ukraine's foreign ministry said
A pro-Russian troop stands in front of the destroyed administration building of Azovstal Iron and Steel Works in Mariupol where hundreds of Ukrainians are trapped
An armoured convoy of pro-Russian troops waving Russian flags moves towards Mariupol yesterday which Putin claims he has 'liberated'
Defiant Ukrainians holed up inside the steelworks are still refusing to surrender Mariupol despite being surrounded by Russian forces.
Today, Captain Svyatoslav Palamar from the Azov Battalion insisted: 'I always say that as long as we are here, Mariupol remains under control of Ukraine.'
Volodymyr Zelensky echoed the remarks in an overnight address, saying Mariupol 'continues to resist' the invading forces.
Palamar's comments are the first to emerge from inside the steelworks, the last remaining bastion of resistance in the city which has been razed to the ground, since Putin claimed victory yesterday.
He described the chilling sight inside Azovstal and its labyrinthine tunnels where scores of dead civilians are trapped in bunkers and under collapsed buildings after taking refuge there from the constant shelling.
The soldier told the BBC: 'All the buildings in the territory of Azovstal are practically destroyed. They drop heavy bombs, bunker-busting bombs which cause huge destruction. We have wounded and dead inside the bunkers. Some civilians remain trapped under the collapsed buildings.'
Daily Mail · by Rachael Bunyan For Mailonline · April 22, 2022
14. He Was a Penniless Donor to the Far Right. He Was Also a Russian Spy.
I am sure this is happening in various forms in every target country of Russia.
He Was a Penniless Donor to the Far Right. He Was Also a Russian Spy.
An investigation in Slovakia has exposed how Russian clandestine operations are trying to sow discord in Europe and create sympathy for Moscow over Ukraine.
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The city center in Kosice, Slovakia. The Kremlin has sought to win influence and sow discord on Europe’s formerly communist eastern fringe.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
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April 20, 2022
KOSICE, Slovakia — He lived with his sick mother and never had a regular job. He had no obvious source of income and, according to his uncle, even signed up for welfare benefits as a caregiver deserving of state support.
But Bohus Garbar, down-on-his-luck and in his early 50s, still managed to donate thousands of euros to Kremlin-friendly, far-right political parties in Slovakia. He also worked for free as a contributor to an anti-establishment website notorious for recycling Russian propaganda.
Family and friends are mystified.
“He definitely wasn’t in a state where he could support any political party,” said Mr. Garbar’s uncle, Bohuslav Garbar, a retired computer programmer in the family’s hometown of Kosice, 50 miles from Slovakia’s eastern border with Ukraine.
A Slovak security service surveillance video, made public in early March, provides at least the start of an explanation: it shows his nephew receiving instructions and two 500-euro bills, a small part of what officials say were tens of thousands of euros in payments, from a Russian military intelligence officer masquerading as a diplomat at Moscow’s embassy in Bratislava, the Slovak capital.
The Russian Embassy in Bratislava, Slovakia.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
“I told Moscow that you are such a good boy,” the Russian spy, Sergei Solomasov, can be heard telling his Slovak recruit before explaining that Moscow would like Mr. Garbar to act as a “hunter” on the prowl for people of influence willing to cooperate with Russia.
For years, European intelligence agencies have sounded the alarm over the clandestine activities of Russian spies, while regarding with suspicion those who cheerlead for Russia and its president, Vladimir V. Putin. Moscow routinely dismissed this as paranoid “Russophobia,” its catchall response to nearly all foreign criticism.
The invasion of Ukraine, accompanied by a barrage of transparent lies, however, has vindicated the darkest Western suspicions and accelerated efforts to uproot hidden networks of spies and their recruits.
Slovakia, a small Slavic nation with a strongly pro-Western government but also large reserves of genuine, homegrown sympathy for Russia, shows in microcosm how the Kremlin has sought to win influence and sow discord on Europe’s formerly communist eastern fringe by leveraging spies, paid helpers, far-right nationalists and disinformation-spouting media.
“We always suspected this was happening, but now we have a smoking gun,” said Daniel Milo, director of an Interior Ministry unit responsible for monitoring and countering disinformation. “This is a clear example of how the Russians operate.”
Bohuslav Garbar, whose nephew was arrested after being filmed by Slovakian security services taking cash payments from a Russian operative, at home in Kosice, Slovakia.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
Mr. Garbar, he added, “is just the tip of the iceberg. We don’t know yet how many other Garbars are out there running around.”
The video of Mr. Garbar’s rendezvous with Mr. Solomasov, the Russian spy, was recorded last year by Slovakia’s military intelligence agency as part of a long investigation. Mr. Solomasov was expelled early last month, among more than 30 Russian diplomats recently sent home from Bratislava, as well as scores more from other European capitals.
Mr. Garbar, arrested and charged with espionage and bribe-taking, has been released from detention pending his trial. The former vice-rector of Slovakia’s military academy was also charged with betraying his country to Russia for money.
Officials say both have confessed and are now cooperating with investigators.
“They are talking and talking and talking and this has to make the Russian network in Slovakia very nervous,” Jaroslav Nad, the defense minister, said in an interview.
Russia has not commented on Mr. Garbar’s liaison with Russian military intelligence, but it called the expulsion of Mr. Solomasov “groundless.”
Russia’s push for influence, officials say, kicked into high gear after its 2014 annexation of Crimea and initial invasion of eastern Ukraine, generating a flood of Russian disinformation in Slovakia and across the region. Friendly outlets routinely portray Russia as a champion of peace and lodestar of Christian values, while casting NATO as a warmongering menace.
Helping this push in Slovakia and neighboring countries was Alexander Usovsky, a freelance Russian nationalist agitator who received funding from Konstantin Malofeev, a wealthy private businessman in Moscow whom the U.S. Treasury on Wednesday named as the leader of a “malign influence network” working to undermine sanctions.
Mr. Usovsky set up the East European Cultural Initiative in Bratislava and various websites across East and Central Europe to rally support for Russia and its seizure of Crimea. His privately funded ventures, unlike Mr. Garbar’s operations, gave the Russian state plausible deniability but fizzled when money from Mr. Malofeev ran out.
In a survey released last year by Globesec, a Bratislava research group, more than half of those surveyed in Slovakia said they viewed Mr. Putin positively, compared with just 12 percent in neighboring Poland and 13 percent in Lithuania.
Newspapers for sale at a shop in Bratislava, Slovakia. Outlets friendly to Russia routinely portray it as a champion of peace and lodestar of Christian values, while casting NATO as a warmongering menace.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
If an unlikely enabler, Mr. Garber proved a valuable conduit who donated large sums of money to nationalist parties enamored with Moscow. One beneficiary was the ultranationalist politician Marian Kotleba, who was given a six-month suspended jail sentence this month and stripped of his seat in Parliament for using Nazi-themed symbols.
After winning election as a regional governor in 2013, Mr. Kotleba put up a banner outside his office: “Yankees go home! STOP NATO!”
Official records show that Mr. Garbar donated 10,000 euros to Mr. Kotleba’s xenophobic party ahead of parliamentary elections in 2016, making him its second biggest donor. Mr. Kotleba’s campaign slogans for that election included “For Slavic brotherhood, against a war with Russia!” In 2018, Mr. Garbar donated a further 4,500 euros to one of Mr. Kotleba’s pro-Russian partner parties.
Investigators have also examined Mr. Garbar’s work as an unpaid contributor and translator for Hlavne Spravy, or Main News. Slovak authorities shut down the website, which calls itself a “conservative daily,” in early March for unspecified “harmful activity,” shortly after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
It still operates, in a reduced form, on Facebook, which Victor Breiner, an adviser to the Slovak defense minister, described as “the main arena now for Kremlin propaganda.”
In the weeks before Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, Main News often echoed Kremlin talking points, mocking American warnings of a coming attack on Ukraine as “hysteria without end” and instead blaming NATO for rising tensions.
Robert Sopko, the founder and editor of Main News, which he runs from his apartment in Kosice, scorned the security service video — first published by a rival and liberal-leaning media outlet, Dennik N — as a “spy parody” and said he knew nothing of his unpaid helper’s paid work for Russian military intelligence. “We were all very surprised by it, everybody who knows him,” he said in an interview.
The apartment building of Robert Sopko, whose website Hlavne Spravy, or Main News, was shut down by the government in early March.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
Mr. Sopko said he set up Main News after attending an anti-abortion protest in 2012 that mainstream media outlets all ignored. Without alternative news sources, he decided, “our opinions, the Christian-conservative view, will be pushed out from the public space completely.” Russia, he added, “is more normal” than the liberal West.
He denied taking money himself from Russia other than what he said were payments of around 600 euros to cover the cost of ads that the Russian embassy had placed on his site.
Mr. Sopko contended that Main News was not overly pro-Russian, though he conceded that “maybe we rooted a little bit more for Russia” to counter what he called “American propaganda” published elsewhere. He also acknowledged that his staff had for four years included Yevgeny Palcev, a Russian resident of Slovakia with ties to state media in Moscow, who wrote fiercely pro-Kremlin articles for the website under a pseudonym.
They parted ways in 2018. “We liked Russia, but not like that. Not that much,” Mr. Sopko recalled.
He said he had known Mr. Garbar for thirty years and insisted that his old friend only wrote occasional articles about China. Officials say otherwise. “He was very much involved in writing about lots of things other than China” and spreading “classic Russia propaganda narratives,” said Mr. Nad, Slovakia’s defense minister.
Pedestrians under a bridge in Bratislava, Slovakia.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
Miroslava Sawiris, an expert on disinformation and adviser to the Slovak government’s Security Council, said the Main News website was “quite sophisticated and did not just spew nonsense.” She said “openly pro-Kremlin” stories accounted for only around 20 percent of the content but achieved unusual reach and influence because of the site’s popularity.
In recent years, as the far right surged in Europe, Main News became what Matej Kandrik, the director of the Strategic Policy Institute, a Slovak research group, described as “the hegemon” in the “media family of alternative news and conspiracy theories.”
It was particularly influential, for example, in stoking fierce opposition early this year to a proposed defense pact between Slovakia and the United States. The pact, which was finally approved by the Slovak Parliament shortly before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, “activated all the pro-Russian players” in a “massive anti-America reaction,” said Michal Trnka, the chief executive of Gerulata Technologies, a Bratislava company focused on data analysis.
Like many other Russia-friendly media outlets, Main News was thrown off balance by Mr. Putin’s onslaught against Ukraine and struggled for several days to explain it. Mr. Sopko said he and his staff had decided that Russia should be criticized just as “we criticized America’s imperialist wars,” but by then their site was shut down.
The city of Kosice, Slovakia, seen from the apartment stairway of Garbar Bohuslav, whose nephew was arrested for his contact with a Russian operative.Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times
In the video of his meeting with the Russian spy, Mr. Garbar explains that finding useful people to work for Moscow could be difficult because those who support Russia tend to be marginal types with no real influence or access to information.
“There are many people who are pro-Russian but they are irrelevant,” Mr. Garbar warned Mr. Solomasov, adding, “They’d give you nothing.”
Mr. Garbar’s uncle said he was mystified that his nephew, who was always fascinated by American culture, particularly heavy metal bands like Metallica, would ever get entangled with Russia. “This whole Russian thing is very strange. He must have gotten into some sort of environment where something happened,” he said.
Ms. Sawiris, the government expert on disinformation, said she did not know what had happened to Mr. Garbar, but worries that “there is no limit to the impact propaganda can have on the human mind, as we now see in Russia.” Since Russia invaded Ukraine, she added, “the curtain has fallen and lots of things have become obvious.”
Miroslava German Sirotnikova contributed reporting from Bratislava.
15. Calling all weapons makers: Pentagon seeks new ideas to arm Ukraine
Hopefully this will help generate new ideas that will not only help Ukraine but also create flexibility and the ability to better support US strategy and operations\ across the spectrum of conflict.
Calling all weapons makers: Pentagon seeks new ideas to arm Ukraine
WASHINGTON ― In its effort to quickly arm Ukraine against Russia, the Pentagon has announced the equivalent of an open casting call for companies to offer weapons and commercial systems that can be rushed to the fight.
The Defense Department on Friday posted a broad request for information from industry on the federal contracting website sam.gov. The move is part of a stepped-up dialogue between the Pentagon and industry, and a sign of the challenge of boosting arms production in response to the ongoing conflict.
The RFI, on behalf of the new undersecretary of defense for acquisitions and sustainment, Bill LaPlante, is seeking input “from across industry” about air defense, anti-armor, anti-personnel, coastal defense, counter battery, unmanned aerial systems, and communications equipment, such as secure radios and satellite internet gear.
To that end, the DoD asks that responding companies describe their weapon, product or system in 100 words or less, and ― in the case of munitions ― check off “appropriate target type(s),” such as area, fixed, airborne/missile, maritime, mine, moving, hard or soft. The RFI says information received will be used to develop requirements for an actual solicitation at a later date.
RFIs are a standard tool used ahead of contracting actions, but it’s one the Pentagon relies on in both routine situations and emergencies.
“The department routinely requests input from industry and commercial partners to conduct market research, learn more about their capabilities, and to shape future requirements,” DoD spokesperson Jessica Maxwell said in an email. “The Department issued similar requests to industry in the earlier stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The cutoff for submissions is May 6, and the DoD is evaluating proposals on a rolling basis. “The department is interested in learning about and discussing novel solutions, including from non-traditional weapons makers,” Maxwell said.
RELATED
As the Army sends off Stinger and Javelin missiles to Ukraine, the service begins the process of replacing its aging Stinger missiles for short-range air defense.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden announced another $800 million in military aid for Ukraine, and ― with total U.S. military aid topping $3.4 billion since Russia’s invasion Feb. 24 ― he plans to ask Congress for more authority next week. The White House also announced it added a new Ukraine aid coordinator.
Top DoD officials convened defense industry leaders at the Pentagon earlier this month to gauge their ability to ramp up arms production in response to the conflict. Firms are still grappling with pandemic-related supply chain and workforce woes, and the Pentagon is also facing questions about how to replenish stocks of U.S. and allied equipment being sent to Ukraine.
As the DoD has raided its stockpiles of Javelin anti-tank and Stinger anti-aircraft missiles as well as Switchblade drones, it’s also recently announced novel aid like an unmanned surface vessel, which the Pentagon has declined to describe in detail, and the Phoenix Ghost, a new drone developed by the Air Force.
The RFI lays out the department’s goal to “accelerate production and build more capacity across the industrial base for weapons and equipment that can be rapidly exported, deployed with minimal training, and that are proven effective in the battlefield.”
Companies must check off whether their system can be delivered in 30 days or less, 31-90 days, 90-180 days, or more than 180 days. If it’s in production, the DoD wants to know the maximum production rate per month and what other systems could be impacted by a production increase. If it’s not in production, the department wants to know what’s needed to begin production.
The U.S. military, which has trained Ukrainian forces on Switchblade drones and howitzers, also wants to know what training each system requires and whether the responding country has training facilities in Central/Eastern Europe.
Joe Gould is senior Pentagon reporter for Defense News, covering the intersection of national security policy, politics and the defense industry.
16. The next National Defense Strategy is coming. These seven points are key to understanding it.
Interesting questions and commentary. I will say it is difficult to make a thorough assessment of the NDS from a page and a half unclassified fact sheet. But it is important that we discuss the merits of what we know.
As I have written based on the fact sheet there is a lot to work with even if it does not directly address some of my pet agenda items (e.g., irregular, unconventional, and political warfare). I like the concepts of integrated deterrence (though I would include not only the integration of all elements of power as well as allies, but also nuclear, conventional and unconventional deterrence). I especially like the emphasis on campaigning and the importance of allies.
The real test of the strategy is on implementation. As a former planner, from what I have seen so far I could easily work with this. It has sufficient "meat" but without over prescribing a strategy.
The next National Defense Strategy is coming. These seven points are key to understanding it.
Join Forward Defense for leading-edge commentary and key recommendations as we help chart the course for the United States’ next National Defense Strategy.
After a lengthy build-up—then delays prompted by Russia’s war in Ukraine—the public release of the next National Defense Strategy (NDS) is finally upon us. And although the full reveal is expected in the next few weeks, we have already received a glimpse at the contours of the document that will guide the Pentagon’s policy making over the coming years.
Last month, the US Department of Defense (DoD) announced that it had sent the classified version of the NDS to Congress—along with the classified Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) and Missile Defense Review (MDR)—and released a two-page fact sheet providing the major elements of the strategy.
As we await the unclassified summaries of each document, the DoD’s press releases answered some critical questions about these strategies while igniting others. Experts from the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security tackled the seven most pressing questions about the forthcoming documents.
1. The new NDS appears to have reprioritized the threats facing the United States to a “1+1+3” construct —with China described as the “most consequential strategic competitor,” followed by “acute threats” from Russia, and then “persistent threats, including those from North Korea, Iran, and violent extremist organizations.” What does this prioritization of threats mean, and what do you think the implications are for the rest of the document?
This “1+1+3” construct seems roughly right to me, but the devil is in the details.
First, we should be modest about our intelligence in the US national security establishment and not have false confidence about which threats might manifest in which ways by specific actors. We are very good at being surprised on a frequent basis.
That said, top threats to US national security must be clarified so that planning and budget development can proceed. The 2022 NDS’s prioritization between great-power threats and other challenges, such as Iran, should be stark enough that DoD decision makers leave the table feeling uncomfortable about taking risks in other areas in order to ensure that policies and posture focused on the two great powers are sufficient. This very clear Tier One pair of threats should have enterprise-wide implications for DoD, ranging from global military posture (for example, the US Army should prioritize Europe) to defense programs, research and development (R&D) priorities, and infrastructure.
Third, how Russia is perceived in DoD must absolutely change going forward. The culture over the past twenty years has been to treat Russia as “pesky” but not nearly the same nature and level of structural challenge as the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. Strangely, despite the ongoing war in Ukraine, this perception does not yet appear to have changed. Despite Russia’s relative weakness compared to China’s unfolding upward geopolitical trajectory, it almost certainly will remain a significant military threat to the United States and Europe for decades, even after Russian President Vladimir Putin leaves the stage. It is a threat that must be managed, as it cannot be “solved.”
Finally, how can DoD handle the worst-case scenario—a nearly simultaneous threat of war posed by China and Russia (whose cooperation “has no limits” according to their leaders’ February joint statement)? The answer has three parts:
- Strategy-driven US capability and R&D investments to prepare the force of the late 2020s to strengthen deterrence against China and Russia, including heavy investments in artificial intelligence, hypersonic weapons, non-kinetic missile defenses, unmanned or uncrewed systems, and other advanced capabilities.
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Intensive diplomacy with the United States’ closest allies toward a new and much clearer set of defined roles in both Europe and the Indo-Pacific, with radically closer cooperation and significantly increased allied defense spending at the heart of a revamped, US-led “latticed” alliance network of democratic countries.
- Increased reliance on US strategic forces for extended deterrence. China is undertaking a full-throttle nuclear force buildup, and Russia already modernized its strategic capabilities and rattled the nuclear saber in the Ukraine war (it certainly will do so again in the future). In the Cold War, the United States leveraged strategic forces for deterrence against attack by a much larger Russian conventional force. Now, as the United States and its allies face a much larger aggregated military threat posed by Russia and China, strategic forces should be postured to do so again.
—Barry Pavel, senior vice president and director of the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security at the Atlantic Council, and former special assistant to the president and senior director for defense policy and strategy on the National Security Council staff.
2. The forthcoming NDS calls out the “growing kinetic and non-kinetic threats to the United States’ homeland from our strategic competitors” and vows to “take necessary actions to increase resilience.” What are these threats, and how can the United States increase its resilience to them?
The United States needs to recognize several categories of increasing non-military threats: cybersecurity and cyber crime; threats to critical infrastructure from climate change and hostile foreign actors; foreign nation states carrying out mis-, dis-, and mal-information operations; pandemic disease; and efforts to sow divisions among the American people. The primary targets of these threats are not the US military—but rather American people and civilian infrastructure. DoD will need to protect the military from these threats and stay ahead of major strategic shifts caused by Russia, China, Iran, and climate change. However, for many of these non-military threats, DoD needs to play a vital supporting role to civilian security efforts. One of DoD’s most important contributions should be a call for more resources and support to civilian security efforts. Then General James Mattis famously said in 2013 that under-funding the State Department forces DoD to buy more bullets. Under-investment in diplomacy and development means that the military must do more to make up the shortfall. The same can also be said today about the strategic dangers of under-investing in civilian security. The US military is a powerful instrument of national power—but against many of today’s hybrid threats, investing in civilian security is far more cost-effective and better defends the American people and infrastructure from its adversaries.
—Thomas S. Warrick, senior fellow at the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security and a former senior official at the Department of State and deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism policy at the Department of Homeland Security.
3. Like the 2018 NDS, the forthcoming strategy recognizes the “critical” importance of “mutually-beneficial Alliances and partnerships.” According to DoD, the NDS will “incorporate ally and partner perspectives, competencies, and advantages at every stage of defense planning.” How can DoD more meaningfully integrate allies and partners into defense planning and ensure this NDS is more successful than the last one in providing actionable tasks to improve integration?
The importance of working with allies and partners has long been a feature of US National Defense Strategies, and rightly so. Previous strategies, however, have fallen short on providing specific and actionable guidance on how to integrate allies’ and partners’ threat assessments and capabilities into US defense plans. What stands out to me is the fact sheet’s reference to “incorporat[ing]” allies and partners at “every stage of defense planning” (emphasis mine), indicating a potential shift in approach from integrating allies into existing US plans to more collaborative defense planning with allies. Without the details, it is unclear precisely the mechanisms and in what capacity allies’ and partners’ “perspectives, competencies, and advantages” will be integrated, but the Biden aadministration appears to have heeded early lessons from Russia’s war in Ukraine about the importance of advanced allied defense planning and interoperability.
The details matter, but involving allies at every stage and much earlier in the defense planning process would be an important step in the right direction. Currently, the United States does not incorporate allies into its defense planning process early, often, or comprehensively. The fact sheet indicates that DoD may be moving toward this. It should concentrate on aligning existing national defense plans earlier and more often, as well as jointly creating plans from the get-go instead of trying to absorb allies into pre-determined US plans later on. While challenges regarding information sharing abound, some US processes are needlessly restrictive and hamper integration with allies. Meaningful efforts to overcome these barriers and move toward combined defense planning, including aligning threat assessments, capability development plans, and force arrangements and posture—especially in regions like Europe and the Indo-Pacific where allies will play an active role in deterrence and warfighting—would put the United States in a better position to balance its many global security objectives.
Allies are often looking for clearer guidance from the United States for their defense planning purposes. If DoD is serious about building a robust deterrence and defense architecture with allies and partners, the full document must provide clear implementation guidance for allied integration in warfighting concept development, operational planning, and tactics and doctrine development, revision, and training.
—Clementine Starling, resident fellow and deputy director of Forward Defense at the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.
4. According to the NDS press release, one of the primary “ways” DoD will accomplish its goals is through “integrated deterrence.” How can DoD implement this broader joint, “whole-of-government,” and “whole-of-alliances and partnerships” deterrence against Washington’s strategic competitors?
Upon its introduction by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and key members of DoD senior leadership, “integrated deterrence” clearly had become central to the next NDS. While the concept is not yet fully developed (at least not publicly), the NDS fact sheet confirmed that it is designed to expand the responsibility for deterring adversaries beyond the Department of Defense. The fact sheet also represents a departure from the 2018 NDS in that deterrence is no longer only an “objective,” but also a “way” of implementing the strategy—implying that the department will actively rethink and calibrate its deterrent posture.
Integrated deterrence is likely a response to the multifaceted security landscape. In an environment defined by “strategic simultaneity” among numerous threats, the United States’ longstanding reliance on nuclear weapons, while essential, will not be sufficient to credibly deter every form of adversary aggression, which may range from information operations to economic competition, and from conventional military invasion to nuclear coercion. Other military, non-military, and allied and partner tools will be necessary. However, the National Security Council is already designed to integrate instruments of national power and ensure coordination among other agencies, so it is not entirely clear how integrated deterrence will be markedly different from existing approaches to US statecraft or whether the Pentagon’s role in that process will change.
If integrated deterrence is to have a meaningful impact, policymakers should take the following steps:
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Robustly integrate nonnuclear strategic forces. Emerging technologies like hypersonic weapons, advanced missile defenses, and cyber tools may undermine the existing legs of the nuclear triad. Policymakers should rethink the balance of strategic forces necessary to deter major attacks in the future, including by eventually replacing the Nuclear Posture Review and Missile Defense Review with a more comprehensive Strategic Posture Review that explores how nuclear and conventional forces can complement each other.
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Clearly coordinate deterrence objectives and responsibilities across agencies. As demonstrated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, sanctions and other non-military tools can often be insufficient to deter military action, though they can be helpful in compelling changes in adversary behavior or deterring hybrid actions. The Biden administration should establish a mechanism for determining which adversary behaviors are consequential enough to be deterred by force (i.e., under the remit of the Department of Defense) and which outcomes can be credibly deterred through non-military means (i.e., under the remit of other agencies).
- Integrate allies comprehensively into defense planning. Many of the fait accompli attacks that concern defense planners would first be felt by US allies and partners. It is critical to work closely with them to determine how they can best blunt adversary attacks and buy time for US and other allied support, among other operational imperatives.
—Christian Trotti, assistant director of Forward Defense at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.
5. Another of the NDS’s “ways” is “campaigning.” According to DoD, this concept will address the “full range of competitors’ coercive actions,” seeming to indicate campaigning will occur across the continuum of competition and conflict. In what ways can and should DoD improve its day-to-day campaigning? In what areas must DoD invest, develop doctrine and tactics, and train to improve competitive efforts?
The 2018 NDS reoriented DoD toward great-power competition, now known as “strategic competition.” But that document failed to provide guidance on how to compete. The press release for the 2022 NDS indicates that this strategy will use “campaigning” as the way DoD competes with China and Russia. This campaigning must occur across the competition continuum, which DoD defines as “enduring competition conducted through a mixture of cooperation, competition below armed conflict, and armed conflict,” including in the so-called “gray zone” (where malign activities have proven unlikely to elicit a response from the United States). Cyberattacks, mis- and disinformation campaigns, and fait accompli actions such as the Chinese construction and militarization of rocks and shoals in the South China Sea are examples of competitors’ gray-zone activities. DoD must become comfortable operating in the gray zone and countering adversary mis- and disinformation campaigns with facts (as had been demonstrated by the declassification and release of intelligence during the build-up to the war in Ukraine).
Additionally, the United States must be willing to counter cyberattacks and fait accompli tactics with a range of options designed to not only halt competitors’ momentum, but also create offensive momentum for the United States and its closest allies and partners. DoD must create units tasked with conducting offensive and defensive operations in the gray zone, using information as a weapon while conforming to US laws and norms. It must also develop doctrine and tactics for these types of operations and integrate these efforts into greater competition campaigns.
Finally, DoD should recognize that the military is just one instrument the United States can wield in the gray zone; all instruments of national power must be used to counter great-power competitors. The next NDS appears to embrace this whole-of-government approach, and according to the press release, DoD will indeed “operate forces, synchronize broader Department efforts, and align Department activities with other instruments of national power.”
— Lt. Col. Tyson Wetzel, senior US Air Force fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security. The positions expressed by Lieutenant Colonel Wetzel do not reflect the official position of the United States Air Force or Department of Defense.
6. In addition to its fact sheet for the NDS, the DOD also released a fact sheet on the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) and Missile Defense Review (MDR), with the goal of “conduct[ing] its strategic reviews in a fully integrated way.” What are the main takeaways of these, and how do they align with the NDS? Will they have any noticeable positive effect in creating a coherent deterrence strategy?
Let’s start with what’s missing. Despite the much vaunted “integration” of the NDS, NPR, and MPR, the fact sheets do not offer much indication as to how the administration actually intends to (more closely) integrate nuclear weapons into overall strategic deterrence. If anything, the decision to adopt a “fundamental role” declaratory policy dis-integrates nuclear weapons from overall deterrence by reducing their prominence in deterring other kinds of major attacks. Whereas the United States previously expressed a willingness to use nuclear weapons in response to non-nuclear strategic attacks (such as ones on US early warning satellites, or an overwhelming conventional attack against a US ally), now those options are left more ambiguous. At the risk of criticizing style over substance, even the decision not to integrate the three fact sheets into one document highlights this disconnect.
The Biden administration faced many major unresolved nuclear policy debates, but the NPR fact sheet primarily addresses one: its decision on declaratory policy, which expressed how the United States sees the purpose of nuclear weapons. The Biden administration will adopt the “fundamental role” language used in the Obama administration’s 2010 NPR. This language will displease proponents of the Trump administration’s 2018 NPR, which laid out a broader view of the purpose of US nuclear weapons. It also could disappoint those on the left: Many progressive nuclear experts hoped that the Biden administration would go further to curtail the purpose of nuclear weapons and the circumstances under which they could be used (they see this ambiguity as dangerous).
Lastly, the NPR fact sheet makes no mention of capabilities, but the Biden administration’s budget proposal tells a different story. The administration requested no additional funding for the SLCM-N, the low-yield nuclear sea-launched cruise missile. The SLCM-N was proposed in the 2018 NPR by the Trump administration as a way to counter Russia’s possible threats to use low-yield nuclear weapons to end a conflict early (and on terms favorable to Russia). Its absence from the Biden administration’s budget suggests that the administration is trying to find a way to keep Biden’s campaign promise of reducing the role of nuclear weapons. Congress, however, still has the capability to restore funding to the project, so the debate on the SLCM-N likely isn’t over.
—Mark J. Massa, assistant director in the Forward Defense practice of the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security at the Atlantic Council and Alyxandra Marine, program assistant in the Forward Defense practice.
7. On the same day DoD transmitted the NDS, NPR, and MDR to Congress, it also released the president’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 budget request. Will the requested $773 billion budget (which would be a 4.1 percent increase) allow DoD to meet the goals and objectives established in its strategy documents?
The proposed DoD topline of $773 billion, plus atomic energy defense and other defense-related activities, comes to a total National Defense Budget proposal of $813.3 billion—only $17.2 billion more than the combined total defense spending in FY2022. Adjusted for current inflation levels, this 2 percent increase means actual defense spending is declining by 6.5 percent. Unfortunately, inflation will likely continue to increase in FY2023, further eroding defense buying power. If the United States is serious about meeting the challenge laid out in the NDS, it cannot afford significant reductions in defense spending.
There is strong bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for increased defense spending to account for inflation. In fact, Congress gave the Pentagon $40 billion more than it asked for in FY2022. The United States should seriously consider the recent proposal by Sen. James M. Inhofe, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, to fund defense spending at inflation plus 5 percent for FY2023 to counter inflationary pressure and maintain the US advantage over its adversaries. If that proposal is adopted and inflation stays at 8.5 percent, total defense spending would climb to more than $900 billion.
— Col. John “Buss” Barranco, senior US Marine Corps fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security. The positions expressed by Colonel Barranco do not reflect the official position of the United States Marine Corps or Department of Defense.
Further reading
Fri, Apr 15, 2022
New Atlanticist By Atlantic Council
As both countries inch toward formally joining the Alliance, we answer six burning questions about what the future holds.
Tue, Mar 8, 2022
A strategic risk calculator for policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic to assess the possible risks and benefits of boosting their military assistance to the Ukrainian government.
Fri, Apr 2, 2021
To better serve US interests, the Biden administration should recalculate the DoD’s GPC framework to address the threats that the country is most likely to confront, while improving the United States’ preparedness for the most dangerous threats. It should replace the single “2+3” concept with three multilayered and interactive frameworks nested upon one another.
Image: US Army paratroopers assigned to the 173rd Airborne Brigade practice acquiring a target with a FIM-92 Stinger during an air defense live-fire exercise alongside soldiers with the Croatian Air Defense Regiment. This training is part of Exercise Shield 22 at Kamenjak near Medulin, Croatia on April 9, 2022. Photo by US Army/Cover Images via Reuters.
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17. Spy agency utilizes autistic analysts' unique skills
The right people, with the right talent and skills, to do the right things to support US national security.
Spy agency utilizes autistic analysts' unique skills
Martinsburg, West Virginia — As the war in Ukraine unfolds, intelligence officials rely on satellite images to map the movements of Russian forces and on analysts in a field where seeing the world differently has its advantages.
"It really feels like, for the first time, I'm getting to use the strengths that I have," said Morgan McCardell, a geospatial analyst at the U.S. government's mapping agency, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. "I'm pretty good at finding patterns."
Zeroing in on tiny details, like a Russian military base near Alaska, McCardell sees the big picture in big data sets.
click to expand
"I'm pretty good at finding patterns," she told CBS News senior investigative correspondent Catherine Herridge.
In school, McCardell struggled for years, not quite fitting in, before landing a position so secret she can't discuss her portfolio. McCardell's mother saw her potential early on.
"She could read the billboards backwards," Debra Young told Herridge. "She would do it perfectly."
But it wasn't until McCardell's 10-year-old son, Gabriel, was diagnosed with autism that she began to notice her differences.
"My mom, she at first was like, 'Well, your son can't have autism. He's just like you,'" McCardell said.
Young said she was surprised to find out her daughter was also autistic "because she's so high-functioning."
Childhood autism diagnoses have more than doubled since 2000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly half of 25 year olds with autism have never held a paying job, according to Autism Speaks. Now, more families are reaching out to the intelligence community to learn more.
Without good options to support her son, McCardell joined a year-old pilot program at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, also known as the NGA. She said the job has "changed everything" about her life.
"I mean, I was on disability for almost 10 years," she said.
At the NGA, McCardell's difference actually gives her an edge.
"Sometimes I can do what it would take somebody a week to do in a couple of hours," she said. "That's the advantage to being able to hyper-focus."
It's a new kind of insight that the agency's deputy director calls "neurodiversity."
"This is really broadening that perspective, digging into how can individuals bring a talent and ability that is different than others," Tonya Wilkerson told Herridge.
McCardell said she now feels like she can achieve anything.
"It's a lot like finding where I fit in, finally. I was looking for an outlet, and it found me," she said. "Really the sky's the limit now. I don't feel like there's anything holding me back."
18. Russia Tried to Hold Ukraine’s Internet Hostage, Then SpaceX Stepped In
Again, "whole of society?" Pretty amazing that a civilian company could "defeat" the Russiasn in operations in the information environment. Speed, agility, and flexibility (and for Ukraine - commercial off the shelf solutions!)
Russia Tried to Hold Ukraine’s Internet Hostage, Then SpaceX Stepped In
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SpaceX’s successful intervention in Ukrainian satellite signal-jamming is a model for the Pentagon, officials say.
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Russian electronic jamming affected Starlink satellite internet receivers sent to Ukraine.
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SpaceX quickly issued a fix for the jam, something the Pentagon says current rules won’t allow the public sector to do.
The U.S. Department of Defense is casting envious eyes on Elon Musk’s SpaceX after the aerospace company swiftly responded to an “electronic warfare attack” in Ukraine last month. SpaceX donated Starlink terminals to Ukraine to help the country stay connected in wartime, but Russian signal-jamming attempted to thwart those plans. The notoriously bureaucratic Pentagon says it’s a model for responding to threats that it can’t currently match—but desperately needs to.
Back in February, Ukraine’s government appealed to SpaceX for a shipment of Starlink satellite internet terminals. The terminals supplemented Ukraine’s prewar internet infrastructure, which has seen reduced service due to damage from the war and Russian hacking. Starlink quickly shipped 5,000 terminals to Ukraine, with 3,667 donated by SpaceX and the remaining 1,333 purchased by the U.S. Agency for International Development. The first shipment of terminals arrived just two days after the appeal.
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SpaceX reprioritized to cyber defense & overcoming signal jamming.
Will cause slight delays in Starship & Starlink V2.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 5, 2022
According to SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk, some Starlink terminals near the front line in Ukraine were experiencing jamming, presumably from Russian military electronic warfare units. Musk later tweeted that the company quickly “reprioritized to cyber defense & overcoming signal jamming,” and issued a fix within a day, broadcast to all Starlink terminals. The fix reportedly involved changing a single line of software code.
A one-day turnaround for software fixes is par for the course for commercial businesses, especially startups, but not for the government. Dave Tremper, director of electronic warfare for the Office of the Secretary of Defense, told attendees at an industry conference that SpaceX’s handling of Russian jamming in Ukraine was “eye-watering.”
SpaceX Starlink internet terminal installed in Odesa, southern Ukraine, March 2022.
Nina Lyashonok/ Ukrinform/Future PublishingGetty Images
Tremper described the Pentagon’s system for implementing a similar jamming fix as involving a “‘significant timeline to make those types of corrections’ as it muddles through analyses of what happened, decides how to fix it, and gets a contract in place for the fix,” according to C4ISRNET.
Laying aside the depressing thought that the U.S. government couldn’t change a single line of code in 24 hours for important software, at least the Pentagon is honest that it must become more responsive. This is one of those situations where the commercial industry can show the Pentagon how to keep pace with threats under rapidly-changing circumstances.
Writer on Defense and Security issues, lives in San Francisco.
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19. Pro-CCP inauthentic social media accounts shift focus to the Quad
Spamouflage.
Excerpts:
This emerging reiteration of the Spamouflage network has only recently started replenishing with newly created accounts and content, so the impact of the campaign has been low. Most tweets have received at most two interactions and most accounts have fewer than 10 followers. These types of networks, however, can quickly scale up to tens of thousands of accounts and persist on US-based social media platforms for years before being retweeted or amplified by an influential opinion leader or government official. It took Russia’s Internet Research Agency at least two years to prepare before it interfered in the 2016 US election.
Twitter has previously attributed these networks to the Chinese government, which makes them useful for gaining insights into the CCP’s broader political and psychological warfare strategies.
Overall, the campaign indicates that the CCP is concerned about the strengthening alignment between countries in Europe, NATO, Asia and the Indo-Pacific following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Eroding alliances such as the Quad, AUKUS, ANZUS and NATO will remain the CCP’s main strategic goal.
It also demonstrates that the network is highly agile and can switch quickly from targeting Chinese diaspora and disseminating propaganda to engaging in military-related information operations and interference in foreign force posturing. Aspects of this campaign sought to shape local domestic Japanese sentiment through intimidation, which is more akin to psychological warfare than propaganda.
Pro-CCP inauthentic social media accounts shift focus to the Quad | The Strategist
A subset of a pro–Chinese Communist Party network, known for disseminating disinformation on US-based social media platforms, is breaking away from its usual narratives in order to interfere in the Quad partnership of Australia, India, Japan and the United States and oppose Japanese plans to deploy missile units in southern Okinawa Prefecture.
‘Osborn Roland’ joined Twitter in August 2021 and claims to be concerned about the military deployments in Okinawa. A Facebook account named ‘Vivi Wu’—who apparently speaks German, Spanish, French, English and Chinese—says that the Japanese ‘are treated as dogs by the United States’. Korean-named ‘Hag Yoenghui’, who has an Arabic profile description, tweeted: ‘We in Australia originally supported the United States to fight against China, and the relationship with China was extremely tense … Why does our government help the United States to deal with China?’
So far, ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre researchers have uncovered 80 accounts—and counting—across Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and YouTube that since December have posted in multiple languages opposing Japan’s military activities and the Quad. The timelines of these accounts show they previously posted content consistent with the pro-CCP Spamouflage network, which typically targets topics relevant to Chinese diaspora communities and amplifies narratives that align with the CCP’s geopolitical goals.
Like with previous campaigns, this network is poorly operated. Errors in hashtags, incomplete URLs to Chinese state media articles and evidence of instructions posted in a tweet are clear indications of coordination and possible automation. One Twitter account named ‘Catherine’ posted a screenshot of their working environment while sharing a Facebook post from ‘Vivi Wu’. The image revealed that the operator of this account saved bookmarks to an ‘offshore navigation and internet access’ (境外导航 –上网从) website and two Canadian Chinese news websites, ‘Anpopo Chinese News’ (安婆婆华人网) and ‘Fenghua Media’ (枫华网), and was closely monitoring Chinese virologist Yan Limeng’s multiple Twitter accounts.
In August last year, Defence Minister Nobuo Kishi confirmed that Japan was emplacing anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles on Ishigaki Island to defend Japan’s contested southwestern islands and counter Chinese anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities that could prevent the US from intervening in a regional conflict. This followed a broader shift in Japanese foreign policy in 2021 which described China’s military assertiveness as a ‘strong concern’ and provoked Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to suggest Japan was being ‘misled by some countries holding biased view against China’.
In response to these announcements, the network of pro-CCP accounts leveraged local concerns about the environment and the tourism industry in Ishigaki to try to prevent the missile emplacement and suggested Japan ‘was acting as a pawn for the United States’ in an attempt to undermine the bilateral relationship. This included posting photos of atomic bomb mushroom clouds over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Other accounts in the network posed as citizens in Australia, India, Japan and the US to criticise the Quad diplomatic partnership by spruiking their economic relationships with China. These covert efforts coincided with a Chinese state media article posted in December arguing that Japanese politicians are ‘attempting to interfere in the Taiwan Straits’ and the ‘international community should be highly vigilant about Japanese right-wing forces’ mentality of playing with fire’.
Some accounts amplified Change.org petitions created in 2019 that sought to stop the construction of missile bases on Ishigaki. By this month, the English-language petition had 312 signatures while the Japanese-language version had more than 6,000. Based on our analysis of previous CCP information operations, we expect pro-CCP accounts in this network to co-opt other similar local petitions and protests. One account has already amplified reporting of a December protest over the use of private ports in Ishigaki by the Japan Self-Defense Forces.
This emerging reiteration of the Spamouflage network has only recently started replenishing with newly created accounts and content, so the impact of the campaign has been low. Most tweets have received at most two interactions and most accounts have fewer than 10 followers. These types of networks, however, can quickly scale up to tens of thousands of accounts and persist on US-based social media platforms for years before being retweeted or amplified by an influential opinion leader or government official. It took Russia’s Internet Research Agency at least two years to prepare before it interfered in the 2016 US election.
Twitter has previously attributed these networks to the Chinese government, which makes them useful for gaining insights into the CCP’s broader political and psychological warfare strategies.
Overall, the campaign indicates that the CCP is concerned about the strengthening alignment between countries in Europe, NATO, Asia and the Indo-Pacific following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Eroding alliances such as the Quad, AUKUS, ANZUS and NATO will remain the CCP’s main strategic goal.
It also demonstrates that the network is highly agile and can switch quickly from targeting Chinese diaspora and disseminating propaganda to engaging in military-related information operations and interference in foreign force posturing. Aspects of this campaign sought to shape local domestic Japanese sentiment through intimidation, which is more akin to psychological warfare than propaganda.
20. ‘Voice of April’: Chinese netizens get creative to keep censored film on social media
Cyber resistance.
‘Voice of April’: Chinese netizens get creative to keep censored film on social media
Rare show of political defiance came shortly after further strengthening of Shanghai’s Covid lockdown
A virtual protest has taken place on China’s heavily monitored social media platforms, where netizens took turns to keep a censored video called the Voice of April alive and overwhelm censors.
The six-minute short documentary is a collage of audio snippets of government official announcements, as well as residents’ descriptions of their sufferings during Shanghai’s strict lockdowns in the last three weeks. The video showed the city’s skyline presented without commentary and was mostly in black and white. The ending card of the video read: “Get better soon, Shanghai.”
April is the cruelest month. 四月之声: voices of frustrations, outcries, lies, moments of truth, and love, and despair.
Crying as I’m watching this.
— Ting (@tingguowrites) April 22, 2022
The video was quickly taken down from China’s internet, but it continued to spread on WeChat on Friday. Users found creative ways to circulate the video by embedding a QR code in a film poster, or directing others to cloud services to download it.
A screen grab from the Voice of April film that criticises lockdown life in Shanghai Photograph: Internet
In the past few days, creative netizens have produced numerous content to express their frustration. Some mixed the British band Slaves’ 2015 single Cheer Up London with a few defining images of the last three weeks of lockdown in Shanghai. Others changed the script of American comedy duo Key & Peele’s A Man Who Enjoys a Continental Breakfast and dubbed it in Shanghainese dialect, to imagine what it would look like when a Shanghai man was finally allowed to enjoy a nice breakfast after the lockdown was lifted.
The rare show of defiance on Friday night came shortly after the authorities announced further strengthening of the lockdown in China’s most populous city – home to 25 million people and a key financial hub in mainland China. Despite the criticism, Shanghai is doubling down on its “dynamic clearance” to eradicate the spread of the virus, neighbourhood by neighbourhood.
It is unclear how widespread such a movement has become on Chinese internet and beyond Shanghai, but analysts said Friday’s eruption of dissenting creativity is reminiscent of a similar episode in the early days of the Wuhan lockdown. In early March 2020, Chinese netizens used creative ways to keep a censored magazine profile of a Wuhan medical professional, Dr Ai Fen, circulating.
“After weeks of draconian lockdown, there’s a sense of deep frustration and discontentment for residents of Shanghai, but also a sense of solidarity for those who were not in the middle of it,” said Dali Yang, a political scientist at the University of Chicago. “I am surprised that many who were reposting the video and other materials did not see the act as political.”
He continued: “For the authorities, this collective action and the implied criticism of the lockdown, sends a potent message they’re working hard to censor. Our understanding of this act also needs to be considered with the localised acts of defiance and protest, in the beating of cooking utensils and the noncompliance with nucleic acid testing orders.”
Hu Xijin, the former editor of nationalist tabloid the Global Times weighed in late on Friday night to justify the erasure of the video. He said the internet was invented by the west, so when it entered China it ought to be “sinofied”. He urged citizens to trust the government and remain confident in China’s resilience.
Grocery hall vlog shines a light on price gouging in locked-down Shanghai – video
The phrase, The Voice of April, has now been taken down on Weibo. But some Chinese netizens are posting images with quotes to indirectly express their dissatisfaction.
In one entry, Jin Xing, one of Shanghai’s best-known TV talkshow hosts, posted a photo of Mao Zedong with the quote: “People in China and around the world, even our enemies, will use the performance of our work in Shanghai to examine whether our party has the ability to manage a big city and the whole country.”
At times, the subtle show of defiance was poetic. One user commented, in response to the censoring of Voice of April, with a poem from TS Eliot’s The Waste Land:
“April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain”
But as censors rushed to take down explicitly critical content, users began to post materials that on the surface did not seem as controversial. For example, on WeChat, some have used a clip from one of China’s foreign ministry spokespeople, in which she said Chinese citizens have the right to free speech and freedom of thought.
Others quoted the phrase from China’s zero-Covid policy to describe the cat-and-mouse game with the censors. “This is called ‘dynamic clearance’,” they wrote.
21. Hackers Claim to Target Russian Institutions in Barrage of Cyberattacks and Leaks
Excerpts:
U.S. officials have repeatedly warned American companies that Russia could carry out similar attacks against them and have urged them to harden their cyberdefenses. The governments of Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand have issued similar warnings.
In early April, the Justice Department and the F.B.I. announced that they had acted in secret to pre-empt a Russian cyberattack by removing malware from computer networks around the world. The move was part of an effort by the Biden administration to put pressure on Russia and discourage it from launching cyberattacks in the United States. Last month, the Justice Department charged four Russian officials with carrying out a series of cyberattacks against critical infrastructure in the United States.
But so far, the Russian activity directed at the West has been relatively modest, as Chris Inglis, the national cyber director for the Biden administration, acknowledged on Wednesday at an event hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations.
“It’s the question of the moment — why, given that we had expectations that the Russian playbook, having relied so heavily on disinformation, cyber, married with all other instruments of power, why haven’t we seen a very significant play of cyber, at least against NATO and the United States, in this instance?” he asked.
He speculated that the Russians thought they were headed to quick victory in February, and when the war effort ran into obstacles, “they were distracted,” he said. “They were busy.”
Hackers Claim to Target Russian Institutions in Barrage of Cyberattacks and Leaks
April 22, 2022
April 22, 2022
April 22, 2022, 2:46 p.m. ET
Red Square outside the Kremlin in Moscow. The Ukrainian government appears to have begun a parallel effort to punish Russia by publishing the names of Russian soldiers and agents of the F.S.B., a major Russian intelligence agency.Credit...Maxim Shipenkov/EPA, via Shutterstock
Hackers claim to have broken into dozens of Russian institutions over the past two months, including the Kremlin’s internet censor and one of its primary intelligence services, leaking emails and internal documents to the public in an apparent hack-and-leak campaign that is remarkable in its scope.
The hacking operation comes as the Ukrainian government appears to have begun a parallel effort to punish Russia by publishing the names of supposed Russian soldiers who operated in Bucha, the site of a massacre of civilians, and agents of the F.S.B., a major Russian intelligence agency, along with identifying information like dates of birth and passport numbers. It is unclear how the Ukrainian government obtained those names or whether they were part of the hacks.
Much of the data released by the hackers and the Ukrainian government is by its nature impossible to verify. As an intelligence agency, the F.S.B. would never confirm a list of its officers. Even the groups distributing the data have warned that the files swiped from Russian institutions could contain malware, manipulated or faked information, and other tripwires.
Some of the data may also be recycled from previous leaks and presented as new, researchers have said, in an attempt to artificially increase the hackers’ credibility. Or some of it could be manufactured — something that has happened before in the ongoing cyberconflict between Russia and Ukraine, which dates back more than a decade.
But the hacking effort appears to be part of a campaign by those opposing the Kremlin to help in the war effort by making it extremely difficult for Russian spies to operate abroad and by planting a seed of fear in the minds of soldiers that they could be held to account for human rights abuses.
Dmitri Alperovitch, a founder of the Silverado Policy Accelerator, a Washington think tank, and the former chief technology officer at the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, said there was reason to maintain a healthy skepticism about the reliability of some of the leaks.
But he added that the hacking campaign “once again may prove that in the age of pervasive cyberintrusions and the generation of vast amounts of digital exhaust by nearly every person in a connected society, no one is able to hide and avoid identification for egregious war crimes for long.”
The leaks also demonstrate Ukraine’s willingness to join forces with amateur hackers in its cyberwar against Russia. In early March, Ukrainian officials rallied volunteers for hacking projects, and the Ukrainian government has been publishing information about its opponents on official websites. A channel on the messaging platform Telegram that lists targets for the volunteers to hack has grown to more than 288,000 members.
American intelligence officials say they believe that hackers operating in Russia and Eastern Europe have now been split into at least two camps. Some, like Conti, a major ransomware group that was itself hacked in late February, have pledged fealty to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Others, mostly from Eastern Europe, have been offended by the Russian invasion, and particularly the killings of civilians, and have sided with the government of President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.
Some of the online combatants have shifted away from tactics used earlier in the conflict. In the first phase of the war, Ukrainian hackers focused on attacks intended to knock Russian websites offline. Russian hackers targeted Ukrainian government websites in January, ahead of the invasion, installing “wiper” malware that permanently clears data from computer networks. More recently, Russian hackers appear to have mounted attacks that could have turned off electricity or shut down military communications. (Several of those efforts were foiled, American officials say.)
But the disclosure of personal data is more akin to information warfare than cyberwarfare. It has echoes of Russia’s tactics in 2016, when hackers backed by a Russian intelligence agency stole and leaked data from the Democratic National Committee and from individuals working on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Such hacks are intended to embarrass and to influence political outcomes, rather than to destroy equipment or infrastructure.
Experts have warned that the involvement of amateur hackers in the conflict in Ukraine could lead to confusion and incite more state-backed hacking, as governments seek to defend themselves and strike back against their attackers.
“Some cybercrime groups have recently publicly pledged support for the Russian government,” the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency warned in an advisory on Wednesday. “These Russian-aligned cybercrime groups have threatened to conduct cyberoperations in retaliation for perceived cyberoffensives against the Russian government or the Russian people.”
Distributed Denial of Secrets, or DDoSecrets, the nonprofit organization publishing many of the leaked materials, was founded in 2018 and has published material from U.S. law enforcement agencies, shell companies and right-wing groups. But since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the group has been flooded with data from Russian government agencies and companies. It currently hosts more than 40 data sets related to Russian entities.
“There has been a lot more activity on that front since the start of the war,” said Lorax B. Horne, a member of DDoSecrets. “Since the end of February, it hasn’t been all Russian data sets, but it has been an overwhelming amount of data that we’ve been receiving.”
DDoSecrets operates as a clearinghouse, publishing data it receives from sources through an open submission process. The organization says that its mission is transparency with the public and that it avoids political affiliations. It is often described as a successor to WikiLeaks, another nonprofit group that has published leaked data it received from anonymous sources.
On March 1, the Ukrainian news outlet Ukrainska Pravda published names and personal information that it said belonged to 120,000 Russian troops fighting in Ukraine. The information came from the Center for Defense Strategies, a Ukrainian security think tank, the news outlet reported. In late March, Ukraine’s military intelligence service leaked the names and personal data of 620 people it said were officers with Russia’s F.S.B.
And in early April, the military intelligence service published the personal information of Russian soldiers it claimed were responsible for war crimes in Bucha, a suburb where investigators say Russian troops waged a campaign of terror against civilians.
“All war criminals will be brought to justice for crimes committed against the civilian population of Ukraine,” the military intelligence service said in a statement on its website that accompanied the Bucha data dump. (Russia has denied responsibility for the Bucha killings.)
Russian state-backed hackers have also carried out a number of cyberattacks in Ukraine since the war began, targeting government agencies, communications infrastructure and utility companies. They have largely relied on destructive malware to erase data and disrupt the operations of critical infrastructure companies, but they have occasionally used hack-and-leak tactics.
In late February, a group calling itself Free Civilian began to leak personal information that supposedly belonged to millions of Ukrainian civilians. Although the group posed as a collective of “hacktivists,” or people using their cyberskills to further their political ends, it actually operated as a front for Russian state-backed hackers, according to researchers at CrowdStrike. The hack-and-leak operation was intended to sow distrust in Ukraine’s government and its ability to secure citizens’ data, the researchers said.
Hackers affiliated with Russia and Belarus have also targeted news media companies and Ukrainian military officials in an effort to spread disinformation about a surrender by Ukraine’s military.
But much of Russia’s hacking efforts have focused on damaging critical infrastructure. Last week, Ukrainian officials said they had interrupted a Russian cyberattack on Ukraine’s power grid that could have knocked out power to two million people. The G.R.U., Russia’s military intelligence unit, was responsible for the attack, Ukraine’s security and intelligence service said.
U.S. officials have repeatedly warned American companies that Russia could carry out similar attacks against them and have urged them to harden their cyberdefenses. The governments of Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand have issued similar warnings.
In early April, the Justice Department and the F.B.I. announced that they had acted in secret to pre-empt a Russian cyberattack by removing malware from computer networks around the world. The move was part of an effort by the Biden administration to put pressure on Russia and discourage it from launching cyberattacks in the United States. Last month, the Justice Department charged four Russian officials with carrying out a series of cyberattacks against critical infrastructure in the United States.
But so far, the Russian activity directed at the West has been relatively modest, as Chris Inglis, the national cyber director for the Biden administration, acknowledged on Wednesday at an event hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations.
“It’s the question of the moment — why, given that we had expectations that the Russian playbook, having relied so heavily on disinformation, cyber, married with all other instruments of power, why haven’t we seen a very significant play of cyber, at least against NATO and the United States, in this instance?” he asked.
He speculated that the Russians thought they were headed to quick victory in February, and when the war effort ran into obstacles, “they were distracted,” he said. “They were busy.”
22. What I learned in Ranger School helped me through a mental health crisis
The many benefits of Ranger School - "embracing the suck."
What I learned in Ranger School helped me through a mental health crisis
After graduating from West Point and the Engineer Officer Basic Course in 1979, I, along with more than a hundred classmates, volunteered for the Army Ranger School, which is renowned as the toughest, most challenging leadership school in the Army — if not the entire U.S. military. It is a 9-week school, known jokingly in the Army as the ultimate “suck fest,” which pushes students beyond their mental, physical and emotional limits. Significant sleep and food deprivation are an inherent part of this grueling experience in small unit, commando training, tactics and operations.
During our Ranger class, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. The Ranger instructors, or RIs, assembled everyone and told us the class was being cancelled and we would all return immediately to our assigned units for deployment and war with the Soviet Union. We had loaded trucks to begin returning to home stations when the RIs called off their false alarm. But the message was clear: this training is for real war, and its lessons for real combat. Pay attention to detail, work hard, take care of your buddy, be a team player — Ranger training may very well save your lives, and make the difference between victory and defeat on the battlefield.
After this dramatic lesson in the cold, dark Georgia woods, we off-loaded the trucks and re-started our training, with a grim new sense of the harsh reality of the world we lived in, and in which we would soon be leading American soldiers. Probably the biggest relief — even more than not going off to actual war and potential death — was that we wouldn’t have to cut our Ranger training short and have to re-start later, placing all our current course achievements at risk. Above all else, each of us hungered to earn the highly coveted black and gold Army Ranger tab. We would be forever authorized to wear that little piece of “magic cloth” on our uniforms, earning instantaneous respect and credibility from subordinates, peers and superiors.
Gregg F. Martin's Army Ranger Class in January 1980, Fort Benning, Ga. Martin is pictured 6th from the right (wearing glasses) in the first row, standing. (Gregg F. Martin/Courtesy photo)
The RIs zeroed in on me for my unusually upbeat attitude. The RIs were a bit tougher on me, because Ranger School is not supposed to be fun or enjoyed. It’s supposed to suck — totally — which it did. Next to climbing out of the pit of my hellish bipolar crisis, Ranger School was the most physically and mentally challenging experience of my life, but I loved it. My squad of 12 Rangers also developed a buoyant, positive attitude that carried us through all obstacles enthusiastically as a team. Against all odds, some of us actually enjoyed it — at least some of the time.
One unforgettable memory is climbing up a long steep ridge in the Appalachian Mountains of northern Georgia, in total darkness and frigid cold, trudging through snow and ice, sleep and food deprived, carrying nearly 100 pounds of combat gear. Like many of my fellow Rangers, I slipped into a state of exhausted delirium, and soon found myself floating above the column of Rangers, looking down on them as they trudged onward. I saw myself down below and, like in a cartoon, I had bubbles coming up out of my head, which formed into a cloud just above me. Inside the cloud was a large, steaming hot plate of spaghetti and meatballs, with parmesan cheese, golden-brown garlic bread, and a frosted mug of draft beer with a perfect head. I could not only see the meal, but I could also smell and taste it. Years later in my Army career, while manic in Iraq and Washington, D.C., I also experienced out-of-body hallucinations where I was floating up above, and looking down on myself and the action, a part of my bipolar psychosis.
I now know that in addition to my exceptional physical conditioning, mental preparation, willpower and the strength of fellowship provided by fighting and suffering through hardship with my band of Army brothers, a major part of my success and unusually positive attitude during the extreme challenge and grueling nature of Ranger School was my underlying mental condition of hyperthymia, a kind of “pre-bipolar” or “under-bipolar disorder.” Completely unknown to me, my hyperthymia elevated my performance for decades, until it surged into bipolar disorder at 47, which marked the beginning of the end of my Army career.
Hyperthymia is a near-continual state of mild mania (not to be confused with hypomania, which is characterized by episodic cases of mild mania, but not continual). Below the threshold of a mental illness, hyperthymia causes the brain to produce excess amounts of dopamine and endorphins, the natural chemicals that provide the recipient with above normal levels of energy, drive, enthusiasm, positivity, happiness, optimism and the like. While it elevates performance and amplifies natural talents, it also puts the person at above average risk for full-blown depression or mania, which is when people trend to the label of bipolar disorder, essentially what happened to me.
My hyperthymia rose steadily for decades, inching ever closer to mania, until my brain eventually surged into mania and bipolar disorder during the Iraq War. It was there that the intense stress of leading a brigade of thousands of soldiers in combat triggered my genetic predisposition for bipolar.
After fighting through “bipolar hell” in my fifties and early sixties, I have now been recovered, healthy and happy for more than five years. Lithium and medications have been critical, along with the life foundation and help of the “3 P’s” — People (positive connections with my wife, family, friends and colleagues), Place (moving to and living in wonderful Cocoa Beach, Florida), and devoting myself to a meaningful Purpose (my life mission is sharing my bipolar story to help stop the stigma and save lives). With that, combined with expert, compassionate medical care from my Veterans Administration care team, I have recovered and rebuilt my bipolar-shattered life.
The Ranger spirit of “embrace the suck,” never quit and drive on through to the objective, was key to my recovery and building a new life of meaning and purpose. In fact, when asked why — like so many spouses — she didn’t leave me during our years of bipolar hell, my wife said it was because I never gave up and always kept on trying to recover. I believe Ranger School had something to do with that!
With recovery, my pre-bipolar mood, personality and hyperthymia have reemerged. I am once again energetic, enthusiastic, positive, driven and extroverted. Now, with the help of the right medications like lithium, and grounded on the foundation of the “3 P’s,” I strive to keep it that way. I must continue to effectively fight and manage my “forever war” with mental illness.
Rangers lead the way!! Army strong!! Hooah!!
Gregg F. Martin is a 36-year Army combat veteran, retired two-star general and bipolar survivor. The former president of the National Defense University, he is a qualified Airborne Ranger engineer and strategist, who has commanded soldiers in combat. A graduate of West Point, MIT and both the Army and Naval War Colleges, he is an ardent and full-time mental health advocate. He lives with his wife in Cocoa Beach, Florida. His forthcoming book is entitled: “Bipolar General: my ‘forever war’ with mental illness.”
These views are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Defense Department or U.S. government.
23. U.N. Slapped Down Latest Taiwan Outreach Effort, Citing Chinese Talking Point
U.N. Slapped Down Latest Taiwan Outreach Effort, Citing Chinese Talking Point
April 22, 2022 12:43 PM
The top U.N. official rejected Taiwan’s request last year to participate in the organization’s activities, NR has learned.
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U.N. secretary general Antonio Guterres denied a request by allies of Taiwan to grant the country the ability to participate in U.N. activities last year, National Review has exclusively learned. He cited a 50-year-old U.N. resolution, using an interpretation favored by China, to block the effort.
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Although Taiwan’s partners have sent such a request every year for the past five years amid a stepped-up Chinese diplomatic effort to isolate the island country, Guterres’s latest rejection is significant because it elicited an unusually blunt rejoinder from Taiwan.
“This example is representative of the rigidity of the Secretariat as a whole, as it appears to have no intention of meaningfully resolving the issues,” the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office of New York — a de facto diplomatic outpost — said in a statement to NR earlier this month.
Taiwan’s allies sent Guterres letters supporting Taiwan last fall. According to a press release issued by the Taiwanese foreign ministry in September, the focus of that effort, led by the 14 countries with which Taiwan held official diplomatic ties (Taiwan later lost one ally, Nicaragua, in December), was to secure Taiwan’s participation in various activities at the U.N.
Guterres responded in December, repeating a line that he used in his previous responses: “Regarding the participation of Taiwan, China, in the work of the United Nations, the Secretariat is guided by General Assembly resolution 2758 (XXVI) of 25 October 1971.”
Guterres’s use of the formulation “Taiwan, China,” is also noteworthy, because it implies that Taiwan is a region of the mainland.
Last year was not the first time that Guterres has replied to letters from Taiwan’s allies, but its disclosure this year is significant because it comes amid mounting frustration in Taipei with the U.N. official’s reluctance to break from Beijing’s position on the matter. Guterres and the U.N. leadership have come under heightened scrutiny for their relationship with the Chinese government in recent months.
In February, Guterres met Chinese Communist Party general secretary Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Beijing Winter Olympics, offering effusive praise of China’s international conduct. Guterres has also faced withering criticism from human-rights groups for declining to condemn China’s genocide of Uyghurs.
While Taiwanese officials have previously been hesitant to publicly criticize the U.N. secretariat in the hopes of reaching an agreement, those efforts have fallen flat amid a renewed pressure campaign by the Chinese Communist Party’s diplomats.
In 1971, the U.N. voted to give Taiwan’s seat — called “China” — to the Communist mainland government. The resolution by which it did so specified only that the People’s Republic of China would take the seat previously held by Taiwan — it did not constitute the U.N.’s official recognition of Chinese claims over the island country.
Prior to 2016, Taiwan had maintained some level of interaction with the U.N. But after President Tsai Ing-wen, who is seen by Beijing as pro-independence, won election that year, Chinese diplomats moved decisively to block Taiwan from all forms of access to the U.N.
Since then, Taiwanese passport-holders have been almost uniformly forbidden from accessing U.N. facilities without documentation from a Chinese-government office. Beijing has also blocked Taiwan from its previous participation at gatherings of the World Health Organization, of the International Civil Aviation Organization, and of other U.N. agencies.
“The fact that Taiwan participated robustly in certain UN specialized agencies for the vast majority of the past 50 years is evidence of the value the international community places in Taiwan’s contributions,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement last October, urging countries to support Taiwan’s participation at the U.N.
Blinken’s statement did not directly criticize the U.N. secretariat, but it did note the fact that Taiwanese nationals have been blocked from entering the U.N. — a decision made at the discretion of U.N. leadership, based on its interpretation of the resolution enacted in 1971.
The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office said that Guterres’s interpretation of the resolution was incorrect. “In fact, the resolution is all about representation, not participation. Engagement by Taiwan in the U.N.-affiliated entities is in line with the letter and spirit of the resolution,” the office told NR. A Guterres spokesperson did not reply to an email requesting comment.
The practical consequences of Taiwan’s exclusion are dire. Taiwan’s de facto U.N. ambassador, James Lee, said during an interview with NR that his country’s exclusion from the WHO system cost “millions of lives” when Taipei’s warnings about Covid in December 2019 were ignored. Other U.N. agencies from which Taiwan is excluded set global telecom standards, international aviation regulations, and other rules.
Taiwan’s exclusion from the U.N. also means that, in the event of a Chinese invasion, its leadership will lack access to the global platform through which Volodymyr Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials have made poignant appeals during Russia’s attack on their country.
That, of course, is the point: Denying Taiwan standing in international organizations and poaching its allies makes it less politically painful for China to absorb the island.
24. US firm purchases former Navy shipyard in Subic Bay, Philippines
US firm purchases former Navy shipyard in Subic Bay, Philippines
Military vehicles from the 402nd Army Field Support Battalion are downloaded from the USNS Red Cloud at Subic Bay, Philippines, Feb. 24, 2022. (Kevin Martin/U.S. Army)
The U.S.-based private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management has completed its purchase of the Subic Bay shipyard in the Philippines, laying to rest concerns of a possible sale to interested Chinese companies.
“The completion of the Subic Bay shipyard will redound to benefits for the country, bring jobs to the local communities, increase economic activity, and at the same [time] fortify our strategic security measures,” Jose Manuel Romualdez, Philippine ambassador to the United States, said in a news release Thursday.
“Working with the United States on this project will help ensure that we are able to protect our interests not only for our country but the whole region,” he said.
The sale of the former U.S. Navy base is an “important example of U.S.-Philippine public-private partnership,” Ely Ratner, assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific security affairs, said in a tweet Wednesday.
“Great to see the completion of the acquisition of Hanjin shipyard in Subic Bay by a U.S.-based firm,” he wrote.
The date and purchase price of the sale were not included in the news release. Agila Naval Inc. will operate the shipyard, according to reports last month in Philippine media. Further information on Agila was unavailable Friday.
Reuters reported last month that Cerberus was buying the shipyard for $300 million. Cerberus did not respond Thursday to a request for comment from Stars and Stripes.
Several Chinese companies were among eight parties that expressed interest in 2019 in buying the shipyard, which holds strategic importance because of its deep-water port and proximity to the contested South China Sea.
The Subic Bay shipyard had been operated by Hanjin Philippines, a South Korean firm that defaulted on loans of $1.3 billion in 2019, according to Reuters. Hanjin’s shipbuilding activity employed about 20,000 workers.
Cerberus, based in New York, has approximately $55 billion in assets in credit, private equity and real estate, according to its website. A potential partner in the deal, Australian shipbuilder Austal, was not involved in the final agreement and is no longer a tenant at the shipyard, according to a March 9 report in Maritime Executive.
The purchase by a U.S. firm represents a full circle in American-Philippine military relations.
The U.S. occupied the Philippines in 1898 after defeating Spain in the Spanish-American War.
Naval Base Subic Bay and the nearby Clark Air Force Base became key strategic hubs for the U.S. through the end of combat operations in the Vietnam War in 1973.
A growing tide of Philippine opposition to America’s military presence — as well as the cataclysmic eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 that decimated Clark — led the U.S. to leave both bases by the end of 1992.
The two countries, however, have continued bilateral training exercises in the decades since then.
That military relationship has become more crucial in recent years as the Philippines and China have clashed over competing claims of sovereignty on portions of the South China Sea.
25. Starlink fought off Russian jamming attack faster than the military could
Can we learn from Elon Musk?
Starlink fought off Russian jamming attack faster than the military could
Though Elon Musk has generally declined for Starlink to get involved with the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, the satellite internet company has apparently been thrown into the fray anyway. Starlink’s infrastructure was able to fend off a Russian cyberattack with incredible speed, according to Dave Tremper, the director of electronic warfare at the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
Just a day after reports of the jamming attack came to light, Starlink managed to jump in and kill it. “Starlink had slung a line of code and fixed it,” Tremper said at the C4ISRNET virtual conference. “How they did that was eye-watering to me.”
SpaceX had sent some Starlink terminals to Ukraine when the Russian invasion first began, as a measure by which to assist Ukraine in maintaining internet connectivity. Russia reportedly tried jamming up those terminals almost as soon as they arrived — but Starlink was able to remotely close up its vulnerabilities with a relatively simple system update.
Pentagon’s got something to learn — It’s obvious from Tremper’s comments (particularly the “eye-watering” one) that the Pentagon really had no idea blocking a Russian cyberattack could be quite so easy. Tremper also noted specifically that the official U.S. response to that jamming attack had a “significant timeline” to correct the necessary vulnerabilities.
Already U.S. cybersecurity officials are planning to take notes directly from Starlink’s responses. “There’s a really interesting case study to look at the agility that Starlink had in their ability to address that problem,” Tremper said. “We need to be able to have that agility.
Not all bad? — Starlink, like all of Elon Musk’s Big Idea projects, has been met with a mixture of fanfare and outright disdain. The satellite internet program makes lofty promises — high download speeds and low latency just about anywhere on the planet — but those promises come with some sizable caveats. The upfront costs of setting up a Starlink terminal are certainly not affordable, for one thing, and customers that live in close proximity to each other have found their connections to be spotty at best.
Starlink as a company is also going to struggle with profitability for the foreseeable future. SpaceX loses about $800 for every home setup it sells, and launching the company’s full satellite array is going to costs upwards of $30 billion over the next decade.
If the Pentagon is to be believed, the technology behind Starlink is significantly more advanced than even the U.S. government knew. If we get nothing else out of Starlink, perhaps our top defense officials will be able to learn a thing or two from SpaceX’s satellites.
V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
