Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

“In this war, which was total in every sense of the word, we have seen many great changes in military science. It seems to me that not the least of these was the development of psychological warfare as a specific and effective weapon.”

- General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1945

“Psychological warfare has always rested as an uneasy activity in democracies, even in wartime. It is partly to do with the suspicion that using the mind to influence the mind is somehow unacceptable. But is it more unacceptable to shoot someone's brains out rather than to persuade that brain to drop down their weapon and live?”

Dr. Phillip M. Taylor,

Munitions of the Mind, Manchester University Press, 1995

“Success will be less a matter of imposing one’s will and more a function of shaping behavior ― of friends, adversaries and, most importantly, the people in between.”

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates

26 November 2007

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 20, 2023

2. 'Guerilla' Warfare Could Mean Big Problems for Putin in Ukraine

3. China sends a subtle message to Central Asia: Rely on us, not Russia

4. F-16 Fighters to Ukraine: A Game-Changer or Waste of Time?

5. Russia’s Unconventional Warfare: Moscow’s domination of the Information Space

6. 'In a lot of the world, the clock has hit midnight': China is calling in loans to dozens of countries from Pakistan to Kenya

7. At G7, Japan quietly strengthens alliances

8. Quad Leaders’ Joint Statement

9. Oh look, you’re unwittingly contributing to Chinese state-sponsored cyber-warfare

10. How GOP attacks on 'wokeism' helped lead the Pentagon to abandon its effort to combat extremism in the military

11. US, Phl update defense guidelines

12. After a Show-Stopping Entrance at the G7, Zelensky Pleads for More Aid

13. Biden Administration Announces Additional Security Assistance for Ukraine

14. Russia is floating a plan to build a village for conservative Americans who want to move to a 'Christian country' and are tired of liberal ideology in the US

15. The dawn of disinformation

16. The Intellectual Rules of Engagement

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 20, 2023

Maps/graphics/citations: https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-may-20-2023

Key Takeaways

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin declared victory in Bakhmut City on May 20 and announced his intent to withdraw from the city on May 25.
Prigozhin’s claimed victory over the remaining areas in Bakhmut is purely symbolic even if true.
Ukrainian forces continue pressuring Bakhmut’s northern and southern flanks.
Wagner forces are unlikely to successfully conduct a controlled withdrawal from Bakhmut while in contact with Ukrainian forces within five days without disrupting the Russian MoD’s efforts to prepare for planned Ukrainian counteroffensives.
Russian conventional forces likely will still need to transfer additional forces to the Bakhmut direction even if Wagner mercenaries remain in Bakhmut.
Russian forces targeted Kyiv Oblast with Iranian-made Shahed drones on the night of May 19 to 20.
US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stated on May 20 that the United States may agree to transfer modern combat aircraft to Ukraine, including the F-16, on the condition that Ukraine does not use them to strike Russian territory.
Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar reported that Russian sources are falsely alleging that high-ranking Ukrainian military commanders have recently died, likely to demoralize Ukrainian forces and to portray Russian forces as constraining Ukrainian counteroffensive capabilities.
Russian forces continued limited ground attacks in the Kreminna area.
Russian forces continued to conduct ground attacks on the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line.
The Washington Post reported on May 19 that a Ukrainian commander stated that Ukrainian Special Operations forces conduct raids in east (left) bank Kherson Oblast but that Ukrainian forces do not hold stable positions there.
The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is incorporating mobilized and conscripted personnel into its own “Veterany” private military company (PMC), leading to discrimination and conflict.
A Lithuanian official publicly accused Russia of attempting to hold international children hostage in occupied Crimea as “human shields” against a future Ukrainian counteroffensive.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, MAY 20, 2023

May 20, 2023 - Press ISW

Download the PDF

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 20, 2023

Kateryna Stepanenko, Riley Bailey, Grace Mappes, George Barros, and Frederick W. Kagan

May 20, 2023, 5:45pm ET

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

Click here to access ISW’s archive of interactive time-lapse maps of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. These maps complement the static control-of-terrain map that ISW produces daily by showing a dynamic frontline. ISW will update this time-lapse map archive monthly.

Note: The data cutoff for this product was 12pm ET on May 20. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the May 21 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin declared victory in Bakhmut City on May 20 and announced his intent to withdraw from the city on May 25.[1] Prigozhin claimed that Wagner Group forces completely captured Bakhmut City on May 20, seizing the last multi-story apartment building in southwestern Bakhmut near the MiG-17 monument. Prigozhin announced that Wagner forces will establish defensive positions before transferring responsibility for the city to Russian conventional forces on May 25. Prigozhin effectively stated that Wagner forces will conduct an operational pause by resting and restoring combat power at field training camps in unspecified areas, presumably far from the frontline. ISW has not observed geolocated footage confirming Prigozhin’s claims as of this publication. Ukrainian officials reported that Ukrainian forces are still fighting in a small section of southwest Bakhmut as of May 20. Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar stated that Ukrainian forces continue to hold positions near the MiG-17 monument as of May 20.[2] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) has not commented on Prigozhin’s claims as of this publication.

Prigozhin’s claimed victory over the remaining areas in Bakhmut is purely symbolic even if true. The last few urban blocks of eastern Bakhmut that Prigozhin claimed that Wagner Group forces captured are not tactically or operationally significant. Their capture does not grant Russian forces operationally significant terrain to continue conducting offensive operations or any particularly strong position from which to defend against possible Ukrainian counterattacks.

Ukrainian forces continue pressuring Bakhmut’s northern and southern flanks. Ukrainian and Russian sources reported that fighting is ongoing on Bakhmut’s northern and southern flanks in the directions of Ivanivske (6km west of Bakhmut), Stupochky (13km southwest of Bakhmut), and Bila Hora (12km southwest of Bakhmut).[3] Ukrainian forces reported on May 19 that they have recaptured approximately four square kilometers of additional territory near Bakhmut, and Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces continue conducting localized attacks near Klishchiivka (6km southwest of Bakhmut).[4] Prigozhin’s claimed capture of the remaining blocks in Bakhmut is not strategically significant as it will not allow exhausted Wagner or conventional Russian forces to establish a meaningful springboard for further offensive operations. Ukrainian ongoing counterattacks north, west, and southwest of Bakhmut will complicate any further Russian advances beyond Bakhmut in the near term. Prigozhin’s withdrawal announcement, whether Wagner withdraws from the city or not, indicates that Prigozhin does not intend to continue an offensive effort to push directly west of Bakhmut.

Wagner forces are unlikely to successfully conduct a controlled withdrawal from Bakhmut while in contact with Ukrainian forces within five days without disrupting the Russian MoD’s efforts to prepare for planned Ukrainian counteroffensives. Wagner forces are unlikely to establish adequate defenses or consolidate recent gains in Bakhmut sufficient to forestall Ukrainian counterattacks by May 25 even if Prigozhin’s announcement of Wagner’s withdrawal is true. Ukrainian forces are still in Khromove and Ivanivske and are engaging Russian forces in and near Bakhmut. Ukrainian artillery can still target Russian forces in and around Bakhmut. Withdrawal in contact with the enemy is an exceedingly difficult task that the Wagner Group’s forces are unlikely to perform well within Prigozhin’s five-day time frame. Conducting a relief-in-place while in contact is also an extremely challenging maneuver that Russian forces would likely struggle to conduct even if the Russian MoD agrees to undertake it. Wagner units have shown poor coordination with Russian conventional forces, other irregular formations subordinated to the Russian MoD, and the Russian military command—factors that would hinder a smooth relief-in-place operation.[5] The Russian military command is unlikely to generate sufficient forces to relieve Wagner in Bakhmut and hold its flanks within the window Prigozhin has announced without redeploying Russian forces from other areas. Prigozhin’s statement of his intent to withdraw could be a crude attempt to mislead Ukrainian forces into conducting a counterattack through Bakhmut City.

Russian conventional forces likely will still need to transfer additional forces to the Bakhmut direction even if Wagner mercenaries remain in Bakhmut. Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty stated that Russian forces continue to transfer airborne, motorized rifle, and special forces elements to reinforce the Bakhmut flanks even as Wagner forces remain in Bakhmut City.[6] The UK MoD also reported that the Russian military command likely redeployed several battalions in the last few days to reinforce Bakhmut despite only having few uncommitted combat units and that this redeployment suggests a substantial commitment to the Bakhmut effort by the Russian leadership.[7] These additional forces could in principle be meant to participate in the relief-in-place of Wagner forces that Prigozhin has just announced, reducing but not eliminating some of the challenges considered above, but it is more likely that they are intended to secure Bakhmut’s threatened flanks.

Russian forces targeted Kyiv Oblast with Iranian-made Shahed drones on the night of May 19 to 20. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces launched 18 Shahed-136/131 drones at Kyiv Oblast, and that Ukrainian air defenses shot down all 18 of the drones.[8] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces destroyed two Russian Shahed drones in eastern Ukraine.[9] Russian forces have targeted Kyiv heavily in the past month, likely to produce informational affects with both Russian and Ukrainian audiences. This hyperfocus on targeting Kyiv is at odds with the new limited Russian air campaign’s other target: alleged Ukrainian rear logistics.[10] These conflicting target sets likely further limit the campaign’s ability to degrade Ukrainian counteroffensive capabilities in the near term.[11]

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stated on May 20 that the United States may agree to transfer modern combat aircraft to Ukraine, including the F-16, on the condition that Ukraine does not use them to strike Russian territory. Sullivan stated the war in Ukraine has “evolved” and that F-16 fourth-generation fighter aircraft have now become “part of that mix” of weapons that Ukraine will need as part of a “future force to be able to deter and defend against Russian aggression as we go forward.”[12] Sullivan stated that any F-16s given to Ukraine – like other Western weapons provided to Ukraine – will be provided under the condition that they do not strike Russian territory.[13] Sullivan also stated that training Ukrainian pilots to use F-16s is the “obvious first step” and that the next steps are to “determine how to do the actual provision of planes.”[14] US President Joe Biden informed G7 leaders on May 19 that Washington will support a joint effort to train Ukrainian pilots on F-16s and other fourth generation aircraft but did not pledge that the US will send Ukraine the F-16s.[15]

Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar reported that Russian sources are falsely alleging that high-ranking Ukrainian military commanders have recently died, likely to demoralize the Ukrainian forces and to portray Russian forces as constraining Ukrainian counteroffensive capabilities. Malyar stated that these information operations allege that Russian strikes have recently killed Ukrainian Territorial Defense Forces Commander General Ihor Tantsyura, Ukrainian Eastern Grouping of Forces Commander Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, and Ukrainian Commander in Chief General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi.[16] Prigozhin also amplified the information operation alleging that Zaluzhnyi might be dead on May 20.[17] These information operations are particularly absurd given that Zaluzhnyi spoke with US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley on May 19 and that Syrskyi appeared on Ukrainian television on May 16.[18] Ukrainian officials have denied previous Russian claims that a May 10 strike on a Ukrainian command post in the Bakhmut area killed several high-ranking Ukrainian military officials and that Wagner forces killed Tantsyura while he was en route to Bakhmut on May 2.[19] ISW has previously assessed that Russian ultranationalists are increasingly seeking to frame any Russian operations as delaying potential Ukrainian counteroffensive actions.[20]

Key Takeaways

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin declared victory in Bakhmut City on May 20 and announced his intent to withdraw from the city on May 25.
Prigozhin’s claimed victory over the remaining areas in Bakhmut is purely symbolic even if true.
Ukrainian forces continue pressuring Bakhmut’s northern and southern flanks.
Wagner forces are unlikely to successfully conduct a controlled withdrawal from Bakhmut while in contact with Ukrainian forces within five days without disrupting the Russian MoD’s efforts to prepare for planned Ukrainian counteroffensives.
Russian conventional forces likely will still need to transfer additional forces to the Bakhmut direction even if Wagner mercenaries remain in Bakhmut.
Russian forces targeted Kyiv Oblast with Iranian-made Shahed drones on the night of May 19 to 20.
US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stated on May 20 that the United States may agree to transfer modern combat aircraft to Ukraine, including the F-16, on the condition that Ukraine does not use them to strike Russian territory.
Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar reported that Russian sources are falsely alleging that high-ranking Ukrainian military commanders have recently died, likely to demoralize Ukrainian forces and to portray Russian forces as constraining Ukrainian counteroffensive capabilities.
Russian forces continued limited ground attacks in the Kreminna area.
Russian forces continued to conduct ground attacks on the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line.
The Washington Post reported on May 19 that a Ukrainian commander stated that Ukrainian Special Operations forces conduct raids in east (left) bank Kherson Oblast but that Ukrainian forces do not hold stable positions there.
The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is incorporating mobilized and conscripted personnel into its own “Veterany” private military company (PMC), leading to discrimination and conflict.
A Lithuanian official publicly accused Russia of attempting to hold international children hostage in occupied Crimea as “human shields” against a future Ukrainian counteroffensive.

We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because these 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 the Ukrainian 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.

Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine (comprised of two subordinate main efforts)
Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and encircle northern Donetsk Oblast
Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast
Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis
Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts
Activities in Russian-occupied areas

Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Luhansk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and northern Donetsk Oblast)

Russian forces continued limited ground attacks in the Kreminna area on May 20. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful offensive operations near Bilohorivka, Luhansk Oblast (12km south of Kreminna).[21] A Russian miblogger claimed that Russian forces conducted assaults in the Serebrianska forest area and advanced towards Hryhorivka (11km south of Kreminna).[22] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty stated on May 20 that the tempo of Russian assaults along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line has decreased over the past month from five to seven daily assaults to one daily assault.[23]

A prominent Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted unsuccessful counterattacks to regain lost positions near Masyutivka (13km northeast of Kupyansk) on May 19.[24] The milblogger also claimed that Russian forces continue to successfully hold a bridgehead on the west (right) bank of the Oskil River in the area.[25] ISW has still not observed visual confirmation of the Russian capture of Masyutivka or the establishment of a Russian bridgehead on the west bank of the Oskil River.

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Donetsk Oblast (Russian Objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)

See topline text on Bakhmut.

Russian forces continued to conduct ground attacks on the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line on May 20. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful offensive operations near Novokalynove (8km north of Avdiivka), Stepove (2km north of Avdiivka), Avdiivka, Sieverne (5km west of Avdiivka), Pervomaiske (11km southwest of Avdiivka), and Novomykhailivka (36km southwest of Avdiivka).[26] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces unsuccessfully attacked Pervomaiske and Nevelske (14km southwest of Avdiivka) but advanced to the railway north of Avdiivka from Krasnohorivka (8km north of Avdiivka).[27] Another Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces made several successful advances in the Donetsk direction in the past week but that Russian forces have stabilized the front near Krasnohorivka.[28] The General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces repelled over 20 ground attacks in the Marinka (27km southwest of Avdiivka) area.[29] Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar reported that Ukrainian defenses in Marinka forced Russian forces to attack on the northern and southern flanks instead.[30]

Ukrainian forces struck the Mariupol airport on the night of May 19. Geolocated footage shows four Ukrainian rounds striking the Mariupol airport area, and some sources speculated that the strikes hit a Russian military concentration point.[31] Some Russian sources speculated that Ukrainian forces used Storm Shadow missiles to target the airport area.[32] Ukrainian forces last struck Mariupol in February prior to the delivery of the Storm Shadow missiles. Some sources speculated that Ukrainian forces used Ground Launched Small Diameter Bombs (GLSDBs) in those strikes.[33] Russian milbloggers amplified geolocated imagery of smoke trails and claimed that Russian air defenses intercepted two additional rockets or missiles on the morning of May 20.[34] The milbloggers claimed that Ukraine targeted Mariupol in order to commemorate the anniversary of the Russian capture of Mariupol on May 20, 2022.

Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis (Russian objective: Maintain frontline positions and secure rear areas against Ukrainian strikes)

The Washington Post reported on May 19 that the Ukrainian commander of the operational group of Kherson troops, Brigadier General Mykhaylo Drapatyy, stated that Ukrainian Special Operations forces conduct raids in east (left) bank Kherson Oblast but that Ukrainian forces do not hold stable positions there.[35] Drapatyy reportedly added that Ukrainian assault units train twice a week for operations to cross the Dnipro River using boats and pontoon bridges, and The Washington Post reported that Ukrainian forces have begun constructing pontoon bridges that could be used to transport heavy weaponry across the river.[36] Drapatyy reportedly stated that Ukrainian forces may use islands in the Dnipro River delta to launch operations on the east bank and claimed that Ukrainian forces control 90 percent of the islands through physical, visual, and artillery means.[37] Drapatyy reportedly highlighted the fact that Russian forces are worried that Ukraine is preparing for active operations in the Kherson direction and that they have recently begun fortifying their defenses in the rear and planting more mines on the east bank.[38] Drapatyy's statements are generally consistent with previous Ukrainian officials' comments about the continued but limited nature of Ukrainian operations on islands in the delta and on the east bank.[39] The Washington Post reported that Russian positions on the east bank are up to 4.8km away from the Dnipro River, although ISW has not observed visual confirmation of this reporting.[40] Geolocated footage published on May 20 indicates that Ukrainian forces are operating in additional areas on Cherkesky Island (26km southwest of Kherson City).[41]

A Russian milblogger claimed on May 20 that Ukrainian forces counterattacked near Dorozhnyanka, Zaporizhia Oblast (7km south of Hulyaipole) and made unspecified marginal gains in the area.[42] ISW has not observed visual confirmation of recent Ukrainian gains in the Hulyaipole area.

The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported on May 20 that Chechen Republic Head Ramzan Kadyrov deployed additional elements of the “Yug-Akhmat” motorized rifle battalion to Zaporizhia Oblast.[43] Kadyrov has previously claimed that “Yug-Akhmat” elements are operating in Zaporizhia Oblast, possibly as internal security forces in the area.[44]

Russian sources claimed on May 20 that Russian electronic warfare units downed a Ukrainian Mugin-5 drone in northern Crimea.[45]

Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts (Russian objective: Expand combat power without conducting general mobilization)

The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is incorporating mobilized and conscripted personnel into its own “Veterany” private military company (PMC), leading to discrimination and conflict.[46] ISW previously reported that Veterany is part of Russian MoD’s Redut PMC reportedly operating on the Bakhmut flanks.[47] Wives and mothers of mobilized servicemen from Khakassia and Altai republics published a video appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin complaining that Veterany mercenaries are not keeping track of casualties among mobilized personnel and are not supporting mobilized men on the frontlines.[48] The wives and mothers noted that only 137 of 500 deployed mobilized men returned from the frontlines and claimed that at least two units of unknown echelon subordinate to Veterany are missing. The family members also noted that Veterany mercenaries claimed to have purchased each mobilized man for 25,000 rubles (about $315) per serviceman to fight in their place. Commander of the Ukrainian Ground Forces, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi stated that Ukrainian forces captured a mobilized serviceman who served in the Veterany PMC – likely in the Bakhmut direction.[49]

The Financial Times (FT) reported that Wagner Group purchased 20,000 helmets worth approximately $2 million from a small Chinese company “Hangzhou Shineraine Import and Export Co.” in November and December 2022 via Russian-based company Broker Expert.[50] Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin denied purchasing supplies from the company. FT reported that Broker Expert has continued to ship items supporting Wagner’s operations in Africa during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Activities in Russian-occupied areas (Russian objective: Consolidate administrative control of annexed areas; forcibly integrate Ukrainian civilians into Russian sociocultural, economic, military, and governance systems)

A Lithuanian official publicly accused Russia of attempting to hold international children hostage in occupied Crimea as “human shields” against a future Ukrainian counteroffensive. Lithuanian National Security and Defense Committee Chairperson Laurynas Kaciunas claimed on May 18 that Russia is trying to lure children from Kazakhstan, Israel, Belgium, Morocco, Tajikistan, Egypt, Armenia, and other unspecified countries to the “Artek” children’s camp in Crimea under various recreational, cultural, and educational schemes, including for winning competitions.[51] Kaciunas claimed that Russia also aims to compel the international community to recognize Russia’s claim to Crimea. ISW cannot verify Kaciunas’s claim, but it is consistent with efforts to draw children from occupied areas of Ukraine to Crimea under summer vacation, health, and other camp schemes.[52] Russian Human Rights Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova attempted to portray Russia as a safe and trustworthy custodian of non-Russian children by claiming that Russia returned one Ukrainian child to her family.[53]

Significant activity in Belarus (ISW assesses that a Russian or Belarusian attack into northern Ukraine in early 2023 is extraordinarily unlikely and has thus restructured this section of the update. It will no longer include counter-indicators for such an offensive.)

ISW will continue to report daily observed Russian and Belarusian military activity in Belarus, but these are not indicators that Russian and Belarusian forces are preparing for an imminent attack on Ukraine from Belarus. ISW will revise this text and its assessment if it observes any unambiguous indicators that Russia or Belarus is preparing to attack northern Ukraine.

Nothing significant to report.

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

2. 'Guerilla' Warfare Could Mean Big Problems for Putin in Ukraine

'Guerilla' Warfare Could Mean Big Problems for Putin in Ukraine

19fortyfive.com · by Stavros Atlamazoglou · May 20, 2023

Ukrainian forces continue to use unconventional warfare to sabotage the Kremlin’s “special military operation” in Ukraine.

Since the start of the war, the Ukrainian special forces and military intelligence have used training provided by the United States and the West to undermine the Russian military’s campaign by destroying infrastructure and logistical nodes even hundreds of miles behind the frontlines.

Sabotage in Ukraine

On Thursday, a train heading to Simferopol, a town in Crimea, got derailed. The derailed train is now blocking the only rail line into the port of Sevastopol, the capital of Russian-occupied Crimea and the headquarters of the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet. Russian officials state that the derailment was the result of foreign interference.

Since the sinking of the missile cruiser Moskva, the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet, by Ukrainian anti-ship missiles in April 2022, the Russian Navy has played a largely secondary role in the “special military operation.” Russian submarines continue to launch ballistic and cruise missiles into Ukraine, but they are doing so at a much restricted pace.

“Russia will move to repair the line quickly, but the incident will disrupt deliveries of supplies and potentially also weaponry, such as Kalibr cruise missiles, to the [Black Sea Fleet],” the British Military Intelligence assessed in its latest estimate of the war.

The Ukrainian military is getting ready to launch a large-scale counteroffensive. The Crimean Peninsula is one of the possible targets for the Ukrainian forces, and these attacks are aiming to disrupt and Russian defenses.

“Any sabotage in this sensitive area will further increase the Kremlin’s concerns about its ability to protect other key infrastructure in Crimea. The peninsula retains a vital psychological and logistical role in enabling Russia’s war in Ukraine,” the British Military Intelligence added.

This is the latest instance of attack or sabotage against Russian infrastructure or logistical nodes.

A few weeks ago, the Ukrainians launched suicide drones against a large Russian oil refinery and fuel depot in the Crimean Peninsula.

Russian Casualties

Meanwhile, the Russian forces are taking significant casualties on the ground. The Russian military and private military company Wagner Group are losing hundreds of troops killed or wounded on a daily basis in the fighting in the Donbas. Bakhmut has become the graveyard of the Russian forces, with more than 100,000 casualties in or around the ruined town.

And on day 449 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the fighting in and around Bakhmut continues with no end in sight.

Overall, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense claimed that as of Friday, Ukrainian forces have killed and wounded approximately 201,760 Russian troops.

Equipment destroyed includes: 308 fighter, attack, bomber, and transport jets, 294 attack and transport helicopters, 3,777 tanks, 3,210 artillery pieces, 7,377 armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles, 564 Multiple Launch Rocket Systems (MLRS), 18 boats and cutters, 6,083 vehicles and fuel tanks, 319 anti-aircraft batteries, 2,769 tactical unmanned aerial systems, 419 special equipment platforms, such as bridging vehicles, and four mobile Iskander ballistic missile systems, and 1,011 cruise missiles shot down by the Ukrainian air defenses.

A 19FortyFive Defense and National Security Columnist, Stavros Atlamazoglou is a seasoned defense journalist specializing in special operations, a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ), and a Johns Hopkins University graduate. His work has been featured in Business Insider, Sandboxx, and SOFREP.

19fortyfive.com · by Stavros Atlamazoglou · May 20, 2023

3. China sends a subtle message to Central Asia: Rely on us, not Russia

As old Bonapate said: "Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake". Seems like the competition over Central Asia has begun.

Here is a post on LinkedIn that accompanied the Washington Post article below. We could generate some useful themes and messages from the comments.

Michael Goodman

• 1st

Strategic Intelligence Planner & Analyst | Strategist | Consultant

1d •

Often, it is hard to stay focused and without emotion when conducting analysis. This is one of those times.

The Post, writing about the Central Asian summit, which was covered by numerous other outlets, buries the most important issue at the bottom of the article:

"As China’s economic ties with Russia have deepened since the war began, the yuan has become the most traded currency on the Moscow stock exchange, and countries from Brazil to Bangladesh have expressed interest in settling deals using it.

Beijing views boosting economic prosperity in the region as key to staving off its long-standing concerns about violence and instability in its western Xinjiang region, where thousands of people belonging to the mostly Muslim Uyghur ethnic minority group have been interned in prison camps.

In the joint declarations issued from the Xi’an summit, Beijing extracted assurances from the Central Asian leaders they would not interfere in its approach to Hong Kong, Taiwan or Xinjiang.

The Xinjiang pledge is significant for China because of links between Kazakhstan and the northwestern region where Beijing has carried out a campaign to strip the mostly Uyghur, mostly Muslim population of their culture and religion."

So the gist is, send us your resources, lock up any dissidents, and don't criticize our "internal" policies in Xinjiang, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

Democracy dies in darkness indeed.

China sends a subtle message to Central Asia: Rely on us, not Russia

The Washington Post · by Meaghan Tobin · May 19, 2023

China promised billions of dollars in “financing support and free assistance” to five Central Asian countries on Friday, as top leader Xi Jinping presented a wide-ranging security and defense plan to a region that has long been in Russia’s orbit.

Hosting the China-Central Asia Summit in the city of Xi’an, the fabled end of the ancient Silk Road, Xi presented himself as a generous and reliable partner for countries that were once part of the Soviet Union — but which have become increasingly alarmed by Russia’s efforts to take back control of Ukraine, another former Soviet Republic.

This approach reveals a crack in Beijing and Moscow’s “no limits” friendship, but the bigger contrast was with the West: While Xi was hosting the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, the Group of Seven leaders were gathering in Hiroshima, Japan, to discuss Russian aggression and Chinese economic coercion.

The split-screen images highlighted how Xi is trying to create a “multipolar” world, where the United States is no longer the sole global superpower.

“Central Asia understands that in this multipolar world, they are expected to be on the side of Russia and China,” said Niva Yau, a nonresident fellow for the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub based in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

“A year ago, there were a lot of discussions in the region because of the war, about whether Central Asia needed to pivot, needed to look to the West,” she said. “This week has shown very clearly where Central Asia has decided to align themselves.”

Xi told the Central Asian leaders that China could boost the region’s “law enforcement, security and defense capability construction.” Over the course of the two-day meeting, he met each leader and signed bilateral agreements boosting trade, infrastructure and technology investment, and making visa-free travel arrangements.

Beijing is angling for greater influence in Central Asia as Moscow remains focused on its grinding war in Ukraine. Chinese state media have echoed that language.

“The countries of Central Asia have realized that Russia is having so much difficulty in its fight against Ukraine that it is not wise to completely rely on Russia — they must find a way out,” read a commentary in the nationalist tabloid Defense Times.

Days before the summit in Xi’an, the five heads of Central Asian states visited Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, where they attended the May Day military parade.

But despite their show of allegiance, Putin’s willingness to flex his military might — in Ukraine last year and in Georgia in 2008 — has unnerved the Central Asian states and prompted them to assert their individual cultural identities.

“If you’re sitting in Kazakhstan, it’s very easy to look at the narratives that Putin used to justify invading Ukraine — there’s an ethnic Russian population, they speak Russian — and he could make exactly the same case there,” said Raffaello Pantucci, a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

In Xi’an, Xi assured the Central Asian states that their “sovereignty, security, independence and territorial integrity” must be “safeguarded.”

This message would have been particularly welcome after the Chinese ambassador to France, Lu Shaye, sparked outrage by questioning independence of former Soviet states and led the Foreign Ministry in Beijing to walk back his remarks.

Although Europe and the United States have sent high-level delegations to Central Asia since the war in Ukraine began — Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited the region in March — analysts say the countries haven’t received as much investment from the West as they would like.

China, on the other hand, has given Central Asia priority status. Kazakhstan was Xi’s first stop outside of China after three years of “zero covid” isolation, en route to Uzbekistan for a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a regional body co-founded by China and Russia as a counterweight to western influence in the region.

It was in Kazakhstan that Xi in 2013 launched his flagship infrastructure investment program, the Belt and Road Initiative, under which China has since invested heavily in railways, pipelines and other infrastructure across the region.

Trade volume between China and the five Central Asian countries topped a record $70 billion last month, according to China’s Commerce Ministry.

In Xi’an on Friday, Xi announced that China would accelerate the expansion of the Central-Asia China pipeline, which China’s National Petroleum Corporation and Kazakhstan’s KazMunayGas National Company have agreed to explore.

Kyrgyzstan became the latest country to express interest in trading with China using the yuan when it agreed to explore conducting trade with China — which is almost entirely comprised Chinese exports to Kyrgyzstan — in their respective currencies.

As China’s economic ties with Russia have deepened since the war began, the yuan has become the most traded currency on the Moscow stock exchange, and countries from Brazil to Bangladesh have expressed interest in settling deals using it.

In the joint declarations issued from the Xi’an summit, Beijing extracted assurances from the Central Asian leaders they would not interfere in its approach to Hong Kong, Taiwan or Xinjiang.

Vic Chiang in Taipei, Taiwan, and Lyric Li in Seoul contributed to this report.

The Washington Post · by Meaghan Tobin · May 19, 2023

4. F-16 Fighters to Ukraine: A Game-Changer or Waste of Time?

F-16 Fighters to Ukraine: A Game-Changer or Waste of Time?

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Farley · May 19, 2023

Is Ukraine finally going to get F-16 Vipers?

For months, analysts and politicos have debated the question of delivering Western fighter jets to Ukraine.

Supporters argue that training and transfers should move forward immediately, and detractors warn of escalation concerns and urge a focus on other priorities within Ukraine’s war effort.

In the past couple of days there appears to be some movement on the matter.

Operators of the F-16 Viper multi-role fighter jet, including the Netherlands, have expressed a willingness to transfer their aircraft to Ukraine. A leaked report from the U.S. Air Force suggests that pilot training for the F-16 could be completed in as little as four months, although there are likely some questions about the effectiveness of the pilots trained.

This puts things squarely in the court of the Biden administration. Because of the complex nature of the arms trade, Washington has a veto over the transfer of essentially any Viper in the world. Now, in apparent response to statements of interest from several operators, the Biden administration appears to be making clear that it will not veto the transfer of F-16s to Ukraine. More important, the Biden administration has also agreed to facilitate joint training of Ukrainian pilots on the F-16.

This all makes it extremely probable that F-16s will soon fly into combat over Ukraine.

What Has Gone Before

The move comes as concerns grow about the health of Ukraine’s air defense network.

While Ukrainian air defenses have shot down a significant number of Russian missiles (exact numbers are unreliable) and have kept fixed-wing Russian aircraft away from the front and away from Ukrainian cities, concerns have grown about the rate at which Ukraine expends its missiles.

If Ukraine ran out of missiles or simply had to curtail their use, Russia’s air forces would gain considerably greater tactical and strategic freedom.

The West has slowly escalated its support for Ukraine’s air force. It started by facilitating the transfer of spare parts and other equipment necessary to put MiG-29s in the air. This was followed in recent months by the decision to transfer MiG-29s from the stocks of former Warsaw Pact countries.

These efforts made it possible for Ukraine to field more aircraft than it flew at the outset of the conflict. The West also provided sophisticated equipment for these aircraft, improving their combat capacity.

Still, the legacy-Soviet fighter fleet faces stark technological limitations compared to modern Western fighters.

F-16 Impact

It’s hard to say what kind of impact the transfer of F-16s will have on the fighting in Ukraine.

Much depends on how swiftly the fighters are sent, and in what numbers.

The F-16 can do a little bit of everything, including tactical bombing, strategic bombing, suppression of enemy air defenses, interception, and air superiority.

And there are lots of F-16s available. Nine European countries operate or have operated the Viper, with several in the process of transitioning from the F-16 to the F-35.

Whether the F-16 will be committed to all of those roles depends to great extent on the weapons the West will provide, and on training. Even following basic training, it will take Ukrainian pilots time to master the intricacies of the aircraft and get the most out of its fighting capabilities. Ukrainian ground crew will need to master maintenance, and Ukrainian airfields will need to be updated.

F-16s could help solve Ukraine’s air defense problem and could keep Russia fixed-wing aircraft far away from the front. In numbers and with the appropriate weapons and training, they could help turn back Russian efforts at the front and contribute directly to the support of Ukrainian ground forces. Flying into the teeth of Russian air defenses is no mean feat, however, and we shouldn’t expect that Vipers will have a decisive impact anytime soon.

The West has transferred its most advanced tanks and its most advanced air defense systems to Ukraine over the past six months. These systems will be critical to the success of Ukrainian arms in the offensives of the summer and fall. There’s no reason at this point to draw a sharp line that includes tanks and excludes fighter aircraft. Indeed, looking ahead, it seems extraordinarily likely that the Ukrainian air force will require the transfer of advanced Western aircraft after the end of the war.

In all likelihood, F-16s will become representative of the West’s commitment to the sovereignty and independence of Ukraine, contributing symbolically and directly over the battlefield.

Dr. Robert Farley has taught security and diplomacy courses at the Patterson School since 2005. He received his BS from the University of Oregon in 1997, and his Ph. D. from the University of Washington in 2004. Dr. Farley is the author of Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force (University Press of Kentucky, 2014), the Battleship Book (Wildside, 2016), and Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and the Diffusion of Military Technology (University of Chicago, 2020). He has contributed extensively to a number of journals and magazines, including the National Interest, the Diplomat: APAC, World Politics Review, and the American Prospect. Dr. Farley is also a founder and senior editor of Lawyers, Guns and Money.

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Farley · May 19, 2023

5. Russia’s Unconventional Warfare: Moscow’s domination of the Information Space

Not sure where the author got this. Kennan defined political warfare.

George Kennan, the father of the containment policy, defined unconventional warfare as “the employment of all the means at a nation’s command, short of war, to achieve its national objectives.”

Excerpts:

The term used by the Russians to denote the use of information as a weapon is “Information Confrontation”. Furthermore, the term “Active Measures” is used for political warfare, including disinformation and propaganda. As these operations have been ongoing, long before the Ukraine War started, it appears that Russia believes itself to be in a state of perpetual conflict with the west. Information warfare strategy from the Soviet era was called the firehose of falsehood and it is still in use today. Conflicting information is sent out which causes internal rifts inside of enemy nations. For example, Russia broadcast information that Zelensky was both a Nazi and a socialist/globalist. Once the contradictory information is discovered, it is still difficult to know which is true. And if enough contradictory information is disseminated, people eventually stop believing anything they read or hear, even accredited news media or messages from their own government.

Free-speech laws in the U.S. make it very difficult to fight Russian misinformation. Attempts to do so become self-fulfilling conspiracy theories about the U.S. government, media, or social media being controlled by foreign forces. These theories, thus detracting from their credibility. Elections in the U.S. present an opportunity for the Kremlin to step up its influence in support of its larger foreign policy objectives. The Russians know which party is interested in which issues and can push narratives that help or hurt certain politicians. Attempts by U.S. authorities to quell the false stories fuel the presumption that they are true.

Russia’s Unconventional Warfare: Moscow’s domination of the Information Space

Published 21 hours ago on May 20, 2023

By Antonio Graceffo

moderndiplomacy.eu · by Antonio Graceffo · May 20, 2023

U.S. intelligence and defense services, as well as the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) 2023 Threat Assessment recognize China and Russia as the two greatest threats to U.S. national security. The U.S. has more firepower than either of the two and is a member of the world’s most powerful military alliances NATO, Aukus, and the Quad. Consequently, the U.S. would have a distinct advantage in a direct conflict. However, direct conflict remains a future possibility. Meanwhile, Russia and China have both been attacking the U.S. through unconventional warfare for decades. Because Russia is better at understanding American language and culture, and owing to their vast experience, dating back to World War II, arguably, Russia tends to be more effective at unconventional warfare than China.

George Kennan, the father of the containment policy, defined unconventional warfare as “the employment of all the means at a nation’s command, short of war, to achieve its national objectives.” Unconventional warfare can be military or quasi-military operations, other than conventional, direct warfare. Called the Gray Zone, an area between peace and conflict, unconventional warfare can include the use of covert forces or guerilla warfare in a hot conflict. Proxy wars, such as those fought in Vietnam and Korea would be examples of a conflict between the United States and the USSR which did not involve overt, direct combat between the two. More recent examples would be the Syrian Civil War, where Russia provided military support to the government of President Bashar al-Assad, while the United States was backing various opposition groups. Similar indirect conflicts have taken place in Yugoslavia and Kosovo, as well as Georgia. The most obvious example today is the Ukraine war. Although the direct combatants are Russia and Ukraine, the war can be seen as a great-power struggle between the U.S.-led west and the Russian Federation, although no U.S. troops have taken part.

In addition to backing local forces and actively engaging in combat operations, Russia also deploys the Wagner mercenary group into conflicts around the world. Wagner supports the Kremlin’s objectives, often fighting against third-forces supported by the U.S. The group has taken an active role in conflicts in the Central African Republic, Libya, Mali, Syria, and Ukraine, among others.

Although China sometimes has an economic stake in these conflicts, such as buying oil from Russia to fund the Ukraine war or underwriting the Tatmadaw army in Myanmar, China’s participation is generally much less direct than Russia’s.

As much as Russia is a capable combatant in a hot conflict, it is in a cold conflict where Moscow has been the most damaging to the interests of the United States. In a cold conflict, unconventional warfare can include subversion, political, economic, or psychological warfare, as well as informational competition. This extends to influence operations, propaganda, cyber-attacks, espionage, and hacking. An example would be how Russia uses its influence in Iran to undermine U.S. policy in the Middle East. The Kremlin exploits its close ties with Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to hinder U.S. objectives in the Americas. Across Latin America and in Africa, Moscow pushes an anti-colonialist message which threaten U.S. policy. Ironically, Russia has been heavily involved in Africa, supporting various militias, dictators, and paramilitaries, while claiming not to be meddling in the internal, political affairs of sovereign nations.

Moscow uses the sale of weapons, as well as cheap oil and energy as a foreign policy tool, driving a wedge between the United States, India, Myanmar, and to some extent Vietnam and Turkey. Russian weapons turn up in conflicts all over the world and very often, the Wagner group does as well. Countries helping Russia bypass international sanctions have refused to condemn the Ukraine War. These would examples of the Kremlin employing diplomacy and trade as nonconventional weapons.

According to the ODNI, Russia remains the top cybersecurity threat to the United States and its allies. Russia is constantly improving its ability to damage critical infrastructure, including underwater cables, industrial control systems, telecommunications networks, and power grids. However, the most powerful and prevalent Russian weapon is control of the information space. In this realm, Moscow poses the greatest foreign influence threat faced by the U.S. Russia deploys its intelligence services, proxies, and a vast array of influence tools in an attempt to divide Western alliances and undermine U.S. global standing. To this end, Moscow sows discord within the U.S. while attempting to influence voters as well as lawmakers. Russia is particularly good at capitalizing on news and current events in the U.S. and turning them to Moscow’s advantage.

The five pillars of Russia’s information wars strategy are: official government communications, state-funded global messaging, cultivation of proxy sources, weaponization of social media, and cyber-enabled disinformation. Moscow attempts to build relationships with media personalities in order to feed them state-sponsored messages. Pro-Kremlin content is also broadcast through an array of state media, social media, influencers, and proxy websites. Moscow’s message is also published by individuals and organizations often disguised as independent news sources. Divisive stories might be wholly fabricated. Real stories are sometimes altered to create derision. Existing conspiracy theories may be amplified or fake news stories created to substantiate conspiracy theories. In some cases, real stories are simply targeted at the audience where they are most likely to evoke the desired reaction.

Within days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the administrators of social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube discovered coordinated networks of accounts disseminating disinformation. Some were hacked accounts, while others were fake accounts with AI-generated profile images. These accounts were all sharing similar information about the war which was detrimental to Ukraine.

The Russian messaging is targeted at specific audiences, tailored to evoke a response. Messaging to the right and far-right in America included accusations that Zelensky was gay, or that he was pro-trans, or a globalist puppet, and that Russia, a Christian nation, was fighting for conservative values. The messages sent to the American left included claims that Ukrainians are Nazis. Some messages were meant for general consumption, allegations that Ukraine was an illegitimate state or that it had never been a state, or that Zelensky was corrupt. Another story was that Russia was saving the world from Ukraine’s biological weapons. There were false protest videos, affirming that Ukrainians welcomed the Russian liberators. Videos and images surfaced of Zelensky and his wife allegedly shopping in Paris, spending aid money meant for the war. Conspiracy theories flooded the alt-right, including a narrative that democrats approved aid to Ukraine, so that the aid money could be funneled back to the U.S. to support democrat political campaigns.

Other narratives being pushed were that NATO, Ukraine, or the U.S. was responsible for the war. The goal in all of these disinformation efforts was to cause derision within the U.S. and weaken support for Ukraine. China also seized on the narrative that the west was responsible for the war, in an effort to portray itself as a peacemaker. Xi Jinping flew to Moscow to present Vladimir Putin with his plan for peace in Ukraine. Beijing launched a social media campaign alleging that the Americans would reject Xi’s plan, coercing Zelensky into continued conflict, at the expense of innocent Ukrainian lives. And that is exactly what happened. Ukraine, the U.S., the E.U rejected Xi’s plan, because it did not call for a Russian withdrawal. But this provided Moscow and Beijing the opportunity to cast themselves as peacemakers, while portraying the U.S. as warmongers.

The term used by the Russians to denote the use of information as a weapon is “Information Confrontation”. Furthermore, the term “Active Measures” is used for political warfare, including disinformation and propaganda. As these operations have been ongoing, long before the Ukraine War started, it appears that Russia believes itself to be in a state of perpetual conflict with the west. Information warfare strategy from the Soviet era was called the firehose of falsehood and it is still in use today. Conflicting information is sent out which causes internal rifts inside of enemy nations. For example, Russia broadcast information that Zelensky was both a Nazi and a socialist/globalist. Once the contradictory information is discovered, it is still difficult to know which is true. And if enough contradictory information is disseminated, people eventually stop believing anything they read or hear, even accredited news media or messages from their own government.

Free-speech laws in the U.S. make it very difficult to fight Russian misinformation. Attempts to do so become self-fulfilling conspiracy theories about the U.S. government, media, or social media being controlled by foreign forces. These theories, thus detracting from their credibility. Elections in the U.S. present an opportunity for the Kremlin to step up its influence in support of its larger foreign policy objectives. The Russians know which party is interested in which issues and can push narratives that help or hurt certain politicians. Attempts by U.S. authorities to quell the false stories fuel the presumption that they are true.

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Antonio Graceffo

Antonio Graceffo, PhD. China-MBA, is a China economic-analyst who has spent over 20 years in Asia, including 7 in China, and 3 in Mongolia, where he teaches economics at the American university. He is a graduate of Shanghai University of Sport and Antai College of Economics & Management, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Additionally, he conducted three years of post-doctoral studies at School of Economics Shanghai University, focusing on U.S.-China trade, and currently studies national security at the American Military University. He is the author of 5 books about China, including Beyond the Belt and Road: China’s Global Economic Expansion and The Wushu Doctor. His writing has appeared in The South China Morning Post, The Diplomat, Jamestown Foundation China Brief, Lowy Institute China Brief, Penthouse, and others. He is a frequent guest on various TV shows, providing China commentary on NTD network in the United States.

6. 'In a lot of the world, the clock has hit midnight': China is calling in loans to dozens of countries from Pakistan to Kenya

There have to be ways to exploit this.

'In a lot of the world, the clock has hit midnight': China is calling in loans to dozens of countries from Pakistan to Kenya

BYBERNARD CONDON AND THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

May 18, 2023 at 7:11 PM EDT

Fortune

An Associated Press analysis of a dozen countries most indebted to China — including Pakistan, Kenya, Zambia, Laos and Mongolia — found paying back that debt is consuming an ever-greater amount of the tax revenue needed to keep schools open, provide electricity and pay for food and fuel. And it’s draining foreign currency reserves these countries use to pay interest on those loans, leaving some with just months before that money is gone.

Behind the scenes is China’s reluctance to forgive debt and its extreme secrecy about how much money it has loaned and on what terms, which has kept other major lenders from stepping in to help. On top of that is the recent discovery that borrowers have been required to put cash in hidden escrow accounts that push China to the front of the line of creditors to be paid.

Countries in AP’s analysis had as much as 50% of their foreign loans from China and most were devoting more than a third of government revenue to paying off foreign debt. Two of them, Zambia and Sri Lanka, have already gone into default, unable to make even interest payments on loans financing the construction of ports, mines and power plants.

In Pakistan, millions of textile workers have been laid off because the country has too much foreign debt and can’t afford to keep the electricity on and machines running.

In Kenya, the government has held back paychecks to thousands of civil service workers to save cash to pay foreign loans. The president’s chief economic adviser tweeted last month, “Salaries or default? Take your pick.”

Since Sri Lanka defaulted a year ago, a half-million industrial jobs have vanished, inflation has pierced 50% and more than half the population in many parts of the country has fallen into poverty.

Experts predict that unless China begins to soften its stance on its loans to poor countries, there could be a wave of more defaults and political upheavals.

“In a lot of the world, the clock has hit midnight,” said Harvard economist Ken Rogoff. “ China has moved in and left this geopolitical instability that could have long-lasting effects.”

How it’s playing out

A case study of how it has played out is in Zambia, a landlocked country of 20 million people in southern Africa that over the past two decades has borrowed billions of dollars from Chinese state-owned banks to build dams, railways and roads.

The loans boosted Zambia’s economy but also raised foreign interest payments so high there was little left for the government, forcing it to cut spending on healthcare, social services and subsidies to farmers for seed and fertilizer.

In the past under such circumstances, big government lenders such as the U.S., Japan and France would work out deals to forgive some debt, with each lender disclosing clearly what they were owed and on what terms so no one would feel cheated.

But China didn’t play by those rules. It refused at first to even join in multinational talks, negotiating separately with Zambia and insisting on confidentiality that barred the country from telling non-Chinese lenders the terms of the loans and whether China had devised a way of muscling to the front of the repayment line.

Amid this confusion in 2020, a group of non-Chinese lenders refused desperate pleas from Zambia to suspend interest payments, even for a few months. That refusal added to the drain on Zambia’s foreign cash reserves, the stash of mostly U.S. dollars that it used to pay interest on loans and to buy major commodities like oil. By November 2020, with little reserves left, Zambia stopped paying the interest and defaulted, locking it out of future borrowing and setting off a vicious cycle of spending cuts and deepening poverty.

Inflation in Zambia has since soared 50%, unemployment has hit a 17-year high and the nation’s currency, the kwacha, has lost 30% of its value in just seven months. A United Nations estimate of Zambians not getting enough food has nearly tripled so far this year, to 3.5 million.

“I just sit in the house thinking what I will eat because I have no money to buy food,” said Marvis Kunda, a blind 70-year-old widow in Zambia’s Luapula province whose welfare payments were recently slashed. “Sometimes I eat once a day and if no one remembers to help me with food from the neighborhood, then I just starve.”

A few months after Zambia defaulted, researchers found that it owed $6.6 billion to Chinese state-owned banks, double what many thought at the time and about a third of the country’s total debt.

“We’re flying blind,” said Brad Parks, executive director of AidData, a research lab at William & Mary that has uncovered thousands of secret Chinese loans and assisted the AP in its analysis. “When you look under the cushions of the couch, suddenly you realize, ‘Oh, there’s a lot of stuff we missed. And actually things are much worse.’”

Debt and upheaval

China’s unwillingness to take big losses on the hundreds of billions of dollars it is owed, as the International Monetary Fund and World Bank have urged, has left many countries on a treadmill of paying back interest, which stifles the economic growth that would help them pay off the debt.

Foreign cash reserves have dropped in 10 of the dozen countries in AP’s analysis, down an average 25% in just a year. They have plunged more than 50% in Pakistan and the Republic of Congo. Without a bailout, several countries have only months left of foreign cash to pay for food, fuel and other essential imports. Mongolia has eight months left. Pakistan and Ethiopia about two.

“As soon as the financing taps are turned off, the adjustment takes place right away,” said Patrick Curran, senior economist at researcher Tellimer. “The economy contracts, inflation spikes up, food and fuel become unaffordable.”

Mohammad Tahir, who was laid off six months ago from his job at a textile factory in the Pakistani city of Multan, says he has contemplated suicide because he can no longer bear to see his family of four go to bed night after night without dinner.

“I’ve been facing the worst kind of poverty,” said Tahir, who was recently told Pakistan’s foreign cash reserves have depleted so much that it was now unable to import raw materials for his factory. “I have no idea when we would get our jobs back.”

Poor countries have been hit with foreign currency shortages, high inflation, spikes in unemployment and widespread hunger before, but rarely like in the past year.

Along with the usual mix of government mismanagement and corruption are two unexpected and devastating events: the war in Ukraine, which has sent prices of grain and oil soaring, and the U.S. Federal Reserve’s decision to raise interest rates 10 times in a row, the latest this month. That has made variable rate loans to countries suddenly much more expensive.

All of it is roiling domestic politics and upending strategic alliances.

In March, heavily indebted Honduras cited “financial pressures” in its decision to establish formal diplomatic ties to China and sever those with Taiwan.

Last month, Pakistan was so desperate to prevent more blackouts that it struck a deal to buy discounted oil from Russia, breaking ranks with the U.S.-led effort to shut off Vladimir Putin’s funds.

In Sri Lanka, rioters poured into the streets last July, setting homes of government ministers aflame and storming the presidential palace, sending the leader tied to onerous deals with China fleeing the country.

China’s response

The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a statement to the AP, disputed the notion that China is an unforgiving lender and echoed previous statements putting the blame on the Federal Reserve. It said that if it is to accede to IMF and World Bank demands to forgive a portion of its loans, so should those multilateral lenders, which it views as U.S. proxies.

“We call on these institutions to actively participate in relevant actions in accordance with the principle of ‘joint action, fair burden’ and make greater contributions to help developing countries tide over the difficulties,” the ministry statement said.

China argues it has offered relief in the form of extended loan maturities and emergency loans, and as the biggest contributor to a program to temporarily suspend interest payments during the coronavirus pandemic. It also says it has forgiven 23 no-interest loans to African countries, though AidData’s Parks said such loans are mostly from two decades ago and amount to less than 5% of the total it has lent.

In high-level talks in Washington last month, China was considering dropping its demand that the IMF and World Bank forgive loans if the two lenders would make commitments to offer grants and other help to troubled countries, according to various news reports. But in the weeks since there has been no announcement and both lenders have expressed frustration with Beijing.

“My view is that we have to drag them — maybe that’s an impolite word — we need to walk together,” IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said earlier this month. “Because if we don’t, there will be catastrophe for many, many countries.”

The IMF and World Bank say taking losses on their loans would rip up the traditional playbook of dealing with sovereign crises that accords them special treatment because, unlike Chinese banks, they already finance at low rates to help distressed countries get back on their feet. The Chinese foreign ministry noted, however, that the two multilateral lenders have made an exception to the rules in the past, forgiving loans to many countries in the mid-1990s to save them from collapse.

As time runs out, some officials are urging concessions.

Ashfaq Hassan, a former debt official at Pakistan’s Ministry of Finance, said his country’s debt burden is too heavy and time too short for the IMF and World Bank to hold out. He also called for concessions from private investment funds that lent to his country by purchasing bonds.

“Every stakeholder will have to take a haircut,” Hassan said.

China has also pushed back on the idea, popularized in the Trump administration, that it has engaged in “debt trap diplomacy,” leaving countries saddled with loans they cannot afford so that it can seize ports, mines and other strategic assets.

On this point, experts who have studied the issue in detail have sided with Beijing. Chinese lending has come from dozens of banks on the mainland and is far too haphazard and sloppy to be coordinated from the top. If anything, they say, Chinese banks are not taking losses because the timing is awful as they face big hits from reckless real estate lending in their own country and a dramatically slowing economy.

But the experts are quick to point out that a less sinister Chinese role is not a less scary one.

“There is no single person in charge,” said Teal Emery, a former sovereign loan analyst who now runs consulting group Teal Insights.

Adds AidData’s Parks about Beijing, “They’re kind of making it up as they go along. There is no master plan.”

Loan sleuth

Much of the credit for dragging China’s hidden debt into the light goes to Parks, who over the past decade has had to contend with all manner of roadblocks, obfuscations and falsehoods from the authoritarian government.

The hunt began in 2011 when a top World Bank economist asked Parks to take over the job of looking into Chinese loans. Within months, using online data-mining techniques, Parks and a few researchers began uncovering hundreds of loans the World Bank had not known about.

China at the time was ramping up lending that would soon become part of its $1 trillion “Belt and Road Initiative” to secure supplies of key minerals, win allies abroad and make more money off its U.S. dollar holdings. Many developing countries were eager for U.S. dollars to build power plants, roads and ports and expand mining operations.

But after a few years of straightforward Chinese government loans, those countries found themselves heavily indebted, and the optics were awful. They feared that piling more loans atop old ones would make them seem reckless to credit rating agencies and make it more expensive to borrow in the future.

So China started setting up shell companies for some infrastructure projects and lent to them instead, which allowed heavily indebted countries to avoid putting that new debt on their books. Even if the loans were backed by the government, no one would be the wiser.

In Zambia, for example, a $1.5 billion loan from two Chinese banks to a shell company to build a giant hydroelectric dam didn’t appear on the country’s books for years.

In Indonesia, Chinese loans of $4 billion to help build a railway also never appeared on public government accounts. That all changed years later when, overbudget by $1.5 billion, the Indonesian government was forced to bail out the railroad twice.

“When these projects go bad, what was advertised as a private debt becomes a public debt,” Parks said. “There are projects all over the globe like this.”

In 2021, a decade after Parks and his team began their hunt, they had gathered enough information for a blockbuster finding: At least $385 billion of hidden and underreported Chinese debt in 88 countries, and many of those countries were in far worse shape than anyone knew.

Among the disclosures was that China issued a $3.5 billion loan to build a railway system in Laos, which would take nearly a quarter of the country’s annual output to pay off.

Another AidData report around the same time suggested that many Chinese loans go to projects in areas of countries favored by powerful politicians and frequently right before key elections. Some of the things built made little economic sense and were riddled with problems.

In Sri Lanka, a Chinese-funded airport built in the president’s hometown away from most of the country’s population is so barely used that elephants have been spotted wandering on its tarmac.

Cracks are appearing in hydroelectric plants in Uganda and Ecuador, where in March the government got judicial approval for corruption charges tied to the project against a former president now in exile.

In Pakistan, a power plant had to be shut down for fear it could collapse. In Kenya, the last key miles of a railway were never built due to poor planning and a lack of funds.

Jumping to the front of the line

As Parks dug into the details of the loans, he found something alarming: Clauses mandating that borrowing countries deposit U.S. dollars or other foreign currency in secret escrow accounts that Beijing could raid if those countries stopped paying interest on their loans.

In effect, China had jumped to the front of the line to get paid without other lenders knowing.

In Uganda, Parks revealed a loan to expand the main airport included an escrow account that could hold more than $15 million. A legislative probe blasted the finance minister for agreeing to such terms, with the lead investigator saying he should be prosecuted and jailed.

Parks is not sure how many such accounts have been set up, but governments insisting on any kind of collateral, much less collateral in the form of hard cash, is rare in sovereign lending. And their very existence has rattled non-Chinese banks, bond investors and other lenders and made them unwilling to accept less than they’re owed.

“The other creditors are saying, ‘We’re not going to offer anything if China is, in effect, at the head of the repayment line,’” Parks said. “It leads to paralysis. Everyone is sizing each other up and saying, ‘Am I going to be a chump here?’”

Loans as ‘currency exchanges’

Meanwhile, Beijing has taken on a new kind of hidden lending that has added to the confusion and distrust. Parks and others found that China’s central bank has effectively been lending tens of billions of dollars through what appear as ordinary foreign currency exchanges.

Foreign currency exchanges, called swaps, allow countries to essentially borrow more widely used currencies like the U.S. dollar to plug temporary shortages in foreign reserves. They are intended for liquidity purposes, not to build things, and last for only a few months.

But China’s swaps mimic loans by lasting years and charging higher-than-normal interest rates. And importantly, they don’t show up on the books as loans that would add to a country’s debt total.

Mongolia has taken out $1.8 billion annually in such swaps for years, an amount equivalent to 14% of its annual economic output. Pakistan has taken out nearly $3.6 billion annually for years and Laos $300 million .

The swaps can help stave off default by replenishing currency reserves, but they pile more loans on top of old ones and can make a collapse much worse, akin to what happened in the runup to 2009 financial crisis when U.S. banks kept offering ever-bigger mortgages to homeowners who couldn’t afford the first one.

Some poor countries struggling to repay China now find themselves stuck in a kind of loan limbo: China won’t budge in taking losses, and the IMF won’t offer low-interest loans if the money is just going to pay interest on Chinese debt.

For Chad and Ethiopia, it’s been more than a year since IMF rescue packages were approved in so-called staff-level agreements, but nearly all the money has been withheld as negotiations among its creditors drag on.

“You’ve got a growing number of countries that are in dire financial straits,” said Parks, attributing it largely to China’s stunning rise in just a generation from being a net recipient of foreign aid to the world’s largest creditor.

“Somehow they’ve managed to do all of this out of public view,” he said. “So unless people understand how China lends, how its lending practices work, we’re never going to solve these crises.”

___

Condon reported from New York and Washington. AP writers Munir Ahmed in Islamabad and Noel Sichalwe in Lusaka, Zambia, contributed to this report.

Fortune

7. At G7, Japan quietly strengthens alliances

Excerpts:

According to a recent poll from the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, 80% of Japanese respondents express concern about the likelihood that Japan would be dragged into the potential military conflict across the Taiwan Strait.

Kishida is "constrained by the deep pacifism among the Japanese people," said Kingston from TUJ. "It's a difficult situation."

This means Kishida needs to balance Japan's emboldened foreign policy ambitions with his people's reservations.

International relations expert Kyoko Hatakeyama is among those analysts who think Japan can still maximize its diplomatic influence during the year of its G7 presidency.

"If the G7 summit is successful, it will boost Japan's diplomatic status," said Hatakeyama, a professor at the University of Niigata Prefecture in Japan. "And if Japan takes a more active role in maintaining regional order, the Indo-Pacific region can also benefit from these efforts."

At G7, Japan quietly strengthens alliances – DW – 05/20/2023

William Yang

11 hours ago11 hours ago

Amid rising security risks in the Indo-Pacific region, Japan is diplomatically cultivating allies near and far during the G7 presidency.

As leaders from the Group of Seven (G7) major industrial countries meet in Japan, the host nation is using the three-day summit to highlight pressing security challenges in the Indo-Pacific region while asserting itself as a key player on the international stage.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is "leveraging" Japan's G7 presidency to draw the world's attention to the challenging security situation in the region, said Jeff Kingston, director of Asian Studies at Temple University Japan.

Security issues in the Indo-Pacific region include China's ongoing efforts to expand and modernize its nuclear forces and technologies, its potential invasion of Taiwan, and North Korea's continuation of its military nuclear weapons program.

G7 leaders summit kicks off in Hiroshima

Three countries in Japan's vicinity, North Korea, China and Russia, possess nuclear weapons capabilities. As such, holding the G7 summit in Hiroshima, one of two Japanese cities devastated by atomic bombs dropped by the United States in the last days of World War II, has an enormous symbolism.

Prior to the start of the summit, Kishida said he believes the first step toward any nuclear disarmament effort is to provide "a first-hand experience of the consequences of the atomic bombing and to firmly convey the reality."

Promoting nuclear disarmament, which may include getting North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles program, is a '"personal mission for Kishida," said Kingston, "and it's a distant goal."

Beyond the Indo-Pacific

In his attempt to achieve that goal, Kishida has expanded Japan's diplomatic efforts beyond its traditional allies in the Indo-Pacific. Kishida was quick to condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year and impose sanctions on Russian entities while offering aid and military assistance worth millions of dollars. In March, he made an unannounced visit to Kyiv.

According to Christopher B. Johnstone and Nicholas Szechenyi from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a US think tank, the visit wasn't just about symbolic support. It also showed "Japan's own determination to support Ukraine and oppose Russia's attempt to change the status quo by force — a universal principle that Tokyo sees as vital to uphold in the face of Chinese coercion in Asia."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has also been invited to address the G7 summit in person on Sunday.

Zelenskyy in Japan for G7 summit: Richard Walker reports

Expanding traditional alliances

Kishida has also invited leaders from several Global South nations to attend the meeting as observers, including Indonesia, India, Vietnam, and Brazil.

Although it has become customary to invite leaders from non-G7 nations in recent years, Japan is making efficient use of the G7 to expand traditional alliances, says Japan security expert Robert Ward, amid growing concern about the potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

Japan needs "a network as densely as it can be and in as many areas related to security as it can be," said Ward, Japan chair and senior fellow with the UK-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, "because Japan's needs go beyond the traditional US-Japan security relationship."

G7 leaders offered silent prayers in front of the centotaph at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima CityImage: Naoki Maeda/Yomiuri Shimbun/AP/picture alliance

To further strengthen Japan's security cooperation with key regional allies, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese are also present in Hiroshima.

Japan's diplomatic efforts in Europe and closer to home are paying off, said Eleanor Hughes, a non-resident fellow at the Chicago-based think tank EconVue.

She points to Japan signing of a landmark agreement with the United Kingdom on the eve of the summit. The hailed "Japan's pivotal role in the Indo-Pacific and their centrality to the UK's security and prosperity."

Other signs of Japan's diplomatic success, according to Hughes, include a reciprocal access agreement with Australia, its advancement of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (commonly known as the Quad) between India, Australia, Japan and the United States and increasing engagement with African countries and the Global South.

New defense posture

Japan's efforts to present itself as a major player in international politics are coupled with the dramatic transformation of its defense posture. Last December, Japan announced the plan to double its defense budget and acquire counterstrike capabilities.

Additionally, Kishida has also strengthened bilateral exchanges with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Filipino President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. During a meeting between Japanese and Filipino Foreign Ministers in Tokyo on May 16, both countries agree to deepen security cooperation, citing China's growing maritime assertiveness as a mutual concern.

PM Fumio Kishida is "leveraging" Japan's G7 presidency to draw the world's attention to the challenging security situation in the regionImage: Jonathan Ernst/REUTERS

Despite major changes to its security posture in recent months, the Japanese public seems somewhat ambivalent to the government's new direction.

According to a recent poll from the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, 80% of Japanese respondents express concern about the likelihood that Japan would be dragged into the potential military conflict across the Taiwan Strait.

Kishida is "constrained by the deep pacifism among the Japanese people," said Kingston from TUJ. "It's a difficult situation."

This means Kishida needs to balance Japan's emboldened foreign policy ambitions with his people's reservations.

International relations expert Kyoko Hatakeyama is among those analysts who think Japan can still maximize its diplomatic influence during the year of its G7 presidency.

"If the G7 summit is successful, it will boost Japan's diplomatic status," said Hatakeyama, a professor at the University of Niigata Prefecture in Japan. "And if Japan takes a more active role in maintaining regional order, the Indo-Pacific region can also benefit from these efforts."

8. Quad Leaders’ Joint Statement

Quad Leaders’ Joint Statement | The White House

whitehouse.gov · by The White House · May 20, 2023

20 May 2023, Hiroshima

Today, we — Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, Prime Minister Kishida Fumio of Japan, and President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. of the United States — met for the third in-person Quad Leaders’ Summit, hosted by Prime Minister Albanese.

Together, we reaffirm our steadfast commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific that is inclusive and resilient. The global strategic and economic environment is changing rapidly – with direct impacts on countries in the region. We believe we should navigate this time of uncertainty and opportunity together, working closely with our Indo-Pacific partners. We believe all countries have a role in contributing to regional peace, stability, and prosperity, as well as upholding international law, including the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the rules-based international order. We seek a region where no country dominates and no country is dominated – one where all countries are free from coercion, and can exercise their agency to determine their futures. Our four countries are united by this shared vision.

As Indo-Pacific countries, Quad partners are deeply invested in our region’s success. Harnessing our collective strengths and resources, we are supporting the region’s development, stability, and prosperity through the Quad’s positive, practical agenda. Our work is guided by regional countries’ priorities and responds to the region’s needs. We are and will continue to be transparent in what we do. Respect for the leadership of regional institutions, including the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), and the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA), is and will remain at the centre of the Quad’s efforts.

The Quad Leaders’ Vision Statement we have issued today sets out our shared vision for the Quad and the Indo-Pacific region based on these principles.

Today we reaffirm our consistent and unwavering support for ASEAN centrality and unity. We are committed to ensuring the Quad’s work is aligned with ASEAN’s principles and priorities and continues to support implementation of the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (AOIP). We underscore ASEAN’s regional leadership role, including in the East Asia Summit, the region’s premier leader-led forum for strategic dialogue, and the ASEAN Regional Forum. We strongly support Indonesia’s 2023 ASEAN Chairmanship and its Chair theme “ASEAN Matters: Epicentrum of Growth”. We will continue to strengthen our respective relationships with ASEAN and seek opportunities for greater Quad collaboration in support of the AOIP.

We recommit to working in partnership with Pacific island countries to achieve shared aspirations and address shared challenges. We reaffirm our support for Pacific regional institutions that have served the region well over many years, foremost the PIF, and warmly welcome Cook Islands assuming the PIF Chair in 2023. We continue to support the objectives of the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent, and commit to working with partners, including through Partners in the Blue Pacific, to support engagement with these objectives. We welcome the 3rd Summit of the Forum for India-Pacific Islands Cooperation and the U.S. – Pacific Island Forum meeting, both to be held in Papua New Guinea in coming days. We also applaud Japan’s longstanding engagement with Pacific island countries through the Pacific Islands’ Leaders Meeting (PALM), and Australia’s deep and enduring commitment to the Pacific as part of the Pacific family, including as a founding member of the PIF.

In these efforts, Quad Leaders will listen to and be guided at every step by Pacific priorities, including climate action, ocean health, resilient infrastructure, maritime security and financial integrity. In particular, we acknowledge climate change remains the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and wellbeing of the peoples of the Pacific and applaud Pacific island countries’ global leadership on climate action.

We remain committed to strengthening cooperation in the Indian Ocean region. We welcome the work of IORA as the Indian Ocean region’s premier forum for addressing the region’s challenges. We recognise India’s leadership in finalising the IORA Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (IOIP) and express our support for its implementation. We thank Bangladesh for its term as IORA Chair and commit to working with Sri Lanka and India as they assume the roles of IORA Chair and Vice Chair respectively this year.

We, the countries of the Quad, will work together to be a global force for good. We will bring our combined resolve to support each other’s international leadership in 2023 including Australia’s hosting of the Quad, Japan’s G7 presidency, India’s G20 presidency and the United States’ APEC host year.

The Quad’s positive, practical agenda

We recognise the urgent need to address the climate crisis, which poses tremendous environmental, social, and economic challenges for our region. Today we underline our dedication to taking significant action on climate change – individually and collectively. We will continue to support climate mitigation, adaptation, and resilience efforts in alignment with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement as well as regional architecture, including ASEAN, the PIF, and IORA. We will continue to collaborate on green shipping and ports, disaster risk management, exchanging climate information, and capacity building support for Article 6 implementation of the Paris Agreement. Under the Climate Information Services Initiative, we plan to coordinate our collective resources to support early warning systems in the Indo-Pacific, including through the Pacific-led Weather Ready Pacific initiative and the longstanding leadership of the Pacific Meteorological Council. We also intend to provide support through global partnerships such as the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) and its Infrastructure for Resilient Islands States (IRIS) initiative.

We recognise that achieving sustainable consumption and production is a key component of global efforts to achieve the 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), environment and climate ambitions. We will work together to seek meaningful outcomes on climate action and the clean economy transition in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF).

The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report makes clear that rapid and far-reaching transitions are needed across all sectors and systems. As we move to a net zero world, we underscore that it is critical to strengthen our cooperation to ensure better access to affordable, reliable and secure clean energy in the Indo-Pacific. We will work together to increase the region’s access to climate finance and climate smart technology. Under the Quad Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Package (Q-CHAMP), launched in 2022, we continue to work together and with Indo-Pacific partners to enhance climate and clean energy cooperation as well as promote adaptation and resilience. In this regard, we welcome the Sydney Energy Forum and the Quad Clean Hydrogen Partnership meeting hosted by Australia and India respectively in July 2022.

Building on those foundations, today, we are issuing a Statement of Principles on Clean Energy Supply Chains in the Indo-Pacific, which provide a basis for our engagement in the region on clean energy supply chain development. The principles are designed to promote diverse, secure, transparent and resilient clean energy supply chains and support a sustainable, and inclusive clean energy transition. We also announce a Clean Energy Supply Chains initiative designed to accelerate the Indo-Pacific’s clean energy transition. Working with Indo-Pacific partners, the initiative will facilitate research and development and feasibility study projects to lower clean energy manufacturing and deployment costs, enhance regional energy security, and expand and diversify the regional production of necessary materials and technologies.

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown us how important health security is to our societies, our economies, and the stability of our region. In 2021 and 2022, Quad partners stepped up to help meet the region’s most pressing need, delivering more than 400 million safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine doses to Indo-Pacific countries and almost 800 million doses globally, bilaterally and in partnership with COVAX.

Today, we announce the evolution of our Quad Vaccine Partnership into a broader Quad Health Security Partnership. Through this partnership, we will strengthen our coordination and collaboration in support of health security in the Indo-Pacific. We plan to implement a suite of activities to build the region’s capacity to detect and respond rapidly to outbreaks of diseases with epidemic and pandemic potential. These activities include support for health workforce development, disease surveillance, and electronic health information systems and coordination of outbreak responses, such as the Quad Pandemic Preparedness Exercise.

We will continue cooperation with Indo-Pacific partners to meet the region’s infrastructure priorities. Delivering on our commitment at the 2022 Quad Leaders’ Summit, we will continue to support access to quality, sustainable and climate-resilient infrastructure investments in our region. We aim to ensure the investments we support are fit for purpose, demand driven and responsive to countries’ needs, and do not impose unsustainable debt burdens. We will build on ongoing programs for Indo-Pacific countries including training and capacity-building focused on digital and economic connectivity, clean energy, and climate resilient power sector infrastructure. We continue to strengthen capacity to manage debt issues, including under the G20 Common Framework and promote debt sustainability and transparency.

Today, we announce a new initiative to boost infrastructure expertise across the Indo-Pacific: the ‘Quad Infrastructure Fellowships Program’. The initiative aims to empower more than 1,800 of the region’s infrastructure practitioners to design, build and manage quality infrastructure in their home countries.

The Quad is committed to improving the region’s connectivity through the development of resilient infrastructure. We recognise the urgent need to support quality undersea cable networks in the Indo-Pacific, which are key to global growth and prosperity. Today we announce a new ‘Quad Partnership for Cable Connectivity and Resilience’. The Partnership will strengthen cable systems in the Indo-Pacific, drawing on Quad countries’ world-class expertise in manufacturing, delivering and maintaining cable infrastructure.

Quad partners’ export credit agencies make an important contribution to the prosperity of the Indo-Pacific. We welcome ongoing efforts to enhance cooperation among Quad partners’ export credit agencies: including through a Memorandum of Cooperation between ECGC Limited of India, Export Finance Australia (EFA), Nippon Export and Investment Insurance (NEXI) of Japan, and Export-Import Bank of the United States (USEXIM).

We recognise the transformative power of technology, including digital public infrastructure, to support sustainable development in the Indo-Pacific and deliver economic and social benefits. We are stepping up our efforts to strengthen supply chain resilience and improve the region’s digital connectivity through access to critical and emerging technologies and advanced telecommunications technology, including 5G networks.

Today, we announce cooperation with Palau to establish a deployment of Open Radio Access Networks (Open RAN), the first in the Pacific. The Quad is committed to ensuring regional countries are not left behind as telecommunications markets and network architectures evolve. We support access to innovations, such as Open RAN, that enable greater vendor choice for countries to expand and modernise their telecommunications networks. We also welcome the release of the Open RAN Security Report which is expected to promote industry investment in approaches to telecommunications that are demonstrably open, interoperable, trusted and secure.

The Quad International Standards Cooperation Network and the Quad Principles on Critical and Emerging Technology Standards, released today, reflect our support for industry-led, consensus-based multi-stakeholder approaches to the development of technology standards.

We welcome the launch of the private sector-led Quad Investors Network (QUIN), which aims to facilitate investments in strategic technologies, including clean energy, semiconductors, critical minerals, and quantum.

We intend to support joint research to advance innovation in agriculture through emerging technologies designed to empower farmers everywhere to increase yield and resistance.

We reaffirm our commitment to a more secure cyberspace and to fostering an international digital economy that works for everyone. Quad partners will continue collaborating to enhance regional capacity and resilience to cyber incidents and threats. We welcome the first Quad Cyber Challenge, held earlier this year to promote cyber awareness and empower participants across the Indo-Pacific to protect themselves online. We also welcome the Quad Joint Principles for Secure Software and the Quad Joint Principles for Cyber Security of Critical Infrastructure, and efforts to develop a guiding framework for ensuring supply chain security and resilience. These principles are designed to strengthen our region’s defences against cyber threats to the software supply chain and critical infrastructure and services.

We recognise the importance of space technologies and space-related applications in responding to climate change and disasters, and enhancing the sustainable use of oceans and marine resources. We reaffirm our commitment to supporting capacity building for countries in the region. The Quad Space Working Group will explore avenues to deliver Earth Observation data and other space-related applications to assist nations across the Indo-Pacific to strengthen climate early warning systems and better manage the impacts of extreme weather events. We commit to open sharing of civil Earth Observation data. We will continue to consult each other and the region on the peaceful, safe and sustainable use of outer space. We announce our intention to share expertise and experience in space situational awareness. We commit to strengthening our commercial space cooperation, including convening a commercial space business forum in 2023.

We are pleased the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA), announced at the 2022 Tokyo Quad Leaders’ Summit, is underway in its pilot phase. Through IPMDA, we are providing near-real-time, integrated and cost-effective maritime domain data to maritime agencies in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, and will expand coverage to partners in the Indian Ocean region in the coming months. This supports our regional partners in combatting a wide range of illicit maritime activities, including illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, and responding to climate-related and humanitarian events. We are committed to deepening engagement with regional partners to support maritime safety and security and uphold international law.

At the 2021 Quad Leaders’ Summit in Washington, we launched the Quad Fellowship. This year, we welcome the first cohort of Quad STEM Fellows, who will begin their studies in the United States in August 2023. Our one hundred Quad Fellows from all four Quad countries represent the best and brightest of our next generation. The diversity and dynamism of this inaugural class will help to ensure our nations remain at the forefront of innovation and we wish them well.

Global and regional issues

We remain fully resolved to uphold peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific maritime domain. We strongly oppose destabilising or unilateral actions that seek to change the status quo by force or coercion. We emphasise the importance of adherence to international law, particularly as reflected in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and the maintenance of freedom of navigation and overflight, in addressing challenges to the maritime rules-based order, including those in the East and South China Seas. We express serious concern at the militarisation of disputed features, the dangerous use of coastguard and maritime militia vessels, and efforts to disrupt other countries’ offshore resource exploitation activities. We emphasise that disputes should be resolved peacefully and in accordance with international law, without threat or use of force.

Together, with our global and regional partners, we will buttress international institutions and initiatives that underpin global peace, prosperity and development. We reiterate our unwavering support for the United Nations (UN) Charter and the three pillars of the UN system. In consultation with our partners, we will work collectively to address attempts to unilaterally undermine the integrity of the UN, its Charter and its agencies. We seek to strengthen and reform the multilateral system so it may better reflect contemporary realities and meet aspirations of the Indo-Pacific region. We remain committed to a comprehensive UN reform agenda, including through expansion in permanent and non-permanent categories of membership of the UN Security Council. We reaffirm our commitment to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the achievement of its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We underscore the importance of achieving the SDGs in a comprehensive manner without selectively prioritising a narrow set of such goals, and reaffirm that the UN has a central role in supporting countries in their implementation.

We stand for adherence to international law, peaceful resolution of disputes and respect for principles of the UN Charter, including territorial integrity and sovereignty of all states. In this context, today we express our deep concern over the war raging in Ukraine and mourn its terrible and tragic humanitarian consequences. We recognise its serious impacts on the global economic system including on food, fuel and energy security and critical supply chains. We will continue to render humanitarian assistance to Ukraine for its recovery. Conscious that ours must not be an era of war, we remain committed to dialogue and diplomacy. We support a comprehensive, just and lasting peace consistent with the UN Charter. In this context, we concur that the use, or threat of use, of nuclear weapons is serious and inadmissible.

We condemn North Korea’s destabilising ballistic missile launches and pursuit of nuclear weapons in violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions (UNSCRs). These launches pose a grave threat to international peace and stability. We urge North Korea to abide by all its obligations under the UNSCRs, refrain from further provocations and engage in substantive dialogue. We urge North Korea to resolve the abductions issue immediately. We reaffirm our commitment to the complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula consistent with relevant UNSCRs and call on all countries to fully implement these UNSCRs. We stress the importance of addressing proliferation of nuclear and missile technologies related to North Korea in the region and beyond.

We remain deeply concerned by the deteriorating situation in Myanmar and again call for an immediate cessation of violence. We call for the release of all those arbitrarily detained, unhindered humanitarian access, resolution of the crisis through constructive dialogue, and the transition of Myanmar towards an inclusive democracy. We reaffirm our consistent support to ASEAN-led efforts, including the work of the ASEAN Chair and Office of the Special Envoy. We call for full implementation of all commitments under the ASEAN Five-Point Consensus.

We unequivocally condemn terrorism and violent extremism in all its forms and manifestations including cross-border terrorism. We are committed to international cooperation and will work with our regional partners in a comprehensive and sustained manner to strengthen capability to prevent, detect and respond to threats posed by terrorism and violent extremism, consistent with international law. We are committed to working together to promote accountability for the perpetrators of such terrorist attacks. We reiterate our condemnation of terrorist attacks, including the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai and in Pathankot, and our commitment to pursuing designations, as appropriate, by the UN Security Council 1267 Sanctions Committee. We will strengthen our cooperation through the new Working Group on Counterterrorism announced during the Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in March 2023.

We endorse the outcomes of the 3 March Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in New Delhi and the Ministers’ Joint Statement committing to deepening practical and positive cooperation for the benefit of the Indo-Pacific region. India will host our next in-person Quad Leaders’ Summit in 2024.

We, the Quad Leaders, remain firm in our resolve to meet the challenges facing our region and clear in our vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific that is stable, prosperous and inclusive. In doing so we are committed to working in partnership with Indo-Pacific countries – large and small – in deciding our future and shaping the region we all want to live in.

###

whitehouse.gov · by The White House · May 20, 2023

9. Oh look, you’re unwittingly contributing to Chinese state-sponsored cyber-warfare

Oh look, you’re unwittingly contributing to Chinese state-sponsored cyber-warfare

By Rael Hornby Camaro Dragon isn’t the next Pokémon game — it’s how you’re unknowingly supporting international cyber-warfare

By Rael Hornby laptopmag.com3 min

May 18, 2023

View Original

In the olden times, war was a straightforward kind of thing — two armies met and fought on a designated battlefield and the winner was usually the last one standing. Then we went ahead and ruined all of that chivalry with the invention of tomahawk missiles and Apache helicopters. Since then warfare has become a never-ending escalation on who can cause the most outright destruction in the least amount of time. A task we appear to be scarily good at and in no rush to slow down on.

Worse still, the battlefield itself has now also evolved. We now exist in the age of cyber-warfare on a global scale, with the modern battleground including the near-infinite expanse of the internet. A place where pasty-faced footsoldiers slouch double-time at their desks, moving silently through a digital expanse of ones and zeroes — faceless troops that don keyboards and launch full-scale assaults with lines of virtual code.

The same labyrinth of cables and wires that brings you your beloved BuzzFeed quizzes also works as the supply line for a global tug-of-war for digital dominance. It’s all very cloak-and-dagger stuff, so cloak-and-dagger that you’re probably unaware that you, yes indeed, you are now a part of it. At least you are if you own a TP-Link router.

Welcome to the CCP, Comrade

News just in, owners of TP-Link routers could now be unwitting agents of the Chinese Communist Party.

Over the last few months, Check Point Research has been investigating an alarming new piece of custom malware, going by the name “Horse Shell,” that’s infecting consumer and business-level TP-Link routers. Once deployed, the malware has full access to the infected device, granting it the freedom to upload or download files and mask the origin or destination of any traffic.

The result of which magically transforms your trusty personal wireless router into a fully functioning proxy for ner-do-wells to use and abuse as they please. So just who is behind the injection of this malicious code? According to the security sleuths at Check Point Research, this particular campaign can be traced back to the Chinese state-sponsored group they’ve labeled “Camaro Dragon.” Which, as it turns out is an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) and not some sort of bootleg Pokémon.

The “Horse Shell” malware has already been found to play a part in the targeting of European foreign affairs entities — piggybacking through several of these infected nodes as it went. And, while the malicious code being researched included images of TP-Link firmware, the written code is referred to as “agnostic” in nature, meaning this problem could be more widespread than through one specific brand. So, if you’re within ten feet of a wireless device, you could effectively be surrounded by the impending threat of a foreign cyber attack at any moment. Enjoy carrying that bit of knowledge around with you today.

Outlook

Before you start ripping your TP-Link router from the socket and attacking it with a hatchet for making you an unwitting accomplice to treason, there are methods at hand for the prevention and removal of this malicious injection — methods that won’t result in you picking out shards of plastic and transistors from your white picket-fenced lawn over the next week and change.

The exact method of how “Camaro Dragon” have managed to inject its malware into these devices remains as of yet elusive. Though researchers do presume that weak, default, or otherwise insecure password protection may be as equal a culprit as other commonly known exploits.

As such, be sure to change the default credentials of your router (or any device for that matter) before it is connected to the internet. Also, make sure that your router’s firmware and any attributing software are regularly kept up to date. Simple measures like this may seem quaint, but they will often make your devices far too much of a headache for attackers to bother with.

Check back with Laptop Mag often for any further details and updates on software and online security issues that may be relevant to you.

10. How GOP attacks on 'wokeism' helped lead the Pentagon to abandon its effort to combat extremism in the military

How GOP attacks on 'wokeism' helped lead the Pentagon to abandon its effort to combat extremism in the military | CNN Politics

CNN · by Zachary Cohen,Oren Liebermann,Haley Britzky · May 19, 2023

Washington CNN —

An early Biden administration initiative to root out extremism in the military was designed to identify people like Jack Teixeira, the 21-year-old Air National Guardsman with a long-history of violent and racist behavior now accused of perpetrating one of the biggest leaks of classified documents in modern history.

But more than two years after the Countering Extremism Working Group was formed inside the Pentagon, the effort has vanished virtually without a trace.

As the Pentagon grapples with the aftermath of the leak, the working group’s stated objectives look eerily prescient, and, in some cases, tailor-made to zero-in on the sort of anti-government, White supremacist behavior and views espoused by Teixeira.

CNN interviews with multiple sources familiar with the working group reveal that the Pentagon largely abandoned the effort to combat extremism in its ranks, as senior officials folded under political pressure from Republicans who lashed out at the initiative as an example of so-called wokeism in the military.

Of the six recommendations the working group made at the end of 2021, only one has begun to be implemented across the Defense Department, a Pentagon spokesperson told reporters on May 18.

A casualty of the war on ‘woke’

The working group’s since-departed leader, a Black combat veteran named Bishop Garrison, came under withering attack in 2021 by GOP lawmakers and right-wing media personalities, including one Fox News host who described him as a “MAGA purge man” for criticizing former President Donald Trump in a tweet prior to assuming the extremism adviser role at the Pentagon.

In this 2018 photo, Bishop Garrison speaks at a Nobody Is Above the Law rally protesting President Trump's interference in the Mueller investigation in Washington, DC.

Larry French/Getty Images for MoveOn

Though senior officials, including Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, privately and publicly backed Garrison for a few months, multiple sources tell CNN the sustained GOP criticism eventually eroded internal support for him.

As a result, Garrison and his work were quietly pushed aside, several current and former defense officials said.

“He was deemed to be a distraction,” one defense official said. “He was one of the early casualties in the war on ‘woke.’”

As Garrison became a lightning rod for Republican criticism, ultimately making him “politically toxic,” the official said, it became easier for the Defense Department to turn its efforts elsewhere in the summer of 2021, with the looming withdrawal from Afghanistan and more focus on the handling of sexual assault.

Senior Pentagon leaders were also concerned that Garrison might open them up to additional criticism from Republicans on Capitol Hill and stymie their efforts to get congressional support for other priorities like combating sexual assault in the military and addressing suicide rates among service members, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

A ‘zero-ripple pebble’

Another reason the working group failed was that its task was nearly impossible to implement, sources told CNN. The Pentagon has long struggled with how not only to define extremist activity but also how to police it without violating the rights of troops.

Though the definition of extremist activity was updated as a result of the working group, sources told CNN it has had no measurable impact. For all of the ceremony around its release, one defense official described the new definition as a “zero-ripple pebble in the pond.”

Said another official of the difficulty in trying to define extremist activity, “It’s like saying something is bad, but not being able to say what’s bad in the first place.”

An independent study of extremist activity across the entire US military was supposed to have been finished last June by the Institute for Defense Analysis, a national security research non-profit. But there is no evidence the study ever happened or that any report was ever released. The IDA referred all questions about the study to the Defense Department, which declined to comment on its status.

Kris Goldsmith, Army veteran and CEO of Task Force Butler, a non-profit focused on combating extremism in the military, said the way top Defense officials view the issue of extremism is “paralyzing.”

“They’re making themselves completely ineffective,” Goldsmith said, telling CNN: “I don’t recognize any difference today from two years ago in the way that extremism is treated in the military.”

According to a Defense Department inspector general report, there were 146 allegations of extremist or supremacist activity across the military in the previous fiscal year, exactly half of which was in the Army.

Trouble from the start

In February 2021, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin tapped Garrison to oversee the effort to better define the scope of the extremist problem in the ranks and ensure that troops know what behaviors are not acceptable.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin holds a media briefing at the Pentagon on October 27, 2022 in Arlington, Virginia.

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

A former West Point cadet who served two tours in Iraq with the US Army, Garrison had worked for the Biden-Harris transition team and was viewed internally as a natural pick for the job of rooting out extremism in the military. In his new role, Garrison reported directly to Austin.

In an April 9, 2021 press release, Austin officially announced the creation of the Countering Extremism Working Group and announced it would be led by Garrison. Among its objectives were updating the military’s definition of extremism, standardizing screening questionnaires to solicit specific information about current or previous extremist behavior and commission an independent study on extremist behavior within the entire force.

Before the end of the month however, it became clear that Garrison had his work cut out for him. In a congressional hearing on April 20, two four-star military commanders testified that the US military did not have problems with extremism in its ranks.

The next day, speaking at seminar on White supremacist violence, Garrison pushed back on that testimony and contradicted the military commanders. “It would be remiss if we didn’t admit that there is a problem with extremist behavior in the military. That is to say that one extremist is one too many,” Garrison told a Center for American Progress think tank seminar.

Garrison quickly drew Republican criticism as GOP lawmakers and right-wing media personalities seized on tweets he had previously sent criticizing then-President Trump.

In May, then-Fox News host Tucker Carlson described Garrison as a “lunatic” for a 2019 tweet calling Trump a “racist.”

GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz, a staunch Trump ally, claimed during a House Armed Services Committee hearing that month he was “deeply troubled” by a tweet Garrison wrote in January 2020, as Trump’s impeachment trial was underway, which read: “Calls for civility, rather than shouting down falsehoods and misinformation, shall be the death of this nation.”

Days later, 30 Republican members of the House signed a letter complaining of “creeping left-wing extremism” in the military, citing a report from a conservative media that singled out Garrison’s tweets.

Austin’s public support for Garrison appeared to evaporate later that summer and multiple sources told CNN his work also had also become deprioritized inside the Pentagon by that time.

‘Other Teixeiras’

The working group ultimately produced a final report in December 2021 that outlined the military’s new definition of extremism and provided several recommendations for how to better identify such behavior among servicemen.

But the new definition and its roadmap of potential consequences has largely fallen flat, according to two defense officials who spoke with CNN.

“When it was announced, it was not really major,” said another source familiar with the matter.

For his part, Garrison strongly defends his work at the Pentagon, calling the working group “historic.”

This image made from video provided by WCVB-TV, shows Jack Teixeira, in T-shirt and shorts, being taken into custody by armed tactical agents in April in Dighton, Massachusetts.

WCVB-TV/AP

“While past defense leaders dealt with a variety of topics prominent in societal discourse over the years, none took on extremist activity and its potential corrosive effect on the cohesion of the Total Force in this manner,” Garrison said in a statement to CNN.

In light of the alleged leaks from Teixeira, Garrison further defended the importance of his work in rooting out extremist behavior.

“Individuals that engage in this behavior make the department less safe internal and make its external work more difficult. That’s true whether their actions are of a violent nature or damage the trust in DoD as an institution like Airman First Class Jack Teixeira’s classified leaks. The department should be vocal about the productive policies it had out in place while acknowledging it can and should do more.”

Even if they had been better implemented, it’s unclear whether the working group’s recommendations would have prevented Teixeira’s alleged leaks. One of the officials who spoke to CNN said at the least, they “may have prevented other Teixeiras.”

And given all the red flags in Teixeira’s past that went unheeded, the lack of follow through looks damning in hindsight.

The Defense Department only learned about the leak on April 6, four months after prosecutors say Teixeira began posting the documents on Discord.

Teixeira also allegedly asked another user for advice on how to carry out a shooting “in a crowded urban or suburban environment,” demonstrating again the type of online behavior that qualifies as extremist under the working group’s updated definition.

“Teixeira is a great example of how the Department of Defense has failed to figure out how to root out extremists,” said Goldsmith.

CNN · by Zachary Cohen,Oren Liebermann,Haley Britzky · May 19, 2023

11. US, Phl update defense guidelines

Excerpts:

Specifically, the BDG reaffirm that an armed attack in the Pacific, “including anywhere in the South China Sea,” on either of their public vessels, aircraft or armed forces – which include their Coast Guards – “would invoke mutual defense commitments under Articles IV and V of the (MDT).”

Such attack threats include land, sea, air, space and cyberspace – through “asymmetric, hybrid and irregular warfare and grey-zone tactics.” Big words that need to be explained by experts, for which the guidelines would “chart a way forward to build interoperability in both conventional and non-conventional domains.”

US, Phl update defense guidelines

AT GROUND LEVEL - Satur C. Ocampo - The Philippine Star

May 20, 2023 | 12:00am

philstar.com · by Satur C. Ocampo

The US-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty, nearly 75 years old now, is being dusted off in the light of “current and emerging threats” to the two countries – read: China’s increasing belligerence about Taiwan and its own maritime claims over almost the entire South China Sea.

Last May 3, newly-crafted Bilateral Defense Guidelines (BDG) were released by the US State Department, which assert the treaty’s “enduring relevance” by “modernizing alliance cooperation in the service of the… shared vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific region.”

Specifically, the BDG reaffirm that an armed attack in the Pacific, “including anywhere in the South China Sea,” on either of their public vessels, aircraft or armed forces – which include their Coast Guards – “would invoke mutual defense commitments under Articles IV and V of the (MDT).”

Such attack threats include land, sea, air, space and cyberspace – through “asymmetric, hybrid and irregular warfare and grey-zone tactics.” Big words that need to be explained by experts, for which the guidelines would “chart a way forward to build interoperability in both conventional and non-conventional domains.”

To strengthen US-Philippine “combined deterrence in an evolving security environment,” the guidelines set the following objectives:

• Foster common understanding of roles, missions and capabilities within the alliance framework to face regional and global security challenges (which are mainly US concerns);

• Unify efforts across all areas of bilateral security and defense cooperation to sustain focus on principal regional security concerns; and

• Guide priority areas of defense cooperation to address both conventional and non-conventional security challenges of shared concern.

To advance these objectives, the guidelines say they need to:

• Modernize defense capabilities – Closely coordinate on the AFP modernization program by completing a Security Sector Assistance Roadmap; identify priority “defense platforms and force packages” that would bolster combined deterrence and capacity to resist coercion [presumably from China]; prioritize procurement of interoperable defense platforms (weaponry) “sourced from US programs” and the Philippines’ national defense procurement and funding initiatives and expand investments in non-weaponry defense capacity-building, via education and training exchanges, exercises and other operational activities.

• Deepen interoperability – Orient bilateral exercises and activities around improving/combining ability to counter armed attacks on either country as well as threats in space and cyberspace, while expanding the scope, scale and complexity of exercises; expand cooperation on maritime security and maritime domain awareness, by continued conduct of maritime activities, including but not limited to joint patrols (in the SCS/WPS); under the EDCA, strengthen interoperability, through infrastructure improvements, enhanced joint use of facilities, advancing additional maritime security, maritime domain awareness and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief capabilities; and rotational US access to EDCA sites.

• Enhance bilateral planning and information sharing – Conduct coordinated analysis, tabletop exercises and training/exercises to reinvigorate bilateral planning and coordination efforts; assess bilateral requirements and advance common objectives and approaches to shared challenges; develop adaptable decision-making processes and communication procedures to support flexible, timely, whole-of-government bilateral coordination and action to respond to conventional and non-conventional warfare.

Broaden information-sharing on early indications of threats to the peace and security of both countries, to ensure preparations to address principal challenges confronting the alliance; strive toward real-time information-sharing in collaboration with other departments and agencies to support deeper interoperability and operational coordination; enhance information security via consultations on policies, practices and procedures to protect classified defense and military information.

• Combat transnational and non-conventional threats – Improve cyber defense and cyber security cooperation to secure critical infrastructure and protect against attacks emanating from state and non-state actors; pursue capacity-building activities to respond to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear-related attacks and to counter the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

Prior to the adoption of the guidelines, the US-Philippines 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue held in Washington (involving the two countries’ defense and foreign affairs chiefs), issued a joint statement on April 11, 2023.

The two sides committed to do the following:

• Strengthen bilateral planning and interoperability through conducting “high-impact and high-value” joint military exercises. These characterized the largest-ever Balikatan live-fire war games held in April involving more than 17,000 American and Filipino troops, including a few Australian soldiers.

• Accelerate the implementation of EDCA projects and increase investments in US facilities inside Philippine military bases to further support combined training exercises, interoperability and civilian-led Philippine disaster preparedness and response capabilities.

• By the end of fiscal-year 2023, the US is expected to have allocated $100 million toward infrastructure investments at the five existing EDCA sites and to support the “swift operationalization” of the four additional sites approved by Ferdinand Marcos Jr. last month.

• Complement combined military training exercises with USAID community-based activities in EDCA-related projects, including increasing access to safe water supply, education and health care.

• Expand cooperation, exchange best practices and increase “strategic convergence” in counter-terrorism and addressing grey-zone challenges, including protecting strategic infrastructure against attacks emanating from state and non-state actors; fostering “civilian-led, non-military counter-terrorism initiatives, where feasible and effective, using an inclusive, rights-based, victim-centered and whole-of-society approach.”

These are so many propositions needing to be fleshed out, thoroughly examined and critiqued – from the perspective of Philippine national security, economic and social well-being.

Regarding US funding support for the “swift operationalization” of the four additional EDCA sites, none so far has been reported onstream.

AFP chief Gen. Andres Centino admitted Wednesday that no “EDCA-related construction” has started neither on the Balabac, Palawan site (140 nautical miles from Panganiban Reef, now a Chinese military outpost), nor on the two sites in Cagayan and one in Isabela.

However, the AFP has begun building a three-kilometer runway and a concrete pier with beaching ramp in Balabac, which Gen. Centino checked on recently. The runway project is funded by the Philippine government at P700 million, for joint use by the Philippine Air Force and the Balabac municipality, while the pier (cost: P305 million) is being built at the Narciso del Rosario Naval Station.

Both projects will be offered for further development by the Americans as part of their EDCA site facilities in Balabac.

philstar.com · by Satur C. Ocampo

12. After a Show-Stopping Entrance at the G7, Zelensky Pleads for More Aid

After a Show-Stopping Entrance at the G7, Zelensky Pleads for More Aid

By David E. Sanger and Peter Baker

David E. Sanger, a former Tokyo bureau chief for The Times, and Peter Baker, a former Moscow co-bureau chief for The Washington Post, reported from Hiroshima, Japan.

The New York Times · by Peter Baker · May 20, 2023

He urged his supporters to stay the course and tried to convince fence sitters like India and Brazil that there is no middle ground.

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President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine in Hiroshima on Saturday.

By David E. Sanger and

David E. Sanger, a former Tokyo bureau chief for The Times, and Peter Baker, a former Moscow co-bureau chief for The Washington Post, reported from Hiroshima, Japan.

May 20, 2023, 11:39 a.m. ET

President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine landed in Japan on Saturday determined to urge the wealthiest democracies in the world to stick with him as Moscow bets on the West growing fatigued by the cost and consequences of the war.

Mr. Zelensky made a dramatic entry into Hiroshima, landing in a French plane after days in which Ukrainian and Japanese officials insisted, presumably for security reasons, that he would join the leaders at the Group of 7 summit only virtually. He was dressed in his signature hoodie, standing out from the coat-and-tie diplomatic crowd of this annual summit meeting.

Mr. Zelensky, American and British officials say, seems to sense that when he shows up in person, he can both break through American resistance to sending more powerful weapons and pressure nations like India and Brazil that have stayed on the sidelines.

His presence could make it more difficult for them to maintain their stance as fence sitters, several officials said. And even as Mr. Zelensky consulted with countries already in his corner, he sat down with Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, to make his case for support, much as he had done earlier in the week in Saudi Arabia.

Mr. Zelensky was expected to address the Group of 7 leaders on Sunday as part of his continued efforts to marshal more military aid for his country. He is making his appeals in a city that serves as a sobering reminder of the devastation that arises when a bitter war leads to the use of a nuclear weapon.

Mr. Zelensky plans to go to the peace park that has been built on the island that was ground zero for the explosion in 1945 that ushered in the age of nuclear weapons — an era that has returned amid episodic threats by the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, to turn to his own arsenal.

Mr. Zelensky met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, who has so far refused to take sides in the war.

Even before he landed, Mr. Zelensky had won a significant victory: On Friday night President Biden told other leaders he would join the largely European effort to train Ukrainian pilots on how to fly the F-16 fighter jet. Reversing his previous stance, Mr. Biden said he would work with allies to begin providing the warplanes to Ukraine, weaning it from its dilapidated Soviet-era fighters.

Administration officials said they increasingly realized that sooner or later Ukraine would need the new fighters as part of a long-term program to deter Russia from invading anew, and decided they should get out ahead of the effort. But the planes would have little utility in the present stage of the war, where urban warfare rather than air warfare has dominated.

Mr. Zelensky arrived here just as the head of the Wagner paramilitary group said his forces had captured the devastated city of Bakhmut on Saturday, suggesting that the monthslong struggle to control it was over. The Ukrainian military rejected the claim by the mercenary group’s leader, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, who is prone to making bombastic remarks.

Much of the discussion here in the past two days has focused on cracking down on sanctions evasion, as countries seeking to play both sides of the war — including India and the United Arab Emirates — have done nothing to curtail a black-market trade in semiconductors and materials needed by Russia to keep fighting the war.

Mr. Biden and Mr. Zelensky — and most of the core members of the Group of 7 — appear intent on maximizing Moscow’s pain until it comes to the bargaining table and retreats from Ukrainian territory. While they deny a new Cold War is underway, the surge in sanctions announced over the past two days seems a modern version of the containment strategy that guided the West’s confrontation with the Soviet Union, which collapsed more than three decades ago.

This was the first time Mr. Zelensky has taken his diplomatic tour to Asia, and he landed late Saturday afternoon in the city known to the world for have resurrected itself, in a monumental reconstruction task akin to what many believe Ukraine will have to undertake.

President Volodymyr Zelensky hailed as “historic” President Biden’s decision to allow European nations to send F-16s to Ukraine.

A red carpet had been rolled out on the tarmac of an airport in Hiroshima, where live footage on the public broadcaster, NHK, showed Mr. Zelensky stepping off a French plane in his olive green hoodie. He was immediately whisked away in a black sedan.

“Japan. G7. Important meetings with partners and friends of Ukraine,” Mr. Zelensky wrote on Twitter shortly after landing. “Security and enhanced cooperation for our victory. Peace will become closer today.”

Mr. Zelensky’s visit to Japan for the Group of 7 meeting followed the trip to Saudi Arabia, where he urged Arab leaders meeting there not to turn a “blind eye” to Russian atrocities in Ukraine.

His appearance was arranged after Mr. Zelensky expressed a “strong desire” to participate in the summit face to face, Japan’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The visit is the latest in a flurry of trips outside Ukraine to shore up support ahead of an anticipated Ukrainian counteroffensive.

The leaders — besides President Biden, they include the heads of government from Japan, Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Italy; and a top European Union official — will be talking over the weekend about all dimensions of Russia’s war in Ukraine. In addition to questions of when and how to provide Kyiv with the F-16 fighter jets, they may also discuss the possibility of negotiations over an armistice or peace treaty.

A Ukrainian soldier from the 79th Brigade observes live footage of an artillery battle taking place nearby in the town of Marinka in eastern Ukraine on Friday.Credit...Finbarr O'Reilly for The New York Times

The G7 leaders have already pledged at the summit to toughen punishments on Moscow and redouble efforts to choke off funding for its war.

But they will have to do so without Mr. Biden, who cut short his stay to return to Washington for debt and spending talks.

Mr. Biden had been scheduled to fly from Japan to Papua New Guinea, where he was to meet with a phalanx of island leaders on Monday before heading on to Sydney. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia had also arranged for Mr. Biden to address Parliament in Canberra and host a meeting of the so-called Quad: the United States, Australia, India and Japan.

Now the Quad meeting will happen in Hiroshima on Saturday night instead. Papua New Guinea will get a visit by Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. Other island leaders will get an invitation to Washington. And Mr. Albanese will get a state dinner at the White House this fall, making him the fourth foreign leader to be honored with a state visit since Mr. Biden took office.

“I truly apologize to you for having to meet here instead of coming to Australia, but we have a little thing going on at home,” Mr. Biden told Mr. Albanese on Saturday at a hurriedly arranged meeting in Hiroshima after the Australian leader flew north rather than hosting the American president as originally planned.

Mr. Albanese was gracious.

“Certainly, I understand the circumstances,” he told Mr. Biden.

Motoko Rich and Jim Tankersley contributed reporting.

President Biden meeting with the Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, in the rear left of the photo.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York Times

The New York Times · by Peter Baker · May 20, 2023

13. Biden Administration Announces Additional Security Assistance for Ukraine

The accompanying fact sheet with the comeplete list of weapons and equipment can be downloaded here and it is pasted below.

https://lnks.gd/l/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJidWxsZXRpbl9saW5rX2lkIjoxMDIsInVyaSI6ImJwMjpjbGljayIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8vbWVkaWEuZGVmZW5zZS5nb3YvMjAyMy9NYXkvMjEvMjAwMzIyNjY1OC8tMS8tMS8xL1VLUkFJTkUtRkFDVC1TSEVFVC1NQVktMjEtMjAyMy5QREYiLCJidWxsZXRpbl9pZCI6IjIwMjMwNTIxLjc3MDYxNjExIn0.9xfLZaMj5Xba-32KgDnBEHm1iOhmf92BlL8bKtf7iR4/s/1373640080/br/203480749042-l

Biden Administration Announces Additional Security Assistance for Ukraine

defense.gov

Release

Immediate Release

May 21, 2023 |×

Following President Biden's meeting with President Zelenskyy in Japan, the Department of Defense (DoD) today announced additional security assistance to meet Ukraine's critical security and defense needs. This authorization is the Biden Administration's thirty-eighth drawdown of equipment from DoD inventories for Ukraine since August 2021. It includes additional ammunition for U.S.-provided HIMARS, artillery rounds, anti-armor capabilities, and critical enablers valued at up to $375 million that Ukraine is using on the battlefield to push back against Russia's unprovoked war of aggression.

The capabilities in this package include:

• Additional ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS);

• 155mm and 105mm artillery rounds;

• Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missiles;

• Javelin and AT-4 anti-armor systems;

• Laser-guided rocket system munitions;

• Demolition munitions;

• Armored bridging systems;

• Armored medical treatment vehicles;

• Trucks and trailers to transport heavy equipment;

• Logistics support equipment;

• Thermal imagery systems;

• Spare parts and other field equipment.

The United States will continue to work with its Allies and partners to provide Ukraine with capabilities to meet its immediate battlefield needs and longer-term security assistance requirements.

Publication: Ukraine Fact Sheet – May 21, 2023

ukraine response Biden president

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IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Fact Sheet on U.S. Security Assistance to Ukraine

May 21, 2023

In total, the United States has committed $38 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden Administration, including more than $37.3 billion since the beginning of Russia’s unprovoked and brutal invasion on February 24, 2022.

United States security assistance committed to Ukraine includes:

• Over 1,600 Stinger anti-aircraft systems;

• Over 10,000 Javelin anti-armor systems;

• Over 60,000 other anti-armor systems and munitions;

• Over 160 155mm Howitzers and over 2,000,000 155mm artillery rounds;

• Over 7,000 precision-guided 155mm artillery rounds;

• Over 14,000 155mm rounds of Remote Anti-Armor Mine (RAAM) Systems;

• 100,000 rounds of 125mm tank ammunition;

• Over 50,000 152mm artillery rounds;

• Approximately 40,000 130mm artillery rounds;

• 40,000 122mm artillery rounds;

• 60,000 122mm GRAD rockets;

• 72 105mm Howitzers and over 500,000 105mm artillery rounds;

• Over 300 tactical vehicles to tow weapons;

• 54 tactical vehicles to recover equipment;

• 30 ammunition support vehicles;

• 18 armored bridging systems;

• 38 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems and ammunition;

• 47 120mm mortar systems;

• 10 82mm mortar systems;

• 67 81mm mortar systems;

• 58 60mm mortar systems;

• Over 345,000 mortar rounds;

• Over 4,000 Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missiles;

• Rocket launchers and ammunition;

• Over 1,800,000 rounds of 25mm ammunition;

• Precision-guided rockets;

• 10 command post vehicles;

• One Patriot air defense battery and munitions;

• Eight National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) and munitions;

• HAWK air defense systems and munitions;

• RIM-7 missiles for air defense;

• 12 Avenger air defense systems;

• Nine c-UAS gun trucks and ammunition;

• 10 mobile c-UAS laser-guided rocket systems;

• Anti-aircraft guns and ammunition;

• Equipment to integrate Western air defense launchers, missiles, and radars with Ukraine’s air defense systems;

• Equipment to sustain Ukraine’s existing air defense capabilities;

• High-speed Anti-radiation missiles (HARMs);

• Precision aerial munitions;

• 4,000 Zuni aircraft rockets;

• Over 7,000 Hydra-70 aircraft rockets;

• 20 Mi-17 helicopters;

• 31 Abrams tanks;

• 45 T-72B tanks;

• 120mm and 105mm tank ammunition;

• 109 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles;

• Four Bradley Fire Support Team vehicles;

• Over 2,000 High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles (HMMWVs);

• Over 100 light tactical vehicles;

• 68 trucks and 124 trailers to transport heavy equipment;

• Eight logistics support vehicles and equipment;

• 89 heavy fuel tankers and 105 fuel trailers;

• 90 Stryker Armored Personnel Carriers;

• 300 M113 Armored Personnel Carriers;

• 250 M1117 Armored Security Vehicles;

• Over 500 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles (MRAPs);

• Six armored utility trucks;

• Mine clearing equipment;

• Over 35,000 grenade launchers and small arms;

• Over 200,000,000 rounds of small arms ammunition and grenades;

• Over 100,000 sets of body armor and helmets;

• Switchblade Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS);

• Phoenix Ghost UAS;

• CyberLux K8 UAS;

• Altius-600 UAS;

• Jump-20 UAS;

• Puma UAS;

• Scan Eagle UAS;

• Two radars for UAS;

• Laser-guided rocket systems and munitions;

• Unmanned Coastal Defense Vessels;

• Over 70 counter-artillery and counter-mortar radars;

• 20 multi-mission radars;

• Counter-Unmanned Aerial Systems and equipment;

• Counter air defense capability;

• 21 air surveillance radars;

• Two Harpoon coastal defense systems;

• 62 coastal and riverine patrol boats;

• Port and harbor security equipment;

• M18A1 Claymore anti-personnel munitions;

• Anti-tank mines;

• C-4 explosives, demolition munitions, and demolition equipment for obstacle clearing;

• Obstacle emplacement equipment;

• Tactical secure communications systems and support equipment;

• Four satellite communications antennas;

• SATCOM terminals and services;

• Thousands of night vision devices, surveillance systems, thermal imagery systems, optics, and laser rangefinders;

• Commercial satellite imagery services;

• Explosive ordnance disposal equipment and protective gear;

• Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear protective equipment;

• 200 armored medical treatment vehicles;

• Medical supplies to include first aid kits, bandages, monitors, and other equipment;

• Electronic jamming equipment;

• Field equipment, cold weather gear, generators, and spare parts;

• Support for training, maintenance, and sustainment activities.

The United States also continues to work with its Allies and partners to provide Ukraine with additional capabilities to defend itself.

14. Russia is floating a plan to build a village for conservative Americans who want to move to a 'Christian country' and are tired of liberal ideology in the US

I missed this last week.

Russia is floating a plan to build a village for conservative Americans who want to move to a 'Christian country' and are tired of liberal ideology in the US

Business Insider · by Matthew Loh

Veterans salute during a military parade to mark the 78th anniversary of the Soviet Union's victory in the Great Patriotic War in St. Petersburg, Russia, on May 9, 2023

Irina Motina/Xinhua via Getty Images

Russia is building a village for US expats who are tired of liberal ideology, a lawyer told state media.
The project is approved, and slated to house some 200 American and Canadian families, he said.
Russia has in recent years sought to position itself as a bastion for "traditional" moral values.

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Russia is floating an idea to build a village for hundreds of American and Canadian families who want to run away from the cultural climate in North America.

The village, slated for construction in Moscow's suburbs in 2024, is meant for conservative families who want to "emigrate for ideological reasons," said immigration lawyer Timur Beslangurov on Thursday, according to RIA Novosti.

Around 200 families have expressed interest in the project, Beslangurov said in a speech at a legal forum in St. Petersburg, the state outlet reported.

Many of these families don't have Russian roots but are tired of "the inculcation of radical values" in the US and Canada, Beslangurov said.

"Today, they have 70 genders, it is not known what will happen next," he added, per RIA Novosti. The same rhetoric has been used frequently by Russian Vladimir Putin as US-Russia relations worsened over the last several years. In December 2021, he compared gender nonconformity to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Most of the expats who want to move to the village are Catholics and "strongly believe in the prediction that Russia will remain the only Christian country in the world," Beslangurov said.

The village project has been greenlit by authorities, and the new settlers will pay for the construction, Beslangurov added, per state media.

Insider could not independently verify Beslangurov's claims. When contacted by Insider, the lawyer said the project is in the works, but declined to share further details.

The Russian Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent outside regular business hours.

Putin has, in recent years, sought to portray Russia as a country that stands for "traditional" moral, social, and religious values.

He signed a decree in September that warned of a "battle for cultural supremacy" on the global stage and cautioned of "the aggressive imposition of neoliberal views by a number of states."

It said Russia was in a "unique position" to defend and spread conservative views, which the decree called "traditional Russian moral and religious values."

The village project also comes as Moscow's war on Ukraine and resulting international sanctions have sullied Russia's reputation among tourists and expatriates. In February, tourism agencies reported business slumping lower than pre-pandemic levels since the invasion began.

The Federal Security Service, however, claimed on May 3 that more foreigners are entering the country this year. The influx of foreign citizens to Russia increased by 17.6% in the first quarter of 2023 compared to the same time period in 2022, it said.

People from China and Central Asian nations, such as Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, contributed to the most significant increases in trips to Russia, the state agency added.

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Business Insider · by Matthew Loh

15. The dawn of disinformation

Why will few people recognize this? We are so afraid of the words "political warfare." (though I would argue it never went away)

Excerpt:

“Political warfare has returned,” declared General Sir Nick Carter, Britain’s chief of defence staff, during a lecture in 2019.

Conclusion:

Today the KGB’s covert active measures are being deployed in Putin’s war in Ukraine. But the role of Russia’s intelligence agencies, operating as a clandestine branch of government, shines a light not just on its foreign policy. The nature of these operations also reveals the way in which Russia’s political elite regards itself and its role in the world. The FSB operates like a private army for Putin as a means for preserving his power, but it is characterised by brutality and deception. The legacy of the KGB lives on.

The dawn of disinformation

How the KGB took their Cold War tactics from a Chinese military strategist who died 500 years before the birth of Christ - and why they still work

MARK HOLLINGSWORTH

theneweuropean.co.uk · by Mark Hollingsworth · May 19, 2023

“Political warfare has returned,” declared General Sir Nick Carter, Britain’s chief of defence staff, during a lecture in 2019. Missiles, ammunition, and tanks still matter, he reassured his military audience, but authoritarian states like Russia increasingly undermine the West using disinformation, cyber-attacks and agents of influence. And the West has under-rated or misunderstood this threat to its peril.

The Americans, as the diplomat George Kennan pointed out at the outset of the Cold War, view war “as a sort of sporting contest outside of all political context” while the Russians grasp “the perpetual rhythm of struggle, in and out of war”. For Russia and Putin, war is the continuation of politics by other means.

In the new Cold War, technology has enhanced the effectiveness of organised deception so that its incarnations are more sinister, insidious and pernicious. Waves of trolls and bots promoting pro-Kremlin hashtags during the Ukraine invasion have been unleashed with a speed and magnitude that was impossible before the internet and influence popular opinion on a scale never before possible. But their underlying purpose, as tools of disinformation, remains the same as the Cold War. The historical parallels are chilling.

The favourite author of many KGB officers during the Cold War was not Tolstoy or Dostoevsky. Instead, it was the Chinese military strategist, Sun Tzu (544 BCE – 496 BCE). Best known for The Art of War, Sun Tzu argued the most effective way to win a war was not on the battlefield but through influence operations and psychological tactics. “All warfare is deception,” he wrote. “Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable. When using our forces, we must seem inactive. When we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away. When far away, we must make him believe we are near.”

One of Sun Tzu’s most devoted admirers was a KGB officer called Yuri Bezmenov. Between 1965 and 1970 he worked ostensibly for Novosti press agency but in reality was an intelligence officer based in a secret unit called Political Publications. Bezmenov placed fake stories in foreign countries in order “to change the perception of reality of every American” as he recalled.

The Cold War was fought through the hearts and minds of the combatants and Bezmenov’s task was to distort reality to such an extent that no-one could reach sensible conclusions to defend their country. For the committed KGB officer, Sun Tzu was his operational mentor.

“The highest art of warfare is not to fight at all but to subvert anything of value in your enemy’s country,” recalled Bezmenov. “These include moral and cultural traditions, religion and respect for leaders and authority. And so anything that puts white against black, old against young, the rich against poor works. As long as it disturbs their society and cuts the moral fibre of their nation, that’s good. And when everything in this country is subverted, disorientated, confused, demoralised and destabilised, then the crisis will come.”

For the KGB disinformation was a primary weapon in their armoury. Its purpose was to create chaos and fear in which nobody could be trusted. In The War of Nerves, Martin Sixsmith, a former BBC correspondent in Moscow, argues: “The aim of Soviet disinformation in the Cold War was to undermine the confidence of people in the West in the open nature of their ‘free’ society and in the probity of the men who ran it. Moscow sought out the potential weak points in a nation’s psyche, applying pressure, hoping to speed its degradation.

“The impact of fake news on the human mind is profound. The mind creates mental maps and finds it hard to redraw them once they are settled. Accepting the unreliability of a ‘fact’ on which others have subsequently been built throws the mind into intolerable doubt. Perversely, the more unlikely an assimilated ‘fact’ might seem, the harder it is to dislodge.”

For KGB officers, the deployment of disinformation was a top priority against the USA, UK and NATO. “Only about 25 per cent of our time, money and manpower was spent on espionage,” recalled Bezmenov. “The other 75 per cent was a slow process focusing on what we called ideological subversion or active measures.”

This was confirmed by Ladislav Bittman, a former Czech intelligence officer who worked closely with the KGB. He said that every KGB officer was required to spend most of their time conjuring up ideas for “deliberately distorted information” which was secretly “leaked through a variety of channels in order to deceive and manipulate.”

The sponsorship of strategic deception can be traced back to Lenin who advocated underhand tactics by “various strategies, artifices (tricks), illegal methods, evasions and subterfuges.” In a memo to a Commissar, he wrote: “To tell the truth is a petty bourgeois habit whereas for us to lie is justified by our objectives.”

In 1947 a new disinformation unit was set up “to unmask the anti-Soviet activity of foreign circles, influence the public opinion of other countries and compromise anti-Soviet officials and public figures of foreign governments.” Its aim was to create “a carefully constructed false message leaked to an opponent’s communication system to deceive the decision-making elite or the public”, according to Ladislav Bittman, a former Czech intelligence officer who worked closely with the KGB. To succeed, “every disinformation message must at least partially correspond to reality or generally accepted views because without a considerable degree of plausible, verifiable information, it is difficult to gain the victim’s confidence.”

The KGB believed the dissemination of disinformation would significantly alter the balance of power between the Soviet bloc and NATO. The priority was to discredit and destroy American institutions to create rifts with its NATO allies. Practically every evil and misdeed in the world was attributed to the Americans: the CIA was accused of assassinating President Kennedy, attempting to murder Pope John Paul II and when the UN secretary-general Dag Hammarskjold died in a plane crash, the KGB fuelled rumours that American spies orchestrated the accident.

By the 1960s the dissemination of fake news focused on the under-developed, and newly independent nations. As Sixsmith argues: “Weak, disenfranchised individuals, or indeed nations, appear to be more likely to turn to conspiracy theories. It is comforting to be able to ascribe the troubles in their lives and the lack of control they have over their fate to a single outside factor that is not their responsibility and cannot be overcome by their own effort, relieving the individual of the usually unavailing effort of remedying them.”

Disinformation did not need to persuade people to believe that a conspiracy theory was true – merely to consider it. If there was enough fact to make it plausible, even if it was outlandish, this might be enough to convince them it was possible. Hence a feverish atmosphere could be created whereby the population were willing to believe the worst excesses of their government. Like a virus, lies spread often untraced, circulating further and faster and gaining traction every time they are repeated.

There were no limits and operatives were encouraged to implement increasingly outlandish plots. In the 1980s, even cynical intelligence veterans were uneasy when the KGB manufactured neo-Nazi propaganda in imitation of crude Western-style language and posted such pro-Nazi leaflets to the disaffected youth in West Germany. This was done when there were some neo-Nazi activities in Berlin. But the KGB-written leaflets were accepted as authentic and caused outrage in the West, created needless fear and placed people’s lives in danger – all for the sake of trying to embarrass West Germany politically.

By 1985 the KGB’s annual budget for active measures was a staggering $3.63 billion employing 15,000 people. It was a small army of which Sun Tzu would have been proud. And spreading disinformation was the priority. Hundreds of millions of dollars of KGB cash poured into covert political operations. Some of the funds went to front organisations and subsidies to foreign Communist Parties. But most was given to media outlets staffed by intelligence officers – TASS, Novosti, Pravda, and select foreign newspapers.

The renewal of the nuclear arms race was high up on the KGB target list of active measures. In one year alone the Soviet Union spent $200 million on “special campaigns” against NATO plans to deploy nuclear weapons in western Europe. As negotiations faltered and both sides promoted the instalment of nuclear missiles, the stakes were very high and frightening. But according to former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Tretyakov, the notion of a nuclear winter was a KGB’s disinformation operation. He claimed the KGB deliberately exaggerated the prospect of a nuclear war of mutual destruction and scare the west into reducing their nuclear arsenal, even at the risk of Armageddon.

Today the KGB’s covert active measures are being deployed in Putin’s war in Ukraine. But the role of Russia’s intelligence agencies, operating as a clandestine branch of government, shines a light not just on its foreign policy. The nature of these operations also reveals the way in which Russia’s political elite regards itself and its role in the world. The FSB operates like a private army for Putin as a means for preserving his power, but it is characterised by brutality and deception. The legacy of the KGB lives on.

Mark Hollingsworth is the author of Agents of Influence – How the KGB Subverted Western Democracies, published by Oneworld

theneweuropean.co.uk · by Mark Hollingsworth · May 19, 2023

16. The Intellectual Rules of Engagement

Some useful ROE.

Rule 1) Do Not Fire Unless Fired Upon

Rule 2) Fight in Favorable Terrain

Rule 3) Don’t Waste Ammunition on an Impenetrable Wall

Rule 4) Focus On Capturing Strategic Locations

Rule 5) Leverage the Element of Surprise

The Intellectual Rules of Engagement | Patrick Carroll

fee.org · by Patrick Carroll · May 19, 2023

Have you ever had a debate with someone that felt like it went absolutely nowhere? It’s a common problem, especially for those of us who tend to be more opinionated. The good news is, there are things we can do to avoid this problem.

I realized recently that there tend to be certain contexts where debates will predictably end in frustration. Sometimes it’s because the person you are talking to just isn’t the right person to have this conversation with. Sometimes the topic just doesn’t lend itself well to debates, or it’s not the right place or time. Likewise, the motivation of the participants and their approach can also be red flags. In short, by thinking through the Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How of the discussion, you can often tell in advance which conversations will be fruitful and which will be a waste of time.

After a recent series of frustrating conversations, I realized it would be helpful if I synthesized these insights into some basic Rules of Engagement for intellectual discussions. These aren’t hard-and-fast rules, of course. They’re more like guidelines, things to think about before engaging with someone on the intellectual battlefield. Instead of firing off opinions whenever I could, I wanted to be more judicious about when and how I engaged in intellectual combat.

The military has Rules of Engagement for a reason. They help us avoid chaotic and harmful situations, and they also create a strategy for success. I think Rules of Engagement can do the same in the battle of ideas. So here are five Intellectual Rules of Engagement to keep in mind out on the battlefield.

Rule 1) Do Not Fire Unless Fired Upon

This is one of the most basic Rules of Engagement in the military, and for good reason. Initiating a fight is often just asking for trouble. The same is true in the intellectual battlefield.

There’s a few different ways to think about this rule. One helpful paradigm is the distinction between “push conversations” and “pull conversations” that Brady Wilson talks about in his book Juice: The Power of Conversation. A push conversation is one where you are pushing your ideas onto other people. It invites defensiveness and pushback, and generally leads to poor outcomes. A pull conversation, in contrast, is one where you try to “pull” the other person closer to you. It’s a much gentler approach that tries to understand where the other person is coming from and then invites them to consider a slightly different way of seeing things. In short, don’t just go firing away. Instead, get curious about where they are at, and try to set up a situation where they are asking you about your views out of genuine curiosity and openness. In other words, let them fire first.

In The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey outlines another way of thinking about this rule, which is “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” If you give the other person a chance to feel heard first, they will be much more willing to hear what you have to say.

The key here is restraint. A lot of people, especially opinionated people, can be very trigger happy when it comes to debating ideas. Every social convention, every dinner table, every social media post is seen as an opportunity to come in guns blazing. Don’t be that person. Don’t be looking for a fight everywhere you go. If you are thoughtful and knowledgeable, people will come to you with questions when they are ready.

When it comes to content creation you will of course be initiating conversations. But even here, the only people you are talking to are people who have voluntarily chosen to consume your content. It’s not wrong to start a conversation about ideas. What’s unadvisable is pushing that conversation on someone who’s not interested in having it. The point is, don’t engage with someone unless they’ve shown an interest in engaging.

Rule 2) Fight in Favorable Terrain

There is a vast range of terrain that discussions and debates can take place on. There are a variety of in-person contexts, there is social media, radio, television, podcasts, videos, lectures, articles, and books. Some of these landscapes are much more conducive to edifying and productive conversations than others. The key is to know which terrain is best, and to keep discussions as much as possible in that favorable terrain.

Personally, I’ve found that social media and in-person conversations are some of the worst forms of terrain. That social media is terrible terrain goes without saying. In-person debates are better because they open up tools such as body language, tone of voice, and facial expressions, but it can be difficult to present clear, well-formulated ideas on the spot, and there also tends to be lots of interruptions and sidetracks.

Radio and television discussions run into similar problems. If you have the right people and the right topic, it’s possible to get a good conversation going, but the drive for soundbites and the reality of hard time limits makes it challenging to get very far.

Podcasts tend to be better, especially if they are long-form podcasts. Videos and lectures, likewise, give someone an opportunity to really lay out their argument without interruptions.

But the best terrain in my opinion is the written word, especially articles and books. There’s a reason scholarly debates take place in the literature and not on national television. An article not only gives you an uninterrupted space, it also forces you to be succinct and to synthesize your ideas. Unlike in spoken formats, excessive verbiage is kept to a minimum. You have to get right to the point and make it as clearly as possible. As a result, writing tends to be much more dispassionate and precise. It allows you to clarify your own thinking, and it also allows others to hold you to specific phrasings and to pinpoint potential errors in your reasoning.

So as much as possible, try to engage with ideas through the favorable terrain of articles and books, both as a learner and as a promulgator. If you want to share your perspective on an issue with a friend, try writing a blog post about it and sending it to them instead of giving them your take on the spot.

Rule 3) Don’t Waste Ammunition on an Impenetrable Wall

There are some people in our lives who are persuadable. They might not agree with us yet, but with good reasoning and a bit of time it’s possible they will eventually come to change their mind. There are others who, if we’re honest with ourselves, are likely never going to change. They are either too biased, closed-minded or, to be candid, too dull to get it.

This is a hard reality to accept. We don’t want to give up on people. We don’t want to write anyone off as unwinnable. But when it comes to allocating our resources, we need to be realistic about how persuadable someone is and not spend too much verbal ammunition firing at a wall that simply won’t budge.

This is the idea behind the saying “don’t cast your pearls before swine.” It’s not that everyone who disagrees with us is a pig. Far from it. The point is that we shouldn’t waste precious things on people who won’t appreciate them. In this case, don’t waste too much time and energy trying to convince people who are realistically beyond convincing.

Rule 4) Focus On Capturing Strategic Locations

While every location has value, some locations are more strategically important than others because they can be leveraged to control a much wider territory. The same is true in the battle of ideas. If you focus your efforts on persuading certain kinds of influential people, you will have a much greater impact than you would if you invested equally in everyone.

Some examples of strategic locations in the battle of ideas would include teachers, pastors, lawyers, judges, professors, journalists, politicians, pundits, business executives, and writers. These are the kinds of people who set the tone for a culture. Influencing people in general is great, but the big gains come when you can influence the influencers.

Another strategically important demographic is young people. Not only do they tend to be more open-minded (Rule 3), they also have in their ranks the teachers, pastors, and politicians of the future, so it’s worth spending extra time and attention trying to persuade them.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t try to reach others. (The military also tries to capture non-strategic locations.) This is just to say that when given the choice, all else equal, spend your time trying to persuade the people who’s paradigm shift would make a bigger difference.

And if you don’t have many strategic people in your life, a good way to reach them is through scalable content like videos and articles, where you can reach thousands more people than you would otherwise.

Rule 5) Leverage the Element of Surprise

When people are caught off guard, there’s a moment of chaos and uncertainty that can be taken advantage of. Long-established mental barriers come down, if only for a moment, and in that moment there is an opportunity to present a new idea to a mind that is exposed and, in a sense, vulnerable.

One common way of doing this is by presenting a shocking fact or statistic. When people are confronted with new information that surprises them, they have to reformulate their worldview to accommodate that information. That reformulation period is the perfect opportunity to introduce a new way of thinking about things, because they are looking for a perspective that will make sense of the new information.

Another great way of surprising people is just being something different from what they expect you to be. If they expect you to be a mindless ideologue, interact in a way that demonstrates you are thoughtful and nuanced. If they expect you to be the same as everyone else who belongs to what they think is your tribe, take a third position that challenges the framing of the issue altogether.

People will expect you to be closed-minded. Prove them wrong by being genuinely open to their ideas. People expect to learn nothing new. Prove them wrong by being educational and insightful. People expect you to be unaware of their objections. Prove them wrong by being familiar with all sides of the issue.

Your interlocutor should be so intrigued by you that they become curious and seek out your opinions of their own volition. Even though they may disagree, they regard you as the kind of person whose opinion is worth hearing. Why? Because you surprised them. You gave them something they weren’t expecting: value.

Applying the Rules

Having laid out the rules, let’s consider some examples of what it looks like to apply them in our day to day lives.

Example 1) Your conservative uncle starts going off about politics at Thanksgiving dinner like he does every year, in clear violation of Rule 1 and Rule 5 (it’s about as predictable as the sunrise, after all). You want to push back, but you realize that engaging him would go against Rules 2, 3, and 4, so you decide to just let him rant instead.

Example 2) You are introduced to someone at a party. They are a teacher (Rule 4) and seem interested in talking about ideas (Rule 1), but you quickly realize they are set in their ways (Rule 3), and they keep interrupting you every time you try to make a point (Rule 2). Rather than prolong the conversation, you politely suggest following up over email where the two of you can exchange book recommendations.

Example 3) You see AOC or Bernie Sanders post a bad take, so you submit an article to FEE (Rule 2) responding to their points (Rule 1), which will be broadcasted to an audience that you know is persuadable (Rule 3) and influential (Rule 4), and in the article you present a nuanced view that is educational and reframes the discussion in a way that challenges both sides to think about the issue differently (Rule 5).

Again, none of these are hard-and-fast rules. They are simply guidelines. The point is not to apply them rigidly. The point is to be intentional about how we engage in the battle of ideas. Far too many people just launch right into debates without thinking about whether their approach is tactful or helpful. The more we can engage with intentionality and purpose, the more we can avoid the conversations that accomplish nothing.

This article was adapted from an issue of the FEE Daily email newsletter. Click here to sign up and get free-market news and analysis like this in your inbox every weekday.

fee.org · by Patrick Carroll · May 19, 2023

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

V/R

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow

Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Phone: 202-573-8647

Personal Email: d avid.maxwell161@gmail.com

Web Site: www.fdd.org

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Subscribe to FDD’s new podcast, Foreign Podicy

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

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

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

Access NSS HERE

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Rule 1) Do Not Fire Unless Fired Upon

Rule 2) Fight in Favorable Terrain

Rule 3) Don’t Waste Ammunition on an Impenetrable Wall

Rule 4) Focus On Capturing Strategic Locations

Rule 5) Leverage the Element of Surprise

The Intellectual Rules of Engagement | Patrick Carroll

Rule 1) Do Not Fire Unless Fired Upon

Rule 2) Fight in Favorable Terrain

Rule 3) Don’t Waste Ammunition on an Impenetrable Wall

Rule 4) Focus On Capturing Strategic Locations

Rule 5) Leverage the Element of Surprise

Applying the Rules