Quotes of the Day:

“The arch enemies of society are those who know better, but by any direction, misstatement, understatement, and slander, seek to accomplish their concealed purposes, or to gain profit of some sort by misleading the public. The antidote, for these poisons must be found in the sincere and courageous efforts of those who would preserve their cherished freedom by a wise and responsible use of it.”

– Charles Evans, Hughes. 

“Love all, trust few, do wrong to none.”

"Shakespeare"As our own species is in the process of proving, one cannot have superior science and inferior morals. The combination is unstable and self-destroying.

– Arthur C. Clarke

1. ‘Shooting themselves in the foot’: Pentagon officials outraged by DOD think tank ban

2. China Sees Gaps in U.S. Defenses, Ousted National Security Official Says

3. Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby hands China a gift by blocking Ukraine weapons

4. 'Brutality over precision' — What the Army is learning from Russia in Ukraine

5. How Russia Fights – A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia's Special Military Operation

6. 21st Century War and Strategy: New "Balances" Required

7. Wargaming is having its ‘Moneyball’ moment

8. SOCOM adds new advanced AI capabilities to tech wish list

9. Russia kills 27 in Ukraine attacks despite Trump threat

10. The Pentagon Against the Think Tanks

11. Pentagon reverses decision to cut off hurricane-tracking satellite data

12. The U.S. military is investing in this Pacific island. So is China.

13. Tsunami Waves Reach U.S. After Powerful Russia Quake Forces Pacific Evacuations

14. How China Is Girding for an AI Battle With the U.S.

15. What Americans think about Israel's military action in Gaza, according to a new Gallup poll

16. Once the faces of American aid abroad, USAID workers mourn agency's demise

17. Leadership Infighting Emerges in Chinese Military Mouthpiece

18. Trump Administration Told Taiwan’s President to Avoid New York Stopover

19. The New Model of Privateering

20. From Georgia to Ukraine: Seventeen Years of Russian Cyber Capabilities at War

21. The United States Should Act Now to Mitigate Conflict Escalation on the Moon

22. Reclaiming U.S. Engagement in Latin America: Strategy Beyond Competition

23. Taiwan Is Not Ukraine

24. Taiwan’s Achilles’ Heel – Why the Island Should Shore Up its Energy Security and Resurrect its Nuclear Reactors

25. The Time Has Come for Trump’s America-First Realism

26. What Kind of Great Power Will India Be? – Debating New Delhi’s Grand Strategy

27. Army, Marine Corps, Navy have no plan to stop using M18, M17 pistols

28. 'Taking back what is theirs' — Ukrainian special forces successfully raid Russian-occupied island in Black Sea

29. The Intoku Code: Delta Forces’ Intelligence Officer-Doing Good in Secret by Wade Ishimoto Reviewed by Professor Nancy E. Blacker

30. Beyond the Melting Point: Exodus, the Sequel (book review)

1. ‘Shooting themselves in the foot’: Pentagon officials outraged by DOD think tank ban

Pogo: We have met the enemy and he is us.

I would just add that think tanks do a number of things for DOD that DOD cannot do (or does not do as well), one of them being very well executed wargames and seminars that look at hard problems. In the last 6 months I have participated in more than half a dozen war games that were extremely well constructed and substantive that brought together professionals from DOD, State, the IC and academia and looked at tough problems in the Asia-Indo-Pacific, including simultaneous contingencies. They looked at hard problems and came away with important insights that every desk officer and war planner from DOD and State and the IC could benefit from. I participated in a lot of war games in my 30 years in the military (and a couple run by the military in the last two years) and none of them can match the level of sophistication and substance of these that are run by think tanks. And despite the perceived political leanings of think tanks or their agendas, these war games had only one objective: to advance US national security regardless of the administration. These were not echo chambers of like minded people bashing any specific administration. On the contrary they were/are made up of a broad range of experienced people (dare I say diverse). And some of the best ones had representatives from partners and allies which provided important insights and perspectives. I think too many people are equating this important think tank work with the highly publicized conferences that are being based over ideological differences. But the rank and file DOD action officers and mid and senior level leaders cannot gain the insights and knowledge by staying within the Pentagon. As I said this decision is a mistake based on my extensive experience in the military and my post retirement experience participating in these critical think tank events. We should not be making decisions based on perceived ideological perspectives. And we should ask, why are we so afraid to engage those who have different ideological perspectives in the national security community?

‘Shooting themselves in the foot’: Pentagon officials outraged by DOD think tank ban

The department’s decision not to allow employees to participate in certain events carries bigger repercussions than missed attendance.

By Jack Detsch, Paul McLeary and Felicia Schwartz

07/28/2025 04:05 PM EDT

Updated: 07/28/2025 07:42 PM EDT

Politico

The Pentagon said it made the move to avoid lending the department’s name to organizations and events that run counter to Trump’s values. But it caused chaos throughout the department, according to the officials, who like others, were granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics. The decision came a week after Defense Department officials pulled out of the high-profile Aspen Security Forum citing “the evil of globalism.”

The officials and experts warned cutting off employees’ access to such venues, which include major global conferences, gives the appearance of partisanship to the Pentagon, an institution intended as largely apolitical. The decision follows other seemingly political moves by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, including firing top generals and numerous admirals, and attacking the “left-wing” media.

Top leaders are clearing most of their public speaking engagements to comply with the rules, even if they’re not sure it applies to them, according to the officials.

Two of the defense officials said that they were still awaiting guidance from Hegseth’s office about how the new policy will work. Another said they have yet to see any orders at all.

“I am standing by and updating my X every hour on the hour,” said the official, who was desperately looking for clearer details about what the rules mean.

Rank-and-file members were left wondering how the new restrictions might impact what they could say and do in uniform. For example, were they still allowed to attend wargames and tabletop exercises run by think tanks? Could they be part of fellowship programs? Were they banned from speaking at all think tanks, or just institutions the Trump administration had branded as touting an “America Last” agenda?

“Just another step toward unquestioning sycophancy,” said another military official.

A Defense Department spokesperson celebrated the agency’s efforts to distance itself from the Washington foreign policy establishment. “DOD officials attending think tank events is not a priority whatsoever at this Department of Defense,” Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson said. “This is the 21st century, and there is more than one way to get our message out to the American people and our allies than through the lens of globalist think tanks.”

She added that “the only thing that suffers in this process are ticket sales for organizations that are largely America Last.” While Aspen and other conferences outside the capital are ticketed, think tank events in Washington are often free and open to the public.

The new policy is already leading to bureaucratic kerfluffles.

A select group of top Washington think tankers got a routine invitation last Tuesday: How would they like to join a video call with the outgoing top U.S. general in Africa?

Just 48 hours later, they received a note that Africa Command chief Gen. Michael Langley had canceled with no explanation. A defense official said it was halted so as to not appear out of step with the new rules.

The idea for the halt, according to one of the defense officials, was sped along by the Pentagon’s realization that multiple employees, including Navy Secretary John Phelan, were heading to the Aspen summit. The organization and the other forum attendees were not ideologically aligned with the president’s American First agenda, they felt, so the Pentagon pulled its participation.

“It is absolutely to control who says what, where, and when,” said the official.

Defense Department officials have historically attended roundtables to explain emerging defense policies. Foreign allies worry about losing that big-picture view, especially as the Pentagon makes decisions that catch them off guard — such as pausing military aid to Ukraine and conducting a review of a major submarine deal with Australia and the U.K.

“Meetings with the Pentagon are difficult to book, so losing public events where we can glean some details about military policy will have a big effect on us,” a NATO diplomat said.

The ban will also limit the ability of tech start-ups to understand the Pentagon’s priorities and build the weapons of the future, a defense industry executive said. Many of these companies struggle to get access to DOD officials.

Pentagon speaking requests also now have to be approved by the building’s general counsel, the policy team, and Hegseth’s press shop. Previously, only the individual command needed to approve the request.

The new rules have already led the Navy to bar the service’s top official for research, development, and acquisition, Jason Potter, from participating in a conservative-leaning Hudson Institute event on shipbuilding, according to two people familiar with the matter. There wasn’t enough time to go through the new approvals process.

The Pentagon used to pay member fees for the Council on Foreign Relations and slotted military fellows at think tanks such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies. But that would appear to clash with the new rules. Some employees wondered whether the Pentagon would still pay for their advanced degrees at universities considered more liberal, such as the Harvard Kennedy School or Princeton’s School of Public and International Affairs.

The Halifax International Security Forum, one of the events explicitly targeted by the ban, hoped the Pentagon would change course.

“Halifax International Security Forum has provided a non-partisan venue to strengthen cooperation between the U.S. and its democratic allies,” said Peter Van Praagh, the founder and president of the forum. “When these alliances are nourished, America is stronger and Americans are safer. When these alliances are not nourished, Americans at home and American troops abroad are less safe.”

Nick Taylor-Vaisey contributed to this report.

Politico

2. China Sees Gaps in U.S. Defenses, Ousted National Security Official Says

Excerpts:

China’s priorities, he said, are collecting intelligence, stealing intellectual property from American institutions and companies, and positioning for a possible attack.

In recent years China has mounted two major cyberoperations: Volt Typhoon, which positioned malware to attack critical infrastructure in the event of a possible conflict with the United States, and Salt Typhoon, an ambitious effort to hack U.S. telecom networks, allowing Chinese intelligence to listen to calls from prominent Americans.

“This is a bipartisan issue: cybersecurity and the security of our nation,” General Haugh said.

Artificial intelligence, he added, can make the threat worse but can also help generate new ways to defend against attacks.

...

Glenn Gerstell, a former general counsel for the National Security Agency, said China’s threat was still not well understood, despite breaches like Salt Typhoon and Volt Typhoon.

“The way China approaches cyberoffense is so wildly different from the way we do, with massive investments in personnel, with massive amounts of money and compute power,” Mr. Gerstell said. “Americans, including policymakers, don’t understand that the threat is overwhelming and pervasive.”

Cyberweapons and their effects can often be invisible and hard to understand. The U.S. government, Mr. Gerstell said, could better explain what it knows about China’s offensive capabilities, to draw the public’s attention to the challenges. “If it caused us to focus more on the threat, the trade-off could well be worth it,” he said.

General Haugh said he hoped that in his two new roles he could bring new attention, research and focus to the threat from China.He noted that in the annual threat assessment, the intelligence community warned of how artificial intelligence could help power efforts by adversarial countries to mount malign influence campaigns.

China Sees Gaps in U.S. Defenses, Ousted National Security Official Says

Gen. Timothy D. Haugh, the former head of both the National Security Agency and Cyber Command, gave his first interview since he was fired.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/us/politics/timothy-haugh-nsa-cyber.html?unlocked_article_code=1.aU8.cvPz.CNNw0usBiYQ6&smid=url-share

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Gen. Timothy D. Haugh during a congressional hearing in March. He was forced out of his positions in April after Laura Loomer, a right-wing conspiracy theorist and Trump adviser, accused him, without evidence, of disloyalty.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York Times

By Julian E. Barnes

Reporting from Washington

July 29, 2025

Updated 2:40 p.m. ET

China is taking advantage of gaps in American defenses, as its cyberprogram poses a core challenge to the United States, the former director of the National Security Agency said in an interview.

Gen. Timothy D. Haugh, the former head of both the N.S.A. and U.S. Cyber Command, said there were weaknesses in American cyberdefenses that the Chinese government was trying to exploit. While cybersecurity and cloud computing firms are trying to improve their defenses, China is constantly looking for vulnerabilities, areas that neither kinds of firms are focusing enough of their attention on.

China, General Haugh said, is trying to exploit the “seams” in the defenses.

General Haugh was forced out of his positions in April after Laura Loomer, a right-wing conspiracy theorist and Trump adviser, accused him — without evidence — of disloyalty. In a social media post, Ms. Loomer said General Haugh had been chosen by Gen. Mark A. Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who was critical of Mr. Trump and whom she called a traitor.

Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers lamented General Haugh’s dismissal. Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said General Haugh’s firing made the country less safe. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the former Republican leader, said he “couldn’t figure out” what the Trump administration wanted in its senior national security figures.

In his first interview since being fired, General Haugh seemed reluctant to talk in detail about his dismissal, saying only that he had served at the pleasure of President Trump.

“I don’t and did not expect an explanation, and from the second I was told I was no longer serving in the role, the focus shifts to the leaders the president has put in the capacity,” General Haugh said.

It is not clear exactly why Ms. Loomer focused on General Haugh. Some intelligence officials had said Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, had asked him to speed up production of key reports on key topics. But current and former officials said the N.S.A. had acted quickly.

Current and former officials said there were few signs that the White House had found specific faults with General Haugh’s leadership. Mr. Trump allowed him to retire at the four-star rank, granting a waiver to prevent an automatic reduction.

General Haugh did not appear to be dwelling on his lost jobs, but instead focused on new ways to work against the same threats he had been trying to counter while in government, in particular China’s cyberoperations.

China’s priorities, he said, are collecting intelligence, stealing intellectual property from American institutions and companies, and positioning for a possible attack.

In recent years China has mounted two major cyberoperations: Volt Typhoon, which positioned malware to attack critical infrastructure in the event of a possible conflict with the United States, and Salt Typhoon, an ambitious effort to hack U.S. telecom networks, allowing Chinese intelligence to listen to calls from prominent Americans.

“This is a bipartisan issue: cybersecurity and the security of our nation,” General Haugh said.

Artificial intelligence, he added, can make the threat worse but can also help generate new ways to defend against attacks.

General Haugh is set to teach a class at Yale in the fall, and Ballistic Ventures, a company that funds and advises cybersecurity start-ups, announced on Tuesday that he would join the firm as a strategic adviser.

“For me, two of the things I think I can be impactful with, is how do you inspire people to public service and how do we think about implementing new technologies in ways that more secure as a nation,” General Haugh said.

Glenn Gerstell, a former general counsel for the National Security Agency, said China’s threat was still not well understood, despite breaches like Salt Typhoon and Volt Typhoon.

“The way China approaches cyberoffense is so wildly different from the way we do, with massive investments in personnel, with massive amounts of money and compute power,” Mr. Gerstell said. “Americans, including policymakers, don’t understand that the threat is overwhelming and pervasive.”

Cyberweapons and their effects can often be invisible and hard to understand. The U.S. government, Mr. Gerstell said, could better explain what it knows about China’s offensive capabilities, to draw the public’s attention to the challenges. “If it caused us to focus more on the threat, the trade-off could well be worth it,” he said.

General Haugh said he hoped that in his two new roles he could bring new attention, research and focus to the threat from China.

He noted that in the annual threat assessment, the intelligence community warned of how artificial intelligence could help power efforts by adversarial countries to mount malign influence campaigns.

Ballistic Ventures, he said, was helping work on a range of challenges, including identifying “synthetic media” — propaganda pushed by Russia, China or firms they hire.

“This is one of the areas that I am excited to dive into — how do you identify synthetic media, how do you ensure that we understand the source of what we are looking at,” he said. “There’s work for industry to do.”

Julian E. Barnes covers the U.S. intelligence agencies and international security matters for The Times. He has written about security issues for more than two decades.

3. Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby hands China a gift by blocking Ukraine weapons

We must recognize the linkage of the "CRInK" and the threat it imposes.. We must recognize the interconnectedness and the second and third order effects of our actions (or non-actions). 

Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby hands China a gift by blocking Ukraine weapons

Pentagon’s Undersecretary Elbridge Colby crafted America’s China strategy. Beijing couldn’t be happier.

https://euromaidanpress.com/2025/07/29/man-wants-to-counter-china-by-letting-russia-dismember-ukraine-forgets-theyre-allies/

euromaidanpress.com · by Andrew Chakhoyan · July 28, 2025

“Let’s put out this raging fire,” declared the fireman – then he grabbed a can of gasoline.

That, in essence, is Elbridge Colby’s strategy for contesting China’s rise: letting Russia – Beijing’s most dangerous partner and increasingly a vassal – dismember Ukraine with impunity.

In his widely cited book The Strategy of Denial, Colby argues that America’s overriding priority must be to prevent the People’s Republic of China – which he identifies as a hostile hegemon – from dominating the Indo-Pacific. That requires a narrow, disciplined focus on deterrence, building trust with allies, and showing adversaries that American commitments are ironclad.

And yet, Colby, who wrote this magnum opus, cannot possibly be the same person who threw Ukraine under the bus – to China’s very public delight. No wonder Sen. Mitch McConnell called his ideas “geostrategic self-harm” when voting against his confirmation.

Pentagon policy chief halts Ukraine weapons despite military analysis

A bombshell Politico investigation revealed that the architect of the recent weapons halt to Ukraine was none other than Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Colby. The official justification was concern over stockpile levels – a legitimate consideration that might warrant careful management of aid flows.

But this rationale collapsed under scrutiny. Military analysts inside the Department of Defense concluded that continuing aid to Ukraine would not compromise American readiness.

The decision also undercut the White House’s stated goal: a ceasefire agreed to by both parties. Ukraine accepted the proposal months ago. Russia didn’t just refuse, it mocked the peace talks and made Washington look weak and indecisive.

On 4 July, following the Trump-Putin phone call, Russia hit Ukraine with the largest drone attack of the war. 11 missiles and 539 Russian-Iranian Shahed drones were fired at Kyiv over a seven-hour onslaught. This record was shattered just five days later, on 9 July, when Russia launched 728 drones and 13 missiles in another massive assault.

These attacks, it turns out, are made possible by China.

According to Bloomberg, 92% of the foreign components found in the killer drones terrorizing Ukrainian cities are of Chinese origin. And on 23 July, The Telegraph reported that Russia now deploys fully Chinese-made drones to prosecute its criminal war in Ukraine.

On the very day Colby’s meddling with congressionally mandated weapons deliveries made headlines, Wang Yi – the top foreign policy official in the Chinese Communist Party – laid Beijing’s position bare: “China cannot allow Russia to lose the war in Ukraine,” he told European diplomats in a closed-door briefing.

China enjoys a favorable view among 81% of Russians, while 71% express hostility toward the EU. Ukraine and the United States are the only countries regarded with greater contempt.

A Levada poll showing Russians’ favorable attitude to China

Why Russia won’t abandon China for Western partnership

The idea that Washington can somehow coax Russia into abandoning China and joining the West runs counter to everything we know about the Kremlin’s imperial legacy. Moscow’s legitimacy rests on denying agency to the peoples it subjugates – from serfs during tsarist times to the inhabitants of the Russian Federation today.

America’s Constitution begins with a phrase the Kremlin sees as a mortal threat: We the People. The freedom and dignity that Americans and Europeans wish for the many Peoples of Russia are exactly what threatens Moscow’s system of oppression and subjugation.

Since 2022, Colby has argued for sacrificing Ukraine on the altar of “American interests.” But what lies ahead is the loss of American security to wishful thinking and incompetence.

How weakening Ukraine undermines American deterrence globally

By crippling Ukraine, Colby is doing precisely what his doctrine warned against: enabling the consolidation of a China–Russia-Iran-North Korea axis that threatens US interests far beyond Eastern Europe. American deterrence hinges on reliable commitments. So what message does a cut-off to Ukraine send to Taiwan, Japan, or the Philippines?

America forfeits credibility by broadcasting indifference and betraying people who just want to defend their home and not be murdered by Russia. The erosion of resolve is how great powers stumble into wars they try to avoid.

Ukraine has already shown that denial works. With the right tools, it has sunk much of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, retaken territory, and exposed the limits of Russian air power – most recently in Operation Spiderweb, which destroyed a row of Moscow’s bombers deep behind enemy lines.

Putting the moral case aside, aiding Ukraine is a strategic imperative under Colby’s own framework. Moscow reintroduced overt territorial conquest into modern geopolitics. In such a world, US force projection in East Asia grows harder and exponentially more expensive to sustain.

Explore further

Why Ukraine’s fight is key to defeating Russia-China-North Korea alliance

While Washington burns through nearly a trillion dollars each year on defense, the $40 billion the United States sent annually to Kyiv since 2022 is a minor fraction of that sum – and a bargain, when you consider the cost of letting deterrence collapse.

The truth is, abandoning Ukraine won’t deny China’s rise; it will enable it. It won’t isolate Moscow or draw it closer to the West; it will bind the Kremlin even more tightly to Beijing. It won’t preserve US leadership, it will shred the very credibility on which that leadership depends.

In Colby’s hands, the strategy of denial has morphed into a doctrine of permission. Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping couldn’t have asked for a better gift.

Institute for the Study of War Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 12, 2025

Andrew Chakhoyan

Andrew Chakhoyan is an Academic Director at the University of Amsterdam and a former U.S. government official at the Millennium Challenge Corporation. A Ukrainian-American, he studied at Harvard Kennedy School and Donetsk State Technical University.

Editor’s note. The opinions expressed in our Opinion section belong to their authors. Euromaidan Press’ editorial team may or may not share them.

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euromaidanpress.com · by Andrew Chakhoyan · July 28, 2025

4. 'Brutality over precision' — What the Army is learning from Russia in Ukraine

​Report follows in the next message.

There is a 17 minute video on this website at the link: https://taskandpurpose.com/tech-tactics/army-russia-ukraine-lessons-learned/

'Brutality over precision' — What the Army is learning from Russia in Ukraine

A new Army report reveals how Russian forces are adapting to a long, grinding war — and what lessons the U.S. military is learning from it.

Kyle Gunn

Jul 28, 2025 1:08 PM EDT

taskandpurpose.com · by Kyle Gunn

Russian forces in Ukraine are learning that tactics based on “brutality” and quantity over quality can improve their fortunes, according to a 170-page report put out by the U.S. Army this month. Published last week, “How Russia Fights” lays out a series of hard lessons the U.S. troops are learning from Russia as its full-scale invasion of Ukraine steams towards its fourth year.

“The Russians have already reverted to Soviet form on the battlefield, favoring mass over maneuver, quantity over quality, capacity over capability, brutality over precision, and mobilization over readiness,” the report says.

Produced by the Army’s Foreign Military Studies Office at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, it’s a rare look at how one part of the U.S. military is studying this war and what lessons can be taken from it. Based on events between Feb. 24, 2022, and June 30, 2024, it shows how Russia, despite sanctions, isolation, and battlefield losses, is rapidly adapting and refining a model of warfare that leverages mass, improvisation, and emerging technologies to sustain operations far longer than many expected.

Drones are foundational

One of the strongest themes in the report is how drones have become central to nearly every part of the Russian way of war.

Quadcopter drones, often rigged with improvised explosives or thermobaric payloads, are used at every level of the Russian military. These systems are produced at scale, often through informal networks, and treated as expendable munitions. Russia is reportedly going through tens of thousands of drones per month, according to analysts and open-source tracking.

Drones are now directly tied into command and fire support. Fixed-wing systems like the Orlan-10 conduct intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, or ISR. Targets are passed to artillery batteries or FPV drone teams that engage the target. Another drone confirms damage. In many cases, drones have replaced manned forward observers entirely.

In contrast, Army units below the battalion level often don’t have their own drones, though efforts to fix that are underway.

A Paratrooper playing the Opposing Force receives a drone during Devil Avalanche, at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, July 22, 2025. Army photo by Sgt. Dominick Smith.

Electronic warfare shapes the battlefield

Russia’s use of electronic warfare, EW, is another area the report highlights as both mature and deeply integrated.

Russian battalions independently operate systems like the Borisoglebsk-2 and Leer-3, which jam Ukrainian communications and GPS navigation, spoof drone signals, and expose the location of emitters. More than just a support capability, EW is used to shape the battlefield before major attacks.

Western-supplied guided munitions like JDAM-ERs and Excalibur rounds have reportedly been degraded in areas with dense Russian jamming. And not all of these capabilities are coming from high-end gear: commercial jammers purchased online, some as cheap as $20, are also being deployed.

Russian units are adapting

The Army’s assessment of Russian troop quality is nuanced. Some formations, like Spetsnaz or VDV units, retain a professional core. Others, especially mobilized conscripts and penal battalions, struggle with morale and coordination.

But even in lower-tier units, cohesion and tactical learning are improving. Officers are creating makeshift leadership structures. Training pipelines are becoming more efficient. And units that survive long enough are adapting to the demands of trench warfare and drone-saturated environments.

It’s not a well-oiled machine by any interpretation, but the soldiers and leaders are adapting and learning quickly how to survive.

Artillery is doing the heavy lifting

Russia has shifted decisively to an artillery-first doctrine, creating formations known as “army artillery groups.” These units integrate with drone ISR to deliver massed fires against static defenses and troop concentrations.

Within the U.S. military, the Army has traditionally emphasized maneuver warfare — mobility, initiative, speed. But as the report shows, Russia is winning ground slowly and methodically, with drones feeding targets to artillery in a sustained kill chain.

A whole-state effort

A major theme scattered throughout the report is how this is a war that is being fought through all levels of society. Ministries, civilian industries, universities, and city governments have all been pulled into the effort.

A bread factory in Tambov, Russia, for example, has been retooled to manufacture FPV drones. Local officials help fulfill recruitment quotas and raise money to buy gear for troops. Vans originally designed for public service have been converted into field ambulances. Regional governments are given quotes for “kontraktnik,” volunteer enlisted soldiers. This blurring between civilian and military lines isn’t an accident — it’s part of how Russia sustains its war effort.

This crowd-sourced approach isn’t unique to Russia, with Ukraine employing similar practices, particularly fundraising for gear and equipment, but it does illustrate how large the effort has become to sustain this ‘special military operation.’

What is the U.S. doing about it?

The Army is already making changes. In 2024, it began incorporating drone awareness and concealment techniques into enlisted training at Fort Benning, Georgia, Fort Jackson, South Carolina and Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. Soldiers now train to reduce their visibility to overhead ISR — a direct lesson from the Ukrainian trenches.

Modernization programs like Project Linchpin and TITAN are also underway, aiming to speed up targeting decisions and better integrate sensor data across domains.

The Pentagon’s July 10 memo, “Unleashing U.S. Military Drone Dominance,” opens up the branches to more rapidly acquire, field, and train with small drones by treating them like munitions instead of like an aircraft.

To break down the full report — and what it means for the future of U.S. ground warfare — we’ve got a deep-dive video up now on the Task & Purpose YouTube channel. It covers everything from drone saturation and GPS jamming to Russia’s artillery doctrine and how the Army is rethinking its own training and modernization in response. You can watch it here.

Task & Purpose Video

Each week on Tuesdays and Fridays our team will bring you analysis of military tech, tactics, and doctrine.

Watch Here

Kyle Gunn

Producer, Task & Purpose YouTube

Kyle Gunn has been with Task & Purpose since 2021, coming aboard in April of that year as the social media editor. Four years later, he took over as producer of the YouTube page, inheriting nearly 2 million subscribers and absolutely no pressure not to screw it all up.

• Army
• Around the World
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taskandpurpose.com · by Kyle Gunn

5. How Russia Fights – A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia's Special Military Operation

​Download the 330 page compendium (166 in PDF) at this link: https://api.army.mil/e2/c/downloads/2025/07/11/f2b1e75e/how-russia-fights-a-compendium-of-troika-observations-on-russia-s-special-military-operations.pdf

​Excerpt:

How Russia Fights: A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia’s Special Military Operation, First Edition was written under the auspices of the Emergent Threat, Training, and Readiness Capability (ET2RC) contract. The thrice-weekly Troika Observations and future editions of this Compendium will continue under the Service Solutions for Modernization, Analysis, Readiness Capability, Threat, and Training (SSMARTT) contract. The Troika Observations have always been a dialogue with warfighters in the field.

How Russia Fights

army.mil · July 21, 2025

A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia's Special Military Operation

(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

Download the full publication here: How Russia Fights: A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia's Special Military Operations [PDF - 11.6 MB]

Troika Compendium: Editor's Note

Acknowledgments

This project began as the vision of General Christopher Cavoli when he was the Commanding General, U.S. Army Europe and Africa (CG, USAREUR-AF). He realized that the U.S. Army Foreign Area Officers (FAOs) assigned to the European theater lacked the detailed understanding of the Russian Federation Armed Forces (RF AF) required to advise him and other senior warfighters. During the period from 1991 to 2014, when the United States considered Russia to be a strategic partner, FAO training had shifted its focus away from Russian military capabilities. To address this training gap, GEN Cavoli convened a team of retired Russian-speaking Army FAOs, with a combined total of more than 200 years’ experience working the Russian problem set. We named ourselves “the Troika,” a Russian word rich in history and symbolism. GEN Cavoli directed us to create a training course for FAOs focused on the RF AF at the operational and tactical levels. This course became the Russian Way of War (RWOW) Flagship.

After a successful pilot course in January 2021, GEN Cavoli tasked us to develop a one-day version of RWOW for his senior leaders, and a one-week version for staff officers, NCOs, and civilians, which we did. When Russia launched its “Special Military Operation” (SMO) against Ukraine on 24 February 2022, the Troika watched with rapt attention. We had just completed a flagship course, and our FAO students had planned a notional Russian invasion of Ukraine as part of a course exercise. Our curriculum was based on Russian taktika (doctrine), theory, professional military journals, exercises, and case studies of recent Russian operations in Chechnya, Ukraine, and Syria.

We were anxious to see how well our curriculum held up in a real Russian large-scale combat operation. In fact, it held up quite well. Many of our assumptions turned out to be correct. But there were some surprises, and some things we had overlooked.

The Troika commenced to update our curriculum in real time. On 25 February 2022, Day 2 of the SMO, we consolidated and organized 24 hours of hasty Troika-internal texts and emails summarizing our observations and sent them to GEN Cavoli via his Special Advisor for Russia. He responded with comments and enough questions to generate another set of “Troika Observations.”

He realized the daily Russian Way of War curriculum updates we began sending him in late February 2022 would be of use to his staff, subordinate units, and warfighters throughout the Joint Force. Thus the “Troika Observations,” currently distributed to more than 3,500 email addresses three times per week, were born.

In 2024, as Supreme Allied Commander Europe, GEN Cavoli encouraged us to go back through more than 2 years and several thousand pages of raw observations, analyze them, and produce a Compendium organized by U.S. Army Warfighting Functions.

The current CG of USAREUR-AF, General Christopher Donahue, enthusiastically supported the idea and suggested the title. Mr. Brendan McAloon, SES, served as our conduit to the command, as well as our Editor-in-Chief. He has read every Troika Observation for more than 3 years, helping us improve our often hastily written observations and ensure they were relevant to the warfighters. He also reviewed several drafts of this Compendium and helped us improve this final product.

How Russia Fights: A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia’s Special Military Operation, First Edition was written under the auspices of the Emergent Threat, Training, and Readiness Capability (ET2RC) contract. The thrice-weekly Troika Observations and future editions of this Compendium will continue under the Service Solutions for Modernization, Analysis, Readiness Capability, Threat, and Training (SSMARTT) contract. The Troika Observations have always been a dialogue with warfighters in the field.

We benefit from their feedback, and their requests for information often become research topics for future observations. We see this Compendium in the same vein. We hope to receive feedback from the field, which we will incorporate into future editions.

We will also update future editions with observations and insights from 1 July 2024 and beyond. We encourage readers to provide feedback to this email address: troika.compendium.comments@bah.com.

A project as complex and extensive as this involves many hands, and appreciation is due to many contributors who made it possible. This is a partial acknowledgment of contributors; we will inevitably have omitted some people.

• Managing Editor and Co-Author: COL (Ret) Ted Donnelly
• Co-Author: BG (Ret) Kevin Ryan
• Co-Author: COL (Ret) Tom Butler
• Co-Author: COL (Ret) Jeff Hartman
• Co-Author: COL (Ret) Lee Gabel
• Copy/Technical Editor: Mary Ann Singlaub
• Graphic Design and Layout: MAJ (Ret) Sean Frerking

Mr. Trent Duncan played an integral role in developing the daily procedures for the Troika Observations in early spring 2022 and pushed out the initial versions. Since then, LTC (Ret) Greg Sarafian and COL (Ret) Ken Chance have distributed the reports to the field.

army.mil · July 21, 2025

6. 21st Century War and Strategy: New "Balances" Required

​Will there be an unclassified version of the NDS that we can read and use?

Excerpts:

The aim of this article is to propose the areas where a difference balance of priorities might be required in the new National Defence Strategies for America and Australia.

...

For America and its Australian ally, their 2026 national defence strategies will play an important role in describing how each nation will respond to the current global security environment, while detailing actions that will assist each to achieve their national objectives in that environment.

At the same time, these strategies offer the opportunity to increase the momentum of learning, adaptation and change in the structure, posture, readiness, capacity and mass of contemporary military organisations. New threats and new technologies are changing the character of war. War in the Pacific might look different to the ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, but there are many insights into strategy, industry, technology and military operations from Ukraine which might be translated for use in the Pacific - and for the defence strategies of America, Australia and others.

The environment of contemporary war is highly lethal. Potential future confrontations with China or Russia are likely to be more so. The challenge for the 2026 defence strategies for America and Australia is whether they are able to shift from the legacy approaches of the 20th century to structures and strategies more fit for the coming decades to deter conflict, and if war can’t be deterred, to win it.

Despite the advances of technology, no AI or other advanced technology will achieve this shift. Only humans, demonstrating creativity, audacity, leadership and most importantly, will, can do this.

The 21st century will be very hard on those nations, and those military institutions, that are not up to this challenge. As the recent British Strategic Defence Review notes, a generational challenge requires a generational response.

21st Century War and Strategy: New "Balances" Required

21st century wars will have many differences from those of the 20th century. The coming 2026 U.S. National Defense Strategy offers the chance for different balances of capability.

https://mickryan.substack.com/p/21st-century-war-and-strategy-new?utm

Mick Ryan

Jul 29, 2025

∙ Paid

Australian Wedgetail and Ghost Bat aircraft conducting crewed-unscrewed teaming in 2025. Image: Boeing

A generational challenge demands a generational response.

UK Strategic Defence Review, 2025.

Over the coming months, the development of a new National Defense Strategy will be progressing in the United States. This congressionally mandated activity, which replaces the old Quadrennial Defense Review, aims to align America’s strategic objectives with its defence and national security activities and resources.

At the same time, the Australian Department of Defence will be undertaking a review of its 2024 National Defence Strategy. Like the U.S. National Defense Strategy, this Australian defence strategy will be released in 2026. Unlike their American ally, the Australian publication will be produced by the same government that released the preceding strategy.

Despite this, the planners who are involved in developing these strategies have many things in common. Both must deal with the significant changes in the global security environment that have occurred since the 2022 and 2024 documents were released. These changes, in the activities and capacity of potential adversaries, the politics and international engagement of America, and accelerating technological developments, will have a major influence on the direction of both documents. The extant strategies of America and Australia, which embrace deterrence as a core idea, must evolve based on these changes.

At the same time, the military forces that will be required to underpin these defence strategies require a thorough review. This is being driven by accelerating technological changes which are enabling more state and non-state actors to access capabilities which allow for greater visibility of contested spaces (not just the battlefield), place legacy systems at greater risk, and allow for a much larger array of long-range strike operations against deployed forces and homeland infrastructure.

The need to evolve strategy and military force design therefore will require a careful balancing act to ensure the right resources are applied in the right priorities so America and its Australian ally might achieve its desired national security objectives in the coming years. A new series of ‘balances’ – in strategy and force structure – are necessary.

The aim of this article is to propose the areas where a difference balance of priorities might be required in the new National Defence Strategies for America and Australia.

Balanced Strategy

Both the 2022 US National Defense Strategy and the 2024 Australian National Defence Strategy place deterrence at their core. The American strategy embraces what it describes as Integrated Deterrence, listing a series of areas such as deterrence by denial, deterrence by resilience, and deterrence by cost imposition. The Australian strategy, designed for a nation with more limited resources and much more limited outlook about its role in the world, embraced a strategy of denial.

The coming strategies for 2026 are likely to continue these approaches to deterrence, even if the language may evolve to take account of changes since the publication of their 2022 and 2024 predecessors. Both will need to achieve a difference balance in a couple of areas: resourcing deployed military versus homeland protection; and balancing standing forces versus mobilization plans.

Balancing deployed forces and homeland protection. Even before the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, it was clear that national resilience was a growing challenge for nations around the world. As the 2018 U.S. National Defense Strategy describes, “it is now undeniable that the homeland is no longer a sanctuary.” Whether it was the threat posed by state and non-state cyber actors, the demands of responding to misinformation and societal cohesion, the threat posed by drones to critical infrastructure, and the growing issues related to climate change, the inherent resilience of nations may require a rebalancing of resourcing that are dedicated to military forces designed for expeditionary operations and homeland security forces (which may only be partially military).

The nascent Golden Dome program to produce an American missile shield is just one example of how the U.S. Department of Defense having to tackle this rebalancing challenge. While military forces are capable of homeland and foreign deployments, the challenge now is one of concurrency. If both are required at the same time, as might be necessary in a larger confrontation with China or Russia, the current size and capability of military forces is inadequate. As a consequence, both the 2026 strategies for America and Australia will need to achieve what is likely to be a different balance of resources and priorities between foreign intervention forces and those designed for homeland security activities. This will have very significant implications for force design, force readiness as well as national and military resilience.

Balancing standing forces versus mobilized forces. The experiences of Ukraine and Israel in the past three years have demonstrated the need for rapidly expandable military forces. While the core professionalised force has played the central role in American and Australian forces since the end of the Vietnam War, this model is increasingly not fit for its strategic purpose. The vast array of challenges that military forces must now respond to – at home and abroad – calls for larger forces. At the same time, an array of new skillsets – from drone pilots to AI experts to the need for more logisticians to support integrated global operations – are needed in military organisations used to contracting these capabilities. Finally, the ability to recruit sufficient personnel has come under increasing pressure in societies where there is declining trust in institutions and many people are reticent to commit to long-term careers in a single organization.

Consequently, both the American and Australian versions of their 2026 national defence strategies must provide direction on the planning for mobilization, and how their respective military organisations might achieve a balance between the existing all-volunteer forces and a much larger force of mobilised (conscripted) force. In achieving these balances, both strategies will also need to explicitly describe the resources required and the priorities that will be necessary moving forward. No military organization can do everything that its government requires. There will be winners and losers.

At the same time, the rebalancing required must not be set in stone. As we have experienced in the past few years, the strategic environment, politics and technology can evolve quickly. As such, the new balances achieved in the two 2026 national defence strategies must have mechanisms for adaptation to ensure that as the situation changes, so do priorities, resourcing and the implementation of the strategies.

A Balanced 21^st Century Force

One of most bewildering statements in the Australian 2024 National Defence Strategy was as follows:

The ADF is shifting from a balanced force capable of responding to a range of contingencies, to an integrated, focused force designed to address the nation’s most significant strategic risks. This force must be more capable of the impactful projection of military power.

There were two problems with this.

First, the notion of a focused force implies that the Government understands exactly what the military will be required to do. While this might be true for the objectives it is given in peace time, this is not the case in war. The norm is that democracies are surprised at the start of all wars. The only way to respond and fight through the shock of surprise is to have a broad range of military capabilities to provide many options to government and enhance military resilience. Only a balance force can do this.

Second, the force described in the pages of the Australian strategy was actually a balanced force, incorporating changes across the land, air, cyber, space and maritime domains. Renaming this as a focused force (perhaps because it was focused on achieving its mission, like every other military force) was branding, not strategy.

Both the American and Australian defence strategies for 2026 are going to have to achieve military force structures that achieve a series of different balances. Indeed, both will probably need to consider a new ‘Balanced Force’ model, with six key “balances” to achieve.

1. Balance between air, maritime, land, cyber and space capabilities. One of the most popular terms for military force design is to aim for integrated forces. This was an aspiration of the 2024 National Defence Strategy and the 2022 US equivalent. It is also a term used in the British 2025 Strategic Defence Review, which describes its vision for the British military as:

A leading tech-enabled defence power, with an Integrated Force that deters, fights, and wins through constant innovation at wartime pace.

That is fine as it goes. But, as the late 20^th and early 21^st centuries demonstrate, the air, land and maritime domains have absorbed the majority of resources. That must change. For example, the reliance of space-based capability means that more investment will be required in building the resilience of existing friendly systems (in space and ground-based infrastructure) while holding adversary space-based systems at greater risk.

The 2026 defence strategies for America and Australia will inevitably have to rebalance investment between the different domains if their operations are to be sustainable in a protracted conflict with China or Russia.

2. Balance between crewed and uncrewed systems. With regards to uncrewed systems, the past three years have been the most intense period of learning and adaptation ever seen. The proliferation of uncrewed systems across the land, air and maritime domains has accelerated. The number of systems deployed, and the range of missions they undertake, continues to expand. But uncrewed systems must be employed within a larger human force. Achieving a more optimal balance of crewed and uncrewed systems is required.

Currently, crewed systems provide the overwhelming proportion of military force employed in nearly every environment. The cost and sophistication of uncrewed systems demonstrated by Ukraine and Russia have demonstrated that this crewed-uncrewed mix is changing rapidly. Uncrewed systems will be an increasing percentage of military platforms, although this mix of crewed to uncrewed systems will be different for air, land and sea operations as well as for different mission types.

The 2025 British Strategic Defence Review proposes one solution for its land forces, describing a mix of crewed and uncrewed platforms:

A ‘20-40-40’ mix is likely to be necessary: 20% crewed platforms to control 40% ‘reusable’ platforms (such as drones that survive repeated missions), and 40% ‘consumables’ such as rockets, shells, missiles, and ‘one-way effector’ drones.

This is a useful start point. A baseline ratio of crewed to uncrewed systems will probably be necessary to guide industrial policy and provide incentives for commercial drone manufacturers to innovate and invest. But the balances described above are likely to vary in different environments (desert versus jungle, sea versus air), regions (Pacific versus Europe) and operational contingencies (warfighting versus humanitarian assistance versus peacekeeping).

This will necessitate a rebalancing in the military forces of America and Australia between small numbers of exquisite systems and large numbers of cheap and massed systems. Both are required, but the current ratio between the two is neither sustainable economically nor survivable in future conflicts.

3. Balance between long-range strike and close combat. Events in Ukraine and the Middle East have demonstrated how long-range strike capabilities are no longer the preserve of superpowers or large, wealthy nations. In just three years, Ukraine has constructed a long-range strike capability from almost nothing. In the Middle East, Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iran have all demonstrated sophistocated long-range strike capabilities. However, despite the increasing availability of cheaper long-range strike capabilities – particularly drones and ballistic missiles - these are not silver bullets. Their application against critical enemy targets must be integrated within a larger military strategy.

And while long-range strike drones such as the Shahed and several of the Ukrainian types might now be produced in large quantities, military budgets must still be balanced between these systems, defences against them as well as the cost of building and employing forces for the conduct of close combat on the land, in the air and at sea. Getting this balance right is a crucial part of force design that will fall out of the 2026 defence strategies.

4. Balance between physical activities and the cyber/cognitive wars. In war, countries must fight to win the war while also fighting to win the story of the war. Neither by themselves is sufficient. The penetration of misinformation and authoritarian narratives into western political discourse at present has an impact not only military affairs but overall societal resilience and cohesion.

Tackling foreign misinformation and cyber-attacks is not solely a military affair (and generally the military are in support of such efforts). However, the ability of military institutions to better balance their countering of misinformation and enemy cognitive warfare activities, while better protecting their networks and building resilient constellations of space-based sensors and communications, may demand a different balance of investment between physical activities and the cyber/cognitive capacity in the 2026 defence strategies.

5. Balance between indigenously built and imported weapons and platforms. National resilience often focuses on critical infrastructure or societal cohesion and strength. Since 2022 however, much more emphasis has been placed on the development of enhanced defence industrial capacity to sustain prolonged conflicts which use masses of munitions, drones and other military materiel.

The past three years have also demonstrated that a high degree of sovereign defence industrial is desirable. This is for several reasons. First, the wait time from production to employment of military materiel is much shorter. Second, the reliability of supply is much greater, and this is an important consideration for nations fighting existential wars. Third, an indigenous defence industry develops indigenous research and development capabilities, which can speed up and broaden innovation and adaptation. Finally, indigenously produced weapons cannot be withheld by a less-than-supportive ally.

As Ukraine has demonstrated, it is possible to build an indigenous defence industry that can produce a significant proportion of wartime needs. For countries like Australia, which has a tiny defence industrial base, increased indigenous production will be needed to increase supply reliability, cut supply times and ensure that battlefield lessons are better linked to evolving defence materiel manufacturing.

But America also faces a potential need for rebalancing in this area. In one particular area, shipbuilding, America is now at a significant disadvantage compared to China. It may have to make tough decisions about staying with the Jones Act, or seek carve outs for shipbuilding so Japanese and South Korean shipyards can contribute to the repair and building of American ships before or during a future conflict.

6. Balance between change and continuity. The capacity to learn and adapt is inherent in all military activities in peace and war. Optimal approaches for an institution’s learning and adaptation in war are often developed in the years or decades before a war takes place. Adding to this adaptation imperative now is the pace of technological change. The rapid pace of innovation and change in uncrewed systems, counter-UAV operations and AI means that military institutions must be better than ever at learning and adapting at the tactical, operational and strategic levels. This adaptation must encompass new ways of organising and new ways of thinking about military operations in addition to new technologies. And as I explained in this speech, new technologies such as AI can also assist in the speed and quality of adaption.

However, every institution only has so much capacity to absorb new ideas. Michael Horowitz has described the challenges and opportunities of absorbing new technology and ideas into military institutions in The Diffusion of Military Power. He proposes what he calls The Adoption Capacity Theory:

Adoption-capacity theory posits that the financial and organizational requirements for adopting an innovation govern both the system-level distribution of responses and the way that individual actors make decisions, as well as the subsequent implications for international politics.

Horowitz examines multiple ways this might manifest in different organisations, and thoughts on best practice. Military institutions must prioritise those changes to ensure that those insights with the greatest potential to generate the largest military advantage are resourced.

A final aspect of this ‘balance’ is that not everything needs to change.

There are many enduring elements of war which do not change. The political nature of war is one such feature. But the enduring requirement for good leadership, teamwork and support of the populace for military operations are also enduring elements of war. As such, learning and adaptation sometimes results in the need to reinforce some old ways of thinking and doing things. Getting the balance right between change and continuity is not always about innovation and new technologies.

Onwards to the 2026 National Defence Strategies

For America and its Australian ally, their 2026 national defence strategies will play an important role in describing how each nation will respond to the current global security environment, while detailing actions that will assist each to achieve their national objectives in that environment.

At the same time, these strategies offer the opportunity to increase the momentum of learning, adaptation and change in the structure, posture, readiness, capacity and mass of contemporary military organisations. New threats and new technologies are changing the character of war. War in the Pacific might look different to the ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, but there are many insights into strategy, industry, technology and military operations from Ukraine which might be translated for use in the Pacific - and for the defence strategies of America, Australia and others.

The environment of contemporary war is highly lethal. Potential future confrontations with China or Russia are likely to be more so. The challenge for the 2026 defence strategies for America and Australia is whether they are able to shift from the legacy approaches of the 20^th century to structures and strategies more fit for the coming decades to deter conflict, and if war can’t be deterred, to win it.

Despite the advances of technology, no AI or other advanced technology will achieve this shift. Only humans, demonstrating creativity, audacity, leadership and most importantly, will, can do this.

The 21^st century will be very hard on those nations, and those military institutions, that are not up to this challenge. As the recent British Strategic Defence Review notes, a generational challenge requires a generational response.

7. Wargaming is having its ‘Moneyball’ moment

​I participated in a wargame last week that employed AI. If I were still a war planner I could have written the campaign plan at the end of the 3 days becasuse the AI captured all the discussions (in multiple breakout scenarios looking at multiple scenarios [enemy courses of action]) and organized them and developed data from them. It would have taken weeks to replicate what we did in 3 days and we still might not have captured as much substance. The effective use of AI is going to be a game changer for war planning. 

Wargaming is having its ‘Moneyball’ moment

https://www.militarytimes.com/opinion/2025/07/29/wargaming-is-having-its-moneyball-moment/?utm

By Andrew Mara, Kelly Diaz and Kevin Mather

 Jul 29, 2025, 06:03 PM

The future of wargaming lies in a marriage of modeling and simulation, human expertise and AI, the authors of this op-ed argue. Here, students conduct a wargame while attending Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, in December 2023. (Billy Blankenship/U.S. Air Force)

Twenty years ago, an explosion occurred in professional baseball as traditional baseball scouts — relying on decades of personal experience — collided with data scientists bringing new approaches and technology into the evaluation of baseball players. There were raucous debates on which approach would reign supreme: human expertise or numbers and statistics? We now know that neither approach would win out; the best baseball teams across the major leagues rely on a mix of human expertise and advanced statistics to provide the most complete assessment of talent.

Fast forward to today and a similar tension has formed in the field of defense wargaming, where traditional wargamers — relying on years of expertise and bespoke game designs — are coming to grips with rapid advances in modeling and simulation and artificial intelligence.

At the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, we have been living and breathing that tension as we have worked to incorporate generative AI and modeling and simulation into defense wargaming. The results of that work? We don’t think we need a 20-year debate. Just like in baseball, the future of wargaming lies in a marriage of modeling and simulation, human expertise and AI.

To understand why wargaming is having its “Moneyball” moment, you have to first unpack what makes traditional wargaming so valuable. Wargaming is fundamentally about human decision-making, but its magic is in the experiential learning opportunities the games provide. War is never simple. There is no “all-seeing eye” that provides perfect information. Hence, wargaming explores how humans make decisions in imperfect scenarios, and how other humans respond to those decisions.

Armies of psychologists have spent entire careers attempting to understand human decision-making. It’s not easy to boil down to numbers and equations. Moreover, it’s conveyed through conversation, discussion and debate, something that technology has yet to harness or replicate.

Wargames have served as an indispensable tool in this exploration. They provide a way to exercise the decision-making process, explore why choices were made and determine what the implications might be. However, being human-centric isn’t always efficient. Wargames often require months of planning by experienced wargamers who deeply understand the defense issues at play. They also require human players with the expertise to emulate the various parties in a conflict. All this means wargames are often hosted on an annual cycle and can only explore a small number of the potential scenarios a national security leader might encounter.

After all, how many people could plausibly play the role of Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping?

But with the advent of generative AI, we now have the ability to ask a computer to harness human language and, at a minimum, plausibly approximate human conversation and decision-making. That opens an opportunity to merge technology and wargaming in a way that hasn’t previously been possible — meaning we can bring wargaming to a wider audience over a broader set of possible scenarios.

Combine AI and physics-based modeling and simulation, which can traceably adjudicate how interactions between military platforms will play out (think whether or not an F-35 will be detected), and suddenly you can run wargames with a much smaller number of human players across a much larger number of scenarios. Because the artifacts of these games are captured digitally, you can then rapidly conduct assessments of exactly what happened and why it happened — which is incredibly labor-intensive in traditional wargaming.

While AI skeptics may rightfully point out that the future of AI has been overhyped for literally decades, we are no longer talking about the future of AI. It is a valuable addition to the wargaming toolkit right now — today. We know this because, with AI tools and a modeling and simulation backbone, we are building new scenarios in just days with a mix of AI and human players to explore numerous iterations, branches and variations of a conflict.

Are those AI players infallible? Far from it. But the ability to rapidly iterate the game — you can rewind and replay any move in a matter of seconds — allows you to explore a range of human and AI behaviors and begin to see the breadth of possible outcomes in any military scenario. And when you find that scenario that is critically important for human decision-makers to consider? That is when traditional wargaming really shines. Let national security leaders have that discussion and debate so that they can apply human judgment to the most consequential and important decisions.

The future of wargaming isn’t about traditionalists versus technologists. It’s about traditionalists and technologists working together, just like it was and is in professional baseball. We don’t need 20 years of debate to arrive at that conclusion.

Andrew Mara is the head of the National Security Analysis Department at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) where he leads the analytic team assessing the capabilities needed to solve the most pressing national security challenges; Kelly Diaz leads the Advanced Concepts and Capabilities program at APL, which aims to address complex national security challenges and inform strategic decision-making through innovative and data-driven approaches; Kevin Mather leads a team of analysts at APL in the development of advanced modeling and simulation analysis tools, including advanced framework for simulation, integration and modeling (AFSIM) and AI techniques to support complex national security analysis and decision-making.

8. SOCOM adds new advanced AI capabilities to tech wish list

We should not think of AI as only tech. We need to see AI from the cognitive perspective and not just some piece of tech. In fact AI should not be managed by tech guys (no disrespect to them meant). It should be managed by planners, intelligence personnel, and operators.

SOCOM adds new advanced AI capabilities to tech wish list​

U.S. Special Operations Command amended a broad agency announcement this week.

By

Jon Harper

July 29, 2025

defensescoop.com · by Jon Harper · July 29, 2025

U.S. Special Operations Command amended a broad agency announcement this week, adding additional AI and advanced autonomy capabilities to its technology wish list.

The move comes amid a broader modernization push by special ops forces and the Defense Department to add new digital tools and robotic platforms to their arsenal.

In a new subsection for “Advanced Autonomy and Artificial Intelligence,” the amended BAA for technology development noted that SOF is keen on “modular, open integration” of cutting‐edge solutions incorporating AI and machine learning to enable enhanced autonomy in unmanned systems.

“Specific areas of interest include but are not limited to agentic AI and vision language action (VLA) models to achieve more sophisticated autonomous behaviors like adaptive learning; neural radiance fields (NeRFs) for 3D scene representation and navigation; generative AI for simulation and data augmentation; advanced automatic target recognition (ATR) algorithms with edge node refinement and autonomous model retraining; advanced machine learning operations (MLOPs) to support data management, model training, validation, and monitoring,” officials wrote.

They noted that proposed solutions need to be designed with well‐defined interfaces and adherence to open standards to promote interoperability and integration into existing architectures.

Earlier this year, the command re-released its “SOF Renaissance” strategic vision, which observed that innovations in AI, autonomous systems and cyber tools are reshaping warfare and enhancing targeting and strike capabilities.

The document calls for commando forces to be early adopters of these types of technologies. SOCOM has been on the cutting-edge before as an early DOD user of the Maven Smart System, for example.

“The distinction between optimizing and generative AI is crucial and will be a game changer. Swarms of low-cost drones and remote explosive devices, using AI and autonomy, blur traditional human-machine boundaries on the battlefield. SOF must also use these systems to improve decisionmaking and situational awareness,” officials wrote in the strategy.

Vice Adm. Frank Bradley, the current commander of Joint Special Operations Command who’s been nominated by President Donald Trump to be head of SOCOM, said the use of innovative drone capabilities and tactics in places like Ukraine and the Middle East have ushered in a “revolution in military affairs.”

“The changing, accelerating pace of technology, the ubiquitous information environment, and the advent of man-machine teamed autonomy on the battlefields of the world today are absolutely changing the character of warfare … in our very eyes,” Bradley said last week during his confirmation hearing with the Senate Armed Services Committee.

He added that legislative proposals such as the FORGED Act and SPEED Act, and other initiatives to reform DOD acquisitions and speed up the fielding of new tech, are “critical to allowing us to use the innovative spirit of our operators to be able to capture those problems and opportunities we see on the battlefield and turn them into new man-machine teamed approaches.”

The amendment to the BAA comes just two weeks after the Pentagon’s Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office announced the award of $200 million contracts to multiple vendors for “frontier AI” projects.

“The adoption of AI is transforming the Department’s ability to support our warfighters and maintain strategic advantage over our adversaries,” CDAO Doug Matty said in a statement accompanying that announcement. “Leveraging commercially available solutions into an integrated capabilities approach will accelerate the use of advanced AI as part of our Joint mission essential tasks in our warfighting domain as well as intelligence, business, and enterprise information systems.”

Written by Jon Harper

Jon Harper is Managing Editor of DefenseScoop, the Scoop News Group’s online publication focused on the Pentagon and its pursuit of new capabilities. He leads an award-winning team of journalists in providing breaking news and in-depth analysis on military technology and the ways in which it is shaping how the Defense Department operates and modernizes. You can also follow him on X (the social media platform formerly known as Twitter) @Jon_Harper_

defensescoop.com · by Jon Harper · July 29, 2025

9. Russia kills 27 in Ukraine attacks despite Trump threat

​Another indication of Russian "brutality over precision."

Russia kills 27 in Ukraine attacks despite Trump threat

By  HANNA ARHIROVA and ILLIA NOVIKOV

Updated 2:07 PM EDT, July 29, 2025

apnews.com

Russia kills 27 in Ukraine attacks despite Trump threat | AP News

World News

Russia kills 27 civilians in Ukraine as the Kremlin remains defiant over Trump threats

President Donald Trump warned Monday he’s only going to give Russia 10 to 12 more days to reach peace with Ukraine, shortening a 50-day deadline he gave Russian leader Vladimir Putin two weeks ago, before imposing punishing sanctions and tariffs.

By  HANNA ARHIROVA and ILLIA NOVIKOV

Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year]  

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Glide bombs and ballistic missiles struck a Ukrainian prison and a medical facility overnight as Russia’s relentless strikes on civilian areas killed at least 27 people across the country, officials said Tuesday, despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to soon punish Russia with sanctions and tariffs unless it stops.

Four powerful Russian glide bombs hit a prison in Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, authorities said. They killed at least 16 inmates and wounded more than 90 others, Ukraine’s Justice Ministry said.

This photo provided by Ukraine’s State Criminal Executive Service shows a damaged prison in the village of Bilenke, in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, following a Russian bomb attack that killed at least 17 inmates, on Tuesday, July 29, 2025. (Ukraine’s State Criminal Executive Service via AP)

In the Dnipro region of central Ukraine, authorities said Russian missiles partially destroyed a three-story building and damaged nearby medical facilities, including a maternity hospital and a city hospital ward. At least three people were killed, including a 23-year-old pregnant woman, and two other people were killed elsewhere in the region, regional authorities said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that overnight Russian strikes across the country hit 73 cities, towns and villages. “These were conscious, deliberate strikes — not accidental,” Zelenskyy said on Telegram.

Trump said Tuesday he is giving Russian President Vladimir Putin 10 days to stop the killing in Ukraine after three years of war, moving up a 50-day deadline he had given the Russian leader two weeks ago. The move meant Trump wants peace efforts to make progress by Aug. 8.

This photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, shows an empty hospital room following Russia’s missile attack that hit a hospital killing two in Kamianske, Dnipropetrovsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, July 29, 2025. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)

AP AUDIO: Russia kills 27 civilians in Ukraine as the Kremlin remains defiant over Trump threats

AP correspondent Charles de Ledesma reports Russian glide bombs and missiles have struck a Ukrainian prison and a medical facility overnight, killing at least over people, officials say.

Trump has repeatedly rebuked Putin for talking about ending the war but continuing to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But the Kremlin hasn’t changed its tactics.

“I’m disappointed in President Putin,” Trump said during a visit to Scotland.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that Russia is determined to achieve its goals in Ukraine, though he said Moscow has “taken note” of Trump’s announcement and is committed to seeking a peaceful solution.

Zelenskyy welcomed Trump’s shortening of the deadline. “Everyone needs peace — Ukraine, Europe, the United States and responsible leaders across the globe,” Zelenskyy wrote in a post on Telegram. “Everyone except Russia.”

U.S. President Donald Trump, centre right, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer arrive at Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, Monday, July 28, 2025. (Jane Barlow/Pool Photo via AP)

The Kremlin pushes back against Trump

The Kremlin pushed back, with a top Putin lieutenant warning Trump against “playing the ultimatum game with Russia.”

“Russia isn’t Israel or even Iran,” former president Dmitry Medvedev, who is deputy head of the country’s Security Council, wrote on social platform X.

“Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country,” Medvedev said.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor, the Kremlin has warned Kyiv’s Western backers that their involvement could end up broadening the war to NATO countries.

“Kremlin officials continue to frame Russia as in direct geopolitical confrontation with the West in order to generate domestic support for the war in Ukraine and future Russian aggression against NATO,” the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank, said late Monday.

Russia attacks with glide bombs, drones and missiles

The Ukrainian air force said Russia launched two Iskander-M ballistic missiles along with 37 Shahed-type strike drones and decoys at Ukraine overnight. It said 32 Shahed drones were intercepted or neutralized by Ukrainian air defenses.

The Russian attack close to midnight Monday hit the Bilenkivska Correctional Facility with glide bombs, according to the State Criminal Executive Service of Ukraine.

Glide bombs, which are Soviet-era bombs retrofitted with retractable fins and guidance systems, have been laying waste to cities in eastern Ukraine, where the Russian army is trying to pierce Ukrainian defenses. The bombs carry up to 3,000 kilograms (6,600 pounds) of explosives.

At least 42 inmates were hospitalized with serious injuries, while another 40 people, including one staff member, sustained various injuries.

The strike destroyed the prison’s dining hall, damaged administrative and quarantine buildings, but the perimeter fence held and no escapes were reported, authorities said.

Ukrainian officials condemned the attack, saying that targeting civilian infrastructure, such as prisons, is a war crime under international conventions.

The assault occurred exactly three years after an explosion killed more than 50 people at the Olenivka detention facility in the Russia-occupied Donetsk region, where dozens of Ukrainian prisoners were killed.

Russia and Ukraine accused each other of shelling the prison. The Associated Press interviewed over a dozen people with direct knowledge of details of that attack, including survivors, investigators and families of the dead and missing. All described evidence they believed points directly to Russia as the culprit. The AP also obtained an internal United Nations analysis that found the same.

Russian forces also struck a grocery store in a village in the northeastern Kharkiv region, police said, killing five and wounding three civilians.

Authorities in the southern Kherson region reported one civilian killed and three wounded over the past 24 hours.

Alongside the barrages, Russia has also kept up its grinding war of attrition, which has slowly churned across the eastern side of Ukraine at a heavy cost in troop losses and military hardware.

The Russian Defense Ministry claimed Tuesday that Russian troops have captured the villages of Novoukrainka in the Donetsk region and Temyrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region.

Ukraine launches long-range drones

Ukraine has sought to fight back against Russian strikes by developing its own long-range drone technology, hitting oil depots, weapons plants and disrupting commercial flights.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday that air defenses downed 74 Ukrainian drones over several regions overnight, including 43 over the Bryansk region.

Yuri Slyusar, the head of the Rostov region said a man in the city of Salsk was killed in a drone attack, which started a fire at the Salsk railway station.

Officials said a cargo train was set ablaze at the Salsk station and the railway traffic via Salsk was suspended. Explosions shattered windows in two cars of a passenger train and passengers were evacuated.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine.

HANNA ARHIROVA

Arhirova is an Associated Press reporter covering Ukraine. She is based in Kyiv.

apnews.com

10. The Pentagon Against the Think Tanks

What are we so afraid of?

Excerpts:

Public conferences are part of the American civil-military relationship. Sometimes, these are events such as Aspen, where senior officials present policies or engage their critics under a national spotlight; other gatherings at various nongovernmental organizations help citizens understand what, exactly, their government is doing. At academically oriented meetings, members of the defense community gather ideas, debate, discuss, and sometimes establish contacts for future research and exchanges. Retired Army Colonel Jeffrey McCausland, who served on the National Security Council staff and as the dean of the Army War College, told me that the Pentagon’s shortsightedness could prevent important civil-military exchanges about national defense, and he wonders how far such prohibitions will go: Might the new directive mean that the “guy who teaches history at West Point or a war college,” for example, “can’t go to a history conference and be a better history professor?”

​....

Besides, when people get together and start thinking, anything can happen. Better safe than sorry.

The Pentagon Against the Think Tanks

Pete Hegseth finds a new enemy.

By Tom Nichols

The Atlantic · by Tom Nichols · July 29, 2025

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has scanned the horizon for threats, and sure enough, he has found a new group of dangerous adversaries: think tanks, the organizations in the United States and allied nations that do policy research and advocate for various ideas. They must be stopped, according to a Defense Department announcement, because they promote “the evil of globalism, disdain for our great country, and hatred for the president of the United States.”

This particular bit of McCarthyist harrumphing was the rationalization the Pentagon gave more than a week ago for pulling out of the Aspen Security Forum, a long-running annual conference routinely attended by business leaders, military officers, academics, policy analysts, foreign officials, and top government leaders from both parties, including many past secretaries of defense. For good measure, the Defense Department spokesperson Sean Parnell invoked the current holy words of the Hegseth Pentagon: The Aspen forum, he said, did not align with the department’s efforts to “increase the lethality of our war fighters, revitalize the warrior ethos and project peace through strength on the world stage.”

The Aspen gathering is not exactly a secret nest of Communists. This year’s roster of speakers included former CIA Director Robert Gates, former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper—a Trump appointee—and a representative from Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s office, among many others. John Phelan, the current secretary of the Navy, and Admiral Samuel Paparo, the head of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, were set to attend as well.

Read: The Pentagon’s policy guy is all in on China

Nor is Hegseth content just to stop America’s intellectual enemies cold at the Rockies: The Pentagon last week suspended Defense Department participation in all such activities, functionally a blanket ban on any interaction with think tanks or other civilian institutions that hold conferences, convene panels, and invite speakers. The New York Times reported that the order to pull out of Aspen came from Hegseth personally. And as Politico first reported, the larger ban appears to extend “to gatherings hosted by nonprofit military associations, such as Sea Air Space, which is led by the Navy League, the military service’s largest veteran organization, and Modern Day Marine, a similar trade show for the Marine Corps.” The Pentagon also “specifically banned attendance at the Halifax International Security Forum, which takes place in Nova Scotia each winter and where the Pentagon chief is usually a top guest.”

Take that, Canada.

Right now, no one seems certain of how this new policy works. Hegseth appears to have suspended all such participation subject to additional review by the Pentagon’s public-affairs office and general counsel, so perhaps some defense officials could one day end up attending conferences after their requests have been vetted. Good luck with that, and best wishes to the first Pentagon employee who pops up out of their cubicle to request a pass to attend such meetings. At some point soon, this prohibition will almost certainly be lifted, but why did Hegseth’s Pentagon impose it in the first place?

I am a former Defense Department employee who, over the course of my career, attended (and spoke at) dozens of conferences at various think tanks and other organizations, and I will make an educated guess based on experience: The main reasons are resentment, insecurity, and fear.

The most ordinary reason, resentment, predates Hegseth. Government service is not exactly luxurious, and many trips are special perks that generate internal gripes about who gets to go, where they get to stay, and so on. (These trips are not exactly luxurious either, but in my government-service days, I learned that some people in the federal service chafe when other employees get free plane tickets to visit nice places.) It’s possible that someone who has never been invited to one of these things convinced Hegseth—who seems reluctant to attend such events himself—that these meetings are just boondoggles and that no one should go.

Bureaucratic pettiness, however, isn’t enough of an explanation. One hazard for people like Hegseth and his lieutenants at a place like Aspen or the International Institute of Strategic Studies or the Halifax conference is that these are organizations full of exceptionally smart people, and even experienced and knowledgeable participants have to be sharp and prepared when they’re onstage and in group discussions. The chance of being outclassed, embarrassed, or just in over one’s head can be very high for unqualified people who have senior government jobs.

Hegseth himself took a pass on the Munich Security Conference (usually a good venue for a new secretary of defense), and instead decided to show videos of himself working out with the troops. We can all admire Hegseth’s midlife devotion to staying fit and modeling a vigorous exercise regimen for the troops (who must exercise anyway, because they are military people and are ordered to do it), but America and its allies would probably benefit more from a secretary with an extra pound here and there who could actually stand at a podium in Munich or London and explain the administration’s strategic vision and military plans. The overall prohibition on conferences provides Hegseth and his deputies (many of whom have no serious experience with defense issues) with an excuse for ducking out and avoiding making fools of themselves.

But perhaps the most obvious and Trumpian reason for the Pentagon’s brainpower lockdown is fear. Officials in this administration know that the greatest risk to their careers has nothing to do with job performance; if incompetence were a cause for dismissal, Hegseth would have been gone months ago. The far greater danger comes from the chance of saying something in public that gets the speaker sideways with Trump and turns his baleful stare across the river to the Pentagon. “The Trump administration doesn’t like dissent, I think that’s pretty clear,” a Republican political strategist and previous Aspen attendee told The Hill last week. “And they don’t like dissenting views at conferences.”

The problem for Trump officials is that “dissent” can mean almost anything, because the strategic direction of the United States depends on the president’s moods, his grievances, and his interactions with others, including foreign leaders. Everything can change in the space of a post on Truth Social. To step forward in a public venue and say anything of substance is a risk; the White House is an authoritarian bubble, and much like the Kremlin in the old Soviet Union, the man in charge can decide that what is policy today could be heresy tomorrow.

Read: When Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon tenure started going sideways

In the end, banning attendance at meetings where defense officials can exchange ideas with other intelligent people is—like so much else in this administration—a policy generated by pettiness and self-protection, a way to batten down the Pentagon’s hatches so that no one speaks out or screws up. If this directive stays in place for even a few years, however, it will damage relationships among the military, defense officials, business leaders, academics, and ordinary Americans.

Public conferences are part of the American civil-military relationship. Sometimes, these are events such as Aspen, where senior officials present policies or engage their critics under a national spotlight; other gatherings at various nongovernmental organizations help citizens understand what, exactly, their government is doing. At academically oriented meetings, members of the defense community gather ideas, debate, discuss, and sometimes establish contacts for future research and exchanges. Retired Army Colonel Jeffrey McCausland, who served on the National Security Council staff and as the dean of the Army War College, told me that the Pentagon’s shortsightedness could prevent important civil-military exchanges about national defense, and he wonders how far such prohibitions will go: Might the new directive mean that the “guy who teaches history at West Point or a war college,” for example, “can’t go to a history conference and be a better history professor?”

Maybe someone is mad that they didn’t get to go to Colorado or Canada; perhaps someone else is worried that accepting an invitation could be career suicide. Somehow, the Pentagon has managed to engage productively in such events for decades, under administrations of both parties. But Hegseth, after a string of embarrassments—McCausland points to the lingering “radioactivity” of Signalgate—has apparently chosen a safety-first approach. Unfortunately, the secretary still has to appear in public, and the chances of yet more stumbles from him and his team are high. But at least he’ll be able to reassure the American public that the upright employees of the Pentagon won’t be wined and dined by politically suspect eggheads.

Besides, when people get together and start thinking, anything can happen. Better safe than sorry.

The Atlantic · by Tom Nichols · July 29, 2025

11. Pentagon reverses decision to cut off hurricane-tracking satellite data

​A wise move. The Pentagon is demonstrating that like our founding fathers, what makes America great is that we can correct our mistakes.

But this is a good example of a public good that the government should provide for the welfare of the people.

Pentagon reverses decision to cut off hurricane-tracking satellite data

After an initial plan to cut the data off in late June, the Pentagon extended that timeline to July 31 as forecasters raised concern that any loss of data could increase the risks rapidly intensifying storms pose to coastal communities.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2025/07/29/hurricane-forecasting-data-defense-satellites/?utm

Updated

July 29, 2025 at 3:02 p.m. EDTyesterday at 3:02 p.m. EDT

A specialist inspects a satellite image of Hurricane Beryl at the National Hurricane Center on July 1, 2024, in Miami. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

By Scott Dance

Days before the Pentagon was set to cut off access to satellite observations that help meteorologists track hurricanes overnight, Defense Department officials told government forecasters they would continue sharing the data, after all.

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Defense officials initially announced in late June that they would terminate a feed of satellite data, giving meteorologists just a few days’ notice. As forecasters raised concerns that any loss of data that helps detect fast-strengthening storms could increase the risks they pose to coastal communities, the Pentagon extended that timeline to July 31.

But officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Tuesday that they now expect “no interruption” in the data their meteorologists receive through what is known as the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program, which includes microwave-based observations that reveal storm activity even through the cover of darkness.

U.S. Navy officials said the branch’s Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center had planned to phase out the data as it prepares to replace the aged satellites by next year.

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“But after feedback from government partners, officials found a way to meet modernization goals while keeping the data flowing until the sensor fails or the program formally ends in September 2026,” a Navy spokesperson said in an email.

Meteorologists cheered the decision, saying termination of the microwave data could have set back hurricane capabilities. Several decades ago, before such data was available, forecasters ran the risk of what they called a “sunrise surprise,” when daylight would reveal that a storm had strengthened more than meteorologists had expected.

“Crisis averted,” hurricane expert Michael Lowry, a former National Hurricane Center senior scientist, wrote on the social media platform Bluesky.

NOAA officials stressed that, while valuable, the Defense Department’s microwave satellite observations represent “a single dataset in a robust suite of hurricane forecasting and modeling tools.” Meteorologists at the Hurricane Center and National Weather Service also have access to microwave-based observations collected by NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System.

“NOAA’s data sources are fully capable of providing a complete suite of cutting-edge data and models that ensure the gold-standard weather forecasting the American people deserve,” an agency statement said.

Microwave is a form of radiation best known for how it interacts with water to heat food. But as microwave radiation also naturally emanates from Earth’s surface, scientists can also use it to see where and how water is distributed in the atmosphere — and detect the structure and wind patterns of hurricanes even when they are invisible to the naked eye.

Meteorologists have said such microwave data is vital as more hurricanes are undergoing rapid intensification, transforming from modest and disorganized systems into major Category 5 storms within a matter of hours. Global warming, as a result of fossil fuel combustion-based emissions and the greenhouse effect, is giving storms more energy to intensify, studies have shown.

The more satellites circling the planet and collecting the microwave observations, the better the chances of detecting such rapid intensification more quickly, scientists said.

The U.S. Space Force is replacing the Defense satellites with new environmental satellites, one of which launched last year and began operating in April. Another is set to launch in 2026 and begin operating in 2027.

What readers are saying

The continuation of the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program data is seen as crucial for accurate hurricane forecasting, with several comments highlighting its importance for both military operations and public safety. The decision to maintain the program is viewed as a... Show more

This summary is AI-generated. AI can make mistakes and this summary is not a replacement for reading the comments.

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Extreme weather

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By Scott Dance

Scott Dance is a reporter for The Washington Post covering extreme weather news and the intersections between weather, climate, society and the environment. Contact him securely at @ssdance.22 on Signal.follow on Xssdance

12. The U.S. military is investing in this Pacific island. So is China.

​Extensive photos at the link. What a beautiful place.

A long article about which few of us have any idea of the strategic competition that is taking place between the US and China. 

https://wapo.st/4fg4oWP

The U.S. military is investing in this Pacific island. So is China.

Koror, Palau, where the U.S. plans to expand the main harbor for its warships, and where officials worry a Chinese-owned hotel could be used for surveillance. (Photos by An Rong Xu/For the Washington Post)

New U.S. radar sites are designed to keep China in check. But Chinese developments, some with questionable connections, could create vulnerabilities.

https://wapo.st/4fg4oWP

Yesterday at 5:00 a.m. EDT

By Michael E. Miller, Lyric Li and An Rong Xu

KOROR, Palau — The U.S. military will next year upgrade Palau’s main harbor, usually frequented by dive boats full of tourists heading to emerald lagoons, so that American warships can enter the Pacific island nation’s narrow channels and dock here.

Get concise answers to your questions. Try Ask The Post AI.

The wharf will be expanded and elevated. There will be a new logistics hub with a warehouse, enabling U.S. Navy ships to refuel, reload and rearm.

This is all part of a broader effort to boost the U.S. military’s presence in the Western Pacific, allowing for the rapid mobilization of American forces in the event of a conflict involving China.

Complicating that plan, however, is a Chinese-owned hotel overlooking Malakal Harbor that U.S. and Palauan officials worry could be used for surveillance.

Across Palau, Chinese businesses and developers have leased land near a half-dozen strategic locations where the United States is beefing up efforts to detect and deter China’s growing reach into the region, according to intelligence and security documents and interviews with 20 American, Palauan and Taiwanese officials.

The site in Palau’s Ngaraard state where the U.S. will soon build part of its “over the horizon” radar system, which would play a key role in any potential conflict with China.

Despite not having diplomatic relations with China, Palau has seen an influx of Chinese tourists and investors. Here, a dive boat and a luxury yacht are seen near Palau's Malakal Harbor.

A months-long Washington Post investigation found that Chinese businesses have leased land or built properties for tourism developments near the port, the airport, a U.S. coastal surveillance outpost and a U.S. “over the horizon” radar system. (Palauan law doesn’t allow foreigners to buy land, but they can lease it for up to 99 years.)

These Chinese leases or buildings potentially provide Beijing with not only a bird’s-eye view of the increasing American footprint in Palau but also opportunities to disrupt U.S. military activities here, the officials said.

Skip to end of carouselChinese organized crime goes global

The Washington Post is examining the globalization of Chinese organized crime and Beijing’s selective use or tolerance of criminal groups for geopolitical purposes. Mixing illicit activity and patriotism has become a hallmark of some Chinese organizations with overseas interests.

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Some of the projects have connections to groups allegedly linked to organized crime, according to records obtained by The Post including a U.S. intelligence assessment and parts of a Palauan national security briefing, and officials in both countries are concerned these groups could act as proxies for Beijing, complementing the expansionary goals of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

“The Chinese are very sophisticated,” Palau’s president, Surangel Whipps Jr., said in an interview. “They play the long game. They know exactly what they’re doing and so we’ve got to be smarter.”

China, which has the world’s largest navy, has been aggressively increasing its influence across the South China Sea and into the Western Pacific, seeking to becoming the predominant maritime power in a region the U.S. has long considered its domain.

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The location of Palau, a Micronesian archipelago of more than 300 islands east of the Philippines, has long made it strategically valuable. Japan occupied it during the first half of the 20th century, then fought bloody battles with the U.S. here during World War II.

Today, Palau is an important link in the Second Island Chain, the string of outposts stretching from Japan through Guam and Micronesia to Indonesia that the U.S. is fortifying to constrain China’s expansion. (The First Island Chain includes Taiwan and is closer to China.) The U.S. military, which has broad access in Palau as part of a compact of free association, sees the island nation as a small but key piece of its strategy to quickly disperse forces and project power in the region.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has vowed to take control of Taiwan — by force if necessary — potentially involving the U.S. in a military conflict. In the meantime, Beijing has convinced several countries in the region to sever diplomatic ties with the self-governing democracy that China claims as a province. Palau is one of only three Pacific nations that still recognize Taipei over Beijing.

Whipps said that soon after he was first elected in 2020, he received a call from China’s ambassador to the Federated States of Micronesia, who offered a “million” tourists a year to fill Chinese-built hotels — in exchange for Palau’s abandoning Taiwan.

Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr., who has cracked down on foreign, and especially Chinese, influence in his country.

China’s Foreign Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

“This is a national security issue not only for Palau but also Taiwan and the United States,” said Jessica C. Lee, Taiwan’s ambassador to Palau. “If there is a ‘D-Day,’ the Chinese will be able to cut cables in Palau, activate devices on rooftops, whatever they can to delay a U.S. response to Chinese aggression.”

Beijing has studied U.S. force projection closely and knows that facilities in places like Palau are critical to American readiness, said Abraham Denmark, who was a defense official in the Biden and Obama administrations. “It’s very clear they want to do what they can to disrupt U.S. operations as best they can using whatever means they have available.”

The Palau National Capitol in Ngerulmud.

Officials say this country of just 17,000 people has seen a surge in violence, drugs and corruption involving Chinese nationals that Whipps claims is designed to pressure Palau to recognize China, something Beijing denies.

Whipps has cracked down on foreign, and especially Chinese, influence in Palau. Since his reelection in November, his administration has deported dozens of people, denied more than 150 tourist visas or work permits, and added more than 100 names to its list of undesirable aliens. In all three categories, the majority of people have been Chinese, including some with land leases near strategic sites, records show.

Joel Ehrendreich, the U.S. ambassador to Palau, said the pattern of overpriced land leases in strategic but often economically unviable locations fits with Beijing’s modus operandi.

“Leasing land is certainly the right of the landowner under Palauan law,” Ehrendreich said. “But you’ve got to wonder when you see where the Chinese are doing it, the prices that they’re doing it and what they do with the land after they lease it. It just raises a lot of questions, a lot of suspicion.”

Chinese tourists take photos on Long Beach in the Omekang Islands, a short boat ride from Koror's Malakal Harbor.

Chinese tourists snorkel off Long Beach.

A document obtained by The Post shows that the U.S. Embassy has asked the Trump administration for more assistance, including a senior U.S. law enforcement official with experience in combating Chinese organized crime and a Drug Enforcement Administration agent to tackle trafficking and corruption, plus a rotation of five U.S. police officers and a pair of prosecutors to handle cases involving Chinese suspects.

The State Department said that it couldn’t comment on embassy requests but that transnational organized crime linked to China was “evolving” in the region. “We’ve seen the CCP deepen its influence to undermine Pacific regional security, damage economies and endanger citizens,” it said in a statement.

Analysts say it’s unclear what approach the Trump administration will take to the Pacific. The U.S. DOGE Service canceled the final months of a contract for some U.S. security assistance in Palau.

Whipps hopes President Donald Trump will restore and bolster ties. “Don’t cut off your partners,” the Palauan president said. “We’re on the front line.”

A pilot jogs to a plane in Angaur, where the U.S. military renovated the World War II airstrip in 2020. The U.S. is now building a radar facility nearby.

Interest in a remote island

Roughly 40 miles south of Malakal Harbor sits the island of Angaur. It, too, is in the middle of an American military upgrade. It, too, has been the focus of Chinese interest.

The U.S. military has spent the past two years and $100 million clearing 100 acres here for a receiver for its Tactical Multi-Mission Over the Horizon Radar, or TACMOR. The system, which requires transmitter and receiver stations at least 50 miles apart, will enable the U.S. to detect Chinese hypersonic missiles or airplanes that might target U.S. forces in the Second Island Chain to prevent them from aiding Taiwan.

In 2010, Palau’s government publicly urged the U.S., which was relocating Marines from the southern Japanese island of Okinawa, to move them to Angaur. Soon after, Chinese investors started expressing interest in the remote island.

A propeller from a World War II plane stuck in a tree on Angaur. Angaur and Peleliu, a nearby island, were the scene of intense fighting between the U.S. and Japan in 1944.

A memorial built to fallen Japanese soldiers in Angaur. Japan occupied Palau during the first half of the 20th century.

Land records show that in 2014, Tian Hang, a longtime Chinese resident in Palau known here as Hunter Tian, signed contracts with four family groups to lease about 250 acres of land, including near Angaur’s airstrip and port, for what he said would be a resort.

Tian, who declined interview requests, is the president of the Palau Overseas Chinese Federation, which functions as part of the CCP’s United Front Work Department promoting state objectives and whose members have given illegal campaign contributions to pro-China politicians in Palau, according to the U.S. intelligence assessment, parts of which were first reported by Reuters. None has been charged.

The U.S. and Palau announced the plan for the TACMOR system in mid-2017. A few months later, Tian took prominent Palauans to China to meet with officials, according to the U.S. intelligence assessment and former president Johnson Toribiong, who went on the trip. Tian also launched a China-Palau trade organization and an ill-fated media organization in Palau with ties to Chinese security services, according to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.

The U.S. military has spent two years and $100 million clearing 100 acres in Angaur for part of its TACMOR radar system.

In 2018, Tian’s deputy in the federation introduced Palau’s then president, Tommy Remengesau Jr., to Wan Kuok Koi, a Macao mob boss known as “Broken Tooth” who served 14 years in prison in Macao for illegal gambling, loan-sharking and attempted murder.

Remengesau told The Post he wasn’t aware of Wan’s background. But it became clear in 2019 when Wan boasted in Hong Kong media of his plans for a Palau casino resort — located in Angaur, it was later revealed — where he would control “customs, ports and an airport.” Remengesau responded by banning foreigners with criminal histories from coming to Palau. The U.S. Treasury later imposed sanctions on Wan.

Previously unreported, however, is the fact that Wan was also interested in leasing land next to a second TACMOR site, a transmitter 60 miles north of Angaur in Palau’s Ngaraard state.

Alan Seid, a prominent Palau businessman, told The Post that he signed a memorandum of understanding to lease to Wan a plot of land across the road from the Ngaraard transmitter site. Wan promised to pay as much as $15 million but never delivered, according to Seid, who declined to provide a copy of the MOU and said he, too, was unaware of Wan’s background.

Wan could not be reached for comment.

Work is underway at the TACMOR site in Angaur.

Workers prepare to pour cement.

Whipps said it was “suspect” that Wan, who had been honored by Beijing for his patriotism, had explored leasing land near both TACMOR locations. “When you begin to see the connections, then you begin to wonder how can the Chinese government say they’re not working with organized crime,” the president said.

Experts say Beijing selectively uses organized crime groups to further its objectives overseas — something the Chinese government has denied.

“It works for Beijing in two ways,” said Euan Graham, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a Canberra-based think tank. “They can export their criminal problem, but then they also turn that criminal problem into their front line of influence, basically just to sow corruption and to erode governance in these small island states.”

Tian’s Angaur leases have expired, and Wan’s plan for both TACMOR sites ended when he had to leave the country. But the transmitter site in Ngaraard state, where work awaits an environmental permit, could soon be overlooked by a 275-room Chinese resort.

Tian Shuchun (no relation to Hunter Tian) leased 60 acres here in 2015, two years before the TACMOR announcement. But it wasn’t until late 2023, shortly after the U.S. military held its first public meetings on the radar, that he registered plans to build the Palau International Grand Hotel, according to local tax records. His company, Great Wall Garments, a women’s clothing manufacturer in Tianjin, near Beijing, has branched out into “high-end hotel resorts” in China, Vietnam, Uzbekistan and Palau, according to its website.

Tian, who declined interview requests, has been a member of the CCP for 46 years and has been awarded several honors, including “Outstanding Communist Party Member of Tianjin,” according to the Tianjin Small and Medium Enterprises Association, where Tian serves as a deputy director.

The association has close ties with the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, a key part of China’s United Front Work.

Tian joined the People’s Liberation Army at age 19. When his company hosted an event for PLA veterans in 2022 to promote patriotism and loyalty to the CCP, he told the gathering that he still practiced many PLA habits including “a hard work ethic,” according to a local government press release.

U.S. and Palau officials also worry about Tian’s local ties. In January, Palauan authorities busted what they said was a Chinese-language online gambling and scam operation in a hotel owned by the family of Vance Polycarp, the local agent for Tian’s hotel project. A dozen people, including eight of Polycarp’s employees, were detained, according to court records. Polycarp, who was charged with four misdemeanor labor violations, told The Post that he’d done nothing wrong and that the government was “overreaching.”

The future site of the Ritzy, a Chinese-owned hotel that will be about a mile from Roman Tmetuchl International Airport, where the U.S. military frequently conducts exercises.

‘An intelligence coup’

In October, six U.S. C-17 transport planes swept down on Palau’s Roman Tmetuchl International Airport, part of an exercise simulating scenarios the U.S. could face in Palau in a conflict with China. Hundreds of Army Rangers practiced rapidly securing the airfield before an artillery brigade launched six missiles from High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), all while an electromagnetic warfare squadron provided secure communications.

A mile from the western end of the runway, a sign in Chinese and English warns the public to stay out. Atop a hill, workers were finishing the foundations of a 50-room hotel called the Ritzy.

According to an analysis by Pacific Economics, a Hawaii-based consultancy, the company building the Ritzy — Horizon Holdings Group — has ties to a Chinese-Cambodian conglomerate — Prince Holding Group — that Chinese officials have linked to transnational crime. In a risk assessment prepared for Palauan authorities, Pacific Economics analyzed records from two commercial databases and found ties — including shared directors across two subsidiaries — suggesting that the two companies are associated.

Li Yangkun, Horizon Holding’s chairman, told The Post that the links stemmed from a partner’s selling a company to the Prince Group in 2017. However, commercial data reviewed by The Post shows that Li’s partner, Zhou Bo, continued to serve as a director of the company for at least two years after the sale, alongside Prince Group Chairman Chen Zhi. Zhou also served alongside Chen for several years as a director of Prince Bank PLC, a Prince Group subsidiary.

Chinese prosecutors have accused Prince Group subsidiaries of luring people to Cambodia to work in online casinos, according to public court records. The CCP’s Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission has called the Phnom Penh-based conglomerate a “massive cross-border online gambling corporation,” with officials estimating illicit revenue of $700 million between 2016 and 2024.

A crew at work on the Ritzy hotel.

In response to The Post’s questions, Prince Group spokesman Gabriel Tan acknowledged the past links between Zhou and Chen but said Zhou’s involvement with the Prince Group ended in 2019. Records show that is when Horizon Holdings was incorporated, also in Cambodia.

Tan said the Prince Group has no ties to the Ritzy or Horizon Holdings and “no operations, investments, development activities, subsidiaries, or partnerships in Palau.” He said that any court cases mentioning the company were “cases of impersonation” and that “no executive or employee” has been prosecuted, convicted or “formally investigated in China or any other jurisdiction.”

The conglomerate has maintained its business in China, including several real estate offices that work with Chinese state-owned companies, and is involved in projects in the Belt and Road Initiative, China’s global infrastructure investment program, according to local government press releases.

Citing Pacific Economics, Palau’s National Security Coordination Office warned in a report that the Ritzy’s alleged ties to the Prince Group threatened to introduce “illegal gambling and other illicit activities.” Whipps’s government put three people associated with the Ritzy on the undesirable-alien list in April. The only employee still in Palau, a Chinese project manager named Mu Hongyue, insisted the project wasn’t linked to the Prince Group and didn’t pose any threat.

“It’s ridiculous,” he said in late April as he gave Post reporters a tour of the construction site, including what would eventually be a badminton court. “How can we use this place to attack your aircraft?”

President Surangel Whipps Jr. speaks in April during a visit by a U.S. congressional delegation.

Alan Seid, a prominent Palau businessman who has leased land to Chinese investors, at this year's State of the Republic address at the Capitol.

But Bryan Clark, a former U.S. Navy officer and an expert in electronic warfare at the Hudson Institute, a conservative Washington think tank, said a mile would be close enough to launch an unjammable fiber-optic drone or intercept radio communications.

“You just need to find one or two pilots or navigators who aren’t on the ball and forget to do the right equipment setup and, boom, you’ve got an intelligence coup for your country,” he said.

The Ritzy isn’t the only Chinese development with alleged links to the Prince Group. A project is set to begin in Palau’s north near a U.S. coastal surveillance system, a radar with a 75-mile radius.

In late 2019, not long after he was in discussions with Wan over the land near the TACMOR site in Ngaraard, Seid was approached about an uninhabited islet he co-owned. He took a group of Chinese businessmen led by a “Mr. Chen” — who insisted that he wasn’t to be photographed, Seid said — to Ngerbelas, where he barbecued freshly speared fish for them. He eventually leased them the island for up to 99 years for $7 million, records show.

The Grand Legend International Asset Management Group is now poised to build a luxury resort on Ngerbelas. Palau corporate records show its largest joint shareholder is Chen Zhi, the Chinese-born naturalized Cambodian citizen who heads the Prince Group. A document for the resort filed with the Palauan government and obtained by The Post says that “Grand Legend is a subsidiary of Prince Real Estate Group.” The website for another Prince Group subsidiary featured a map — now removed — showing a project in Ngerbelas.

Tan, the Prince Group spokesman, confirmed Chen’s involvement but said that it was only in a “personal capacity” and that he had not been to Palau. Tan said that Grand Legend was not a subsidiary, that the resort was unrelated to the Prince Group, and that the Prince Group had never positioned developments near U.S. strategic sites in Palau.

Palau, which is home to some of the world's best reef dive sites, has seen an influx of Chinese tourists and investors.

Creating options for later

Above Malakal Harbor in Koror, the upper reaches of the Belmond Hotel are being renovated. Its Chinese owner, Zhang Zhengrong, says it will soon have a rooftop lounge.

U.S. and Palauan officials fear it could house electronic surveillance devices aimed at visiting U.S. warships.

Zhang scoffed at the idea.

“I’m a simple businessman,” the 35-year-old said in a phone interview. “I have zero interest in politics. Not in China. Not in Palau.”

Zhang said he grew up in China’s Fujian province and went into construction after dropping out of school at age 14. He said he went to Palau on vacation in 2019 and liked it so much that he decided to stay and invest. He bought the partly built Belmond for $3 million during the covid-19 pandemic using the proceeds from his construction businesses, he said.

According to the Palau national security brief, however, Zhang has ties to the Fujianese mafia — known for its global reach — and his money comes from running online scam operations in Southeast Asia.

Zhang denied any involvement in the mafia or scam operations. In December, however, police raided a suspected illegal online gambling and scamming operation in one of his four Palau properties. They arrested one person and several others fled. Zhang said he was merely the landlord.

A sign on the road to Roman Tmetuchl International Airport. Officials say Palau has seen a surge in violence, drugs and corruption involving Chinese nationals.

The proposed TACMOR site in Ngaraard, where work awaits an environmental permit. A Chinese-owned hotel is scheduled to be built across the road. (An Rong Xu/For The Washington Post)

Zhang said he learned of the Belmond from Siegfried Nakamura, a local lawyer whose family owned the hotel. Nakamura was elected to Palau’s Senate in November.

Nakamura is one of at least three Palauan politicians who allegedly received illegal campaign donations from Zhang, according to the U.S. intelligence assessment. (Foreigners are not allowed to make campaign donations in Palau.)

Zhang said that he gave Nakamura $10,000 in cash but that it was for legal services. Nakamura also denied the accusation, which he called “unfounded, defamatory and false.” It’s unclear whether authorities investigated. Neither Nakamura nor Zhang was charged.

Zhang’s alleged illegal activity, plus the hotel’s proximity to the port, gives U.S., Palauan and Taiwanese officials cause for concern.

Analysts say the biggest risk is electronic surveillance. That could be monitoring U.S. Navy communications or taking acoustic signatures from U.S. ships that can be used for torpedo targeting, said Clark, of the Hudson Institute. If satellites were disabled — something many military analysts say would be likely in a conflict between the U.S. and China — the hotel could be used to target the port.

“What China does is what we do,” said Clark, “which is to try to create a bunch of options for later.”

Palau is trying to chip away at China’s options. In April, Zhang flew from Hong Kong to Koror but was sent back after finding out he’d been added to Palau’s rapidly growing list of undesirable aliens.

Zhang — speaking, he said, from Thailand — insisted he had zero ties to Beijing, which he said wouldn’t need him anyway.

“In a small country like Palau, if China wants to do surveillance, they can do it from anywhere easily,” he said. “They don’t need a hotel with a good location.”

About this story

Photo editing by Jennifer Samuel. Graphics by Adrián Blanco Ramos. Text editing by Anna Fifield and Peter Finn. Copy editing by Martha Murdock.

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By Michael E. Miller

Michael E. Miller is The Washington Post's Sydney bureau chief. He was previously on the local enterprise team. He joined The Washington Post in 2015 and has also reported for the newspaper from Afghanistan and Mexico.follow on X@MikeMillerDC

13. Tsunami Waves Reach U.S. After Powerful Russia Quake Forces Pacific Evacuations

Tsunami Waves Reach U.S. After Powerful Russia Quake Forces Pacific Evacuations

The 8.8-magnitude earthquake off Russia’s far east sent people fleeing to higher ground

https://www.wsj.com/world/tsunami-watch-warning-japan-us-west-coast-bd815b56?mod=hp_lead_pos1

By Dasl Yoon

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 in Seoul and Megumi Fujikawa

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 in Tokyo

Updated July 30, 2025 6:53 am ET

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An 8.8-magnitude earthquake strikes Russia’s far east, triggering tsunami warnings as far as the U.S. West Coast. Photo: Kyodonews/ZUMA Press; Russian Academy of Sciences/Reuters

Key Points

What's This?

• A major earthquake off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula triggered tsunami warnings across the Pacific.
• Hawaii and Northern California coasts faced warnings, prompting evacuations and flight disruptions.
• While initial waves were small, officials urged caution; Japan also issued warnings, recalling a 2011 tragedy.

A powerful earthquake off the coast of Russia’s far east triggered tsunami warnings in Hawaii and California and sent people fleeing to higher ground across the Pacific, but initial fears subsided as the tsunami waves reached U.S. territory.

“Everything has been OK so far. We haven’t seen a big wave,” Gov. Josh Green said before Hawaii’s tsunami warning was downgraded and evacuation orders lifted. Waves as high as 5.7 feet above normal sea level were recorded in the state.

Tsunami waves that reached the West Coast of the U.S. early Wednesday peaked at 3½ feet on the northern California coast near the Oregon border. Rapid tidal swings of one to two feet were recorded around Monterey Bay, where an evacuation order was issued for residents living near the water.

The earthquake struck Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula on the Pacific coast on Wednesday morning local time. The U.S. Geological Survey measured the earthquake at magnitude 8.8, making it one of the 10 biggest on record if confirmed, according to the agency.

Tsunami wave height*

0 Ft

0.5

1

2

3

4

Alaska

Russia

Kamchatka

Peninsula

Canada

Epicenter

Magnitude 8.8 earthquake

July 30, 11:24 local time

China

U.S.

Japan

Hawaii

Pacific Ocean

*Measured relative to normal sea level

Source: USGS (epicenter); NOAA (wave height)

Daniel Kiss/WSJ

As warnings sounded in Hawaii, people in Oahu rushed to higher ground in vehicles, crowding gas stations and supermarkets for supplies. As traffic slowed, the U.S. military opened army roads to speed up evacuation.

Flights to Hawaii were canceled, delayed or rerouted to the mainland. All flights in and out of Maui were canceled and all commercial harbors were closed.

At a senior care facility near a tsunami flood zone just minutes from the ocean on Oahu, dozens of residents had to be moved to higher ground, said Steve Wong, a driver there.

With tsunami waves expected by late evening, Wong shuttled residents uphill with their wheelchairs, walkers and pets. No property damage was reported and residents waited for the all clear to return, Wong said.

Cars lined up in front of gas stations while some people were buying ice for their coolers in case a tsunami caused power outages, Wong said. “People were getting irate,” said Wong, 60 years old, who has experienced five tsunami warnings in Hawaii.

Waves arriving in Japan hours after the earthquake in Russia’s far east were mostly around a foot high or less. Photo: Kyodonews/ZUMA Press

People looked toward Waikiki Beach in Honolulu, after authorities warned of the possibility of tsunami waves. Photo: nichola groom/Reuters

The earthquake had prompted the National Weather Service to issue tsunami warnings for Hawaii and the northern California coast from Mendocino to the Oregon border. President Trump posted on social media about the alerts and told people to visit tsunami.gov for information. “STAY STRONG AND STAY SAFE,” he wrote.

The health minister for Russia’s Kamchatka region, Oleg Melnikov, told Russian media that some people were hurt while running out of their homes but no serious injuries were reported.

At a Russian kindergarten, the walls collapsed, videos showed. Local authorities said there were no children or adults present at the time of the accident.

State news agency TASS showed a local resident’s video of a flooded fish-processing plant in the town of Severo-Kurilsk on an island near the Kamchatka Peninsula. “Our factories are flooded, and our seafood,” a woman is heard saying as sirens blare in the background.

Officials in Kamchatka peninsula said the earthquake hadn’t done any damage to energy infrastructure, and damage inspections of residential buildings were set to start Thursday, according to TASS.

Aftershocks of the earthquake are expected to continue.

The earthquake was the strongest in the peninsula since 1952, TASS said, when tsunamis in Severo-Kurilsk killed more than 1,000 people, according to Russian accounts.

Tsunami waves flood an area in Severo-Kurilsk, Russia, after an earthquake in the Kamchatka Peninsula. Photo: geophysical survey of the Russia/Reuters

A kindergarten damaged by the earthquake in the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia. Photo: Valeria Kosilova/ZUMA Press

The Japan Meteorological Agency warned shortly after the quake that tsunamis as high as 10 feet could hit Japan’s Pacific coast. Evacuation zones were home to around two million people, authorities said.

But the waves that arrived hours later were mostly around a foot high or less. While Japan’s evacuation warning remained in effect, people were told to stay on higher ground or designated evacuation buildings until the all-clear was given.

Japanese officials said that for faraway earthquakes, it can take some time before meteorologists can be sure that the tsunami danger has passed. After a February 2010 earthquake in Chile, it took about a day before Japan lifted its warnings. An earthquake and tsunami off Japan’s northeastern coast on March 11, 2011, killed some 20,000 people.

Write to Dasl Yoon at dasl.yoon@wsj.com and Megumi Fujikawa at megumi.fujikawa@wsj.com

14. How China Is Girding for an AI Battle With the U.S.

​Just a thought for all the John Boyd acolytes out there: Will AI compress or speed up the OODA Loop? If so, how can it be best applied to?

How China Is Girding for an AI Battle With the U.S.

As Washington tries to limit China’s progress, Beijing is spending more to build AI that doesn’t rely on U.S. technology

https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/how-china-is-girding-for-an-ai-battle-with-the-u-s-5b23af51

By Raffaele Huang

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 and Liza Lin

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July 29, 2025 11:00 pm ET

Humanoid robots on display at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai. Photo: hector retamal/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

China is ramping up efforts to build a domestic artificial-intelligence ecosystem that can function without Western technology, as it steels itself for a protracted tech contest with the U.S.

Washington has been trying to slow China’s AI progress through export controls and other restrictions that limit Chinese access to U.S. capital, talent and advanced U.S. technologies. To an extent, those restrictions have worked. But China is fighting back with expanding efforts to become more self-sufficient in AI—a push that could ultimately make it less vulnerable to U.S. pressure if it succeeds.

Many of the initiatives were on display at an AI conference that ended this week in Shanghai, which Chinese authorities used as a showcase for products free of U.S. technologies. 

China is spending billions of dollars to become more self-sufficient in AI, including on chips used in self-driving cars. Photo: Wu Hao/EPA/Shutterstock

One startup, Shanghai-based StepFun, touted a new AI model that it said required less computing power and memory than other systems, making it more compatible with Chinese-made semiconductors. Although Chinese chips are less capable than American products, Huawei Technologies and other companies have been narrowing the gap by clustering more chips together, boosting their performance.

China also released an AI global governance plan at the event, the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, which called for establishing an international open-source community through which AI models can be freely deployed and improved by users. Industry participants say it showed China’s ambition to set global standards for AI and could undermine the U.S., whose leading models aren’t open-source.

The conference followed a series of announcements and investments in China aimed at turbocharging its AI capabilities, including rapid expansions in power generation and skills training.

The whole-nation effort, led by Beijing, includes billions of dollars in spending by state-owned enterprises, private companies and local governments. 

China’s securities regulator has largely refrained from approving initial public offerings of companies whose businesses aren’t related to “hard tech” sectors such as semiconductors and AI, so that capital can concentrate on funding technologies of strategic importance, people involved in the process said.

China’s AI push has included the expansion of skills training. Photo: tingshu wang/Reuters

Remote-controlled robots boxing at the AI conference in Shanghai. Photo: hector retamal/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Victory in the global AI race carries high stakes. AI is expected to upend economies and militaries, and leadership in the sector is seen as critical to future global influence and national security.

The U.S. maintains its early lead, with Silicon Valley home to the most popular AI models and the most powerful chips. Much of China’s AI spending has led to waste and overcapacity. 

China also clearly wants U.S. technologies. Access to advanced chips has been a priority for Chinese negotiators in trade talks, The Wall Street Journal has reported. Sales of Nvidia’s H20 AI chips to China were recently restored by Washington after it restricted them in April, a reversal seen by Beijing as a gesture of good faith in the talks.

The Trump administration is taking steps to try to preserve the U.S.’s lead. It recently announced an AI “action plan,” which aims to slash red tape and make it easier for tech companies to build data centers needed to train AI models.

Earlier this year at the White House, OpenAI and Japan’s SoftBank unveiled a $500 billion effort to build new AI data centers, though the project has faced delays.

China, though, has shown a willingness to spend whatever it takes. The rising popularity of DeepSeek, the Chinese AI startup, has buoyed Beijing’s hopes that it can become more self-sufficient. Huawei has published several papers this year detailing how its researchers used its homegrown chips to build large language models without relying on American technology.

“China is obviously making progress in hardening its AI and computing ecosystem,” said Michael Frank, founder of think tank Seldon Strategies.

‘Project Spare Tire’

China’s biggest AI challenge is overcoming its difficulty in sourcing the world’s most-advanced chips. Washington has cut China off from some of Nvidia’s most sophisticated semiconductors, as well as the advanced machine tools used to make cutting-edge chips, restrictions that many experts believe will continue to hold China back.

Huawei is helping spearhead efforts to navigate those restrictions. During a meeting with President Xi Jinping in February, Chief Executive Officer Ren Zhengfei told Xi about “Project Spare Tire,” an effort by Huawei and 2,000 other enterprises to help China’s semiconductor sector achieve a self-sufficiency rate of 70% by 2028, according to people familiar with the meeting. 

Increasingly, the company has been able to bundle together the best chips it can produce to match the performance of some American computing systems. That is helping local companies reach some of the same computing goals as the U.S., such as training state-of-the-art generative AI models, though it consumes more power than U.S. chips. 

U.S. researcher SemiAnalysis recently reported that one such Huawei cluster, which connects 384 of its Ascend chips, outperforms Nvidia’s flagship system with 72 graphics-processing units on some metrics. 

China’s President Xi Jinping at an AI incubator this year. Photo: Wang Ye/Zuma Press

Morgan Stanley analysts forecast that China will have 82% of AI chips from domestic makers by 2027, up from 34% in 2024.

China’s government has played an important role, funding new chip initiatives and other projects. In July, the local government in Shenzhen, where Huawei is based, said it was raising around $700 million to invest in strengthening an “independent and controllable” semiconductor supply chain.

Prodded by Beijing, Chinese financial institutions, state-owned companies and government agencies have rushed to deploy Chinese-made AI models, including DeepSeek and Alibaba’s Qwen. That has fueled demand for homegrown AI technologies and fostered domestic supply chains.

Some companies ordered expensive AI servers to deploy the models even before they came up with a use for the technology, according to people familiar with the matter. 

Open-source advantage

At the Shanghai conference, organized by China’s government and featuring more than 800 companies, Chinese researchers played down the impact of U.S. export controls on advanced chips. They compared notes on how they were focusing on overcoming bottlenecks through better model designs and engineering techniques.

Many also touted Chinese companies’ tendency to give users free access to modify and deploy their AI models, an open-source approach that has boosted adoption of Chinese models globally.  

While the world’s best large language model is still American, the best model that everyone can use free is now Chinese. According to benchmark provider Artificial Analysis, the overall performance of China’s best open-weight model has surpassed the American champion since November.

In recent weeks, a flurry of Chinese companies have flooded the market with open-source models, many of which are claiming to surpass DeepSeek’s performance in certain use cases. OpenAI’s Sam Altman said his company had pushed back the release of its open-source model indefinitely for further safety testing.

Talent and power

China is also investing heavily in other areas, including more electricity to power domestic data centers to develop and run AI.

It is spending $564 billion on grid construction projects in the five years up to 2030, an increase of more than 40% from the previous five years, Morgan Stanley researchers forecast.  

China currently has about 2.5 times as much power-generation capacity as the U.S., a disparity that is projected to grow larger in the next five years despite the U.S. expanding power generation.

China has also approved more than 600 colleges to set up degree programs in AI, according to data released by the country’s Ministry of Education in April. That is up from 35 universities with such programs in 2019. 

In Beijing, primary and secondary schools will begin mandatory AI lessons for students starting in September. 

China’s efforts have already enabled it to develop a robust pipeline of homegrown talent, according to researchers from the Hoover Institution and Stanford University, who recently evaluated the backgrounds of more than 200 authors involved in DeepSeek’s papers between 2024 and February 2025. More than half of these DeepSeek researchers never left China for schooling or work, they found.

The U.S. has fewer universities that offer AI degree programs, but American universities dominate rankings for computer and information science. This April, President Trump signed an executive order mandating AI education and learning opportunities for American youth.

Write to Raffaele Huang at raffaele.huang@wsj.com and Liza Lin at liza.lin@wsj.com

The Global AI Race

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Appeared in the July 30, 2025, print edition as 'China Tries to Create Its Own AI Ecosystem Independent of U.S.'.

15. What Americans think about Israel's military action in Gaza, according to a new Gallup poll

What Americans think about Israel's military action in Gaza, according to a new Gallup poll

By  LINLEY SANDERS and AMELIA THOMSON-DEVEAUX

Updated 2:11 PM EDT, July 29, 202

AP · by LINLEY SANDERS · July 29, 2025

WASHINGTON (AP) — Support for Israel’s military action in Gaza has declined substantially among U.S. adults, with only about one-third approving, according to a new Gallup poll — a drop from the beginning of the war with Hamas, when about half of Americans approved of Israel’s operation.

The new polling also found that about half of U.S. adults now have an unfavorable view of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the most negative rating he has received since he was first included in Gallup polling in 1997. The poll was conducted from July 7-21, while reports of starvation in Gaza led to international criticism of Israel’s decision to restrict food aid but before President Donald Trump expressed concern over the worsening humanitarian situation.

The findings underscore the Israeli government’s dramatic loss of support within the U.S. But not everyone is shifting — instead, the war has become more politically polarizing. The rising disapproval is driven by Democrats and independents, who are much less likely to approve of Israel’s actions than they were in November 2023, weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7 surprise attack and after Israel expanded its ground offensive in Gaza.

Republicans, on the other hand, remain largely supportive of both Israel’s military actions and Netanyahu.

Most Americans now disapprove of Israeli military action in Gaza

The new poll finds that about 6 in 10 U.S. adults disapprove of the military action Israel has taken in Gaza, up from 45% in November 2023.

Support for the war has been dwindling in Gallup’s polling for some time. In March 2024, about half of U.S. adults disapproved of Israel’s military action in Gaza, which fell slightly as the year wore on.

In a new low, only 8% of Democrats and one-quarter of independents say they now approve of Israel’s military campaign. Some of that decline may be attributed to the change in administration. While former President Joe Biden faced significant pushback from fellow Democrats on his handling of the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians, they may be even more frustrated by the approach of Trump, a Republican.

Young adults are also much more likely to disapprove of Israel’s actions. Only about 1 in 10 adults under age 35 say they approve of Israel’s military choices in Gaza, compared with about half of those who are 55 or older.

Gallup senior editor Megan Brenan says the latest figures reflect the enduring partisan divide. Even as Democrats grow increasingly unhappy with Israel’s military campaign, Republicans remain supportive.

“We’ve seen this drop in approval since last fall, and it’s really driven by Democrats and independents,” Brenan says. “Republicans are still willing to be in this for the time being.”

Netanyahu’s favorability among US adults is historically low

Views of Netanyahu have also grown less favorable over the past few years, with more viewing him negatively than positively in measurements taken since the war in Gaza began.

About half of U.S. adults, 52%, now have an unfavorable view of Netanyahu in the new poll, which overlapped with Netanyahu’s recent visit to the U.S. Just 29% view him positively, and about 2 in 10 either haven’t heard of him or don’t have an opinion.

That’s a change — although not a huge one — since December 2023, when 47% of U.S. adults had an unfavorable view of Netanyahu and 33% had a favorable opinion. But it’s a reversal from as recently as April 2019, when more U.S. adults viewed him positively than negatively.

Republicans have a much more positive view of Netanyahu than Democrats and independents do. About two-thirds of Republicans view him favorably, which is in line with last year. About 1 in 10 Democrats and 2 in 10 independents feel the same way.

“This is the first time we’ve seen a majority of Americans, with an unfavorable view of him,” Brenan says. “All of these questions in this poll show us basically the same story, and it’s not a good one for the Israeli government right now.”

Trump is unlikely to face the same pressure on his approach to Israel

More than half of U.S. adults, 55%, disapprove of Trump’s handling of the situation in the Middle East, according to a July AP-NORC poll.

But the conflict has not weighed as heavily on Trump as it did on Biden, who watched Democrats splinter on the issue. That’s because of Trump’s solid support from his base on this issue, further reflected in Republicans’ continued approval of Israel’s military action. About 8 in 10 Republicans approve of Trump’s handling of the situation in the Middle East. By contrast, only about 4 in 10 Democrats approved of Biden’s handling of the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians last summer, shortly before he dropped out of the presidential race.

In an AP-NORC poll from March, Republicans were significantly more likely than Democrats and independents to say they sympathized more with the Israelis than with the Palestinians in the conflict.

And while Americans overall were more likely to say it was “extremely” or “very” important for the United States to provide humanitarian relief to Palestinians in Gaza than to say the same about providing aid to Israel’s military, Republicans said the opposite — more saw military aid to Israel as a higher priority than providing humanitarian relief to the Palestinians in Gaza.

AP · by LINLEY SANDERS · July 29, 2025

16. Once the faces of American aid abroad, USAID workers mourn agency's demise

This will come back to haunt us in the future.

U.S. News July 30, 2025 / 5:01 AM

Once the faces of American aid abroad, USAID workers mourn agency's demise

https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2025/07/30/usaid-former-workers/5421753729498/

By Bridget Erin Craig

Before and after: The photo at the left shows the U.S. Agency for International Development main office at 1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW in Washington before the administration's edict to disband the agency. At right is what the building looks like today. Photos by Bridget Erin Craig/UPI

WASHINGTON, July 30 (UPI) -- For decades, workers at the U.S. Agency for International Development were among the quiet architects of American diplomacy, bringing food, medicine and governance reform to places where conflict and poverty had taken root.

As of July 1, hundreds lost their jobs following President Donald Trump's executive order in January to consolidate foreign assistance programs. More layoffs are expected by Sept. 2.

Some 1,600 U.S.-based employees were affected by the reduction in force, with thousands more around the globe impacted. Of 6,200 programs, some 5,200 were terminated.

This story profiles three former USAID workers, all of whom requested anonymity out of concern for professional retaliation and the heightened political climate.

Related

• State Department to burn birth control worth $9.7M
• House passes bill cutting $9B in foreign aid, public broadcasting
• Aid organizations left in dark months after USAID cuts begin

They devoted their careers to public service-often in complex, high-risk environments. Now, having lost jobs they felt deeply called to, they say they can't speak for attribution due to ongoing administrative proceedings.

"The toughest thing about the closure are the literally millions of people who have been denied life-saving aid," said a former senior foreign service officer who depicted the close connection between USAID and the United Nations World Food Program in which the United States was the top donor for many years.

"One of the countries that we watched very close for the World Food Program and in previous administrations was Sudan," he continued. "The acute food insecurity in Sudan today affects probably over 25 million people. A subset of those are living in famine conditions. They're going to die, and the fact that we stopped or we've reduced our food aid under this administration is tragic."

Founded in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy, USAID has long served as the primary engine for U.S. foreign aid, responsible for development assistance, disaster relief, global health and democratic governance.

Operating in more than 100 countries, it helped the U.S. project influence without deploying troops -- a model many experts saw as essential to preventing conflict and fostering long-term alliances.

"We were accused of being criminal and radical lunatics and extreme liberals doing this work. ... it's absolutely not true," a former USAID official said. "USAID was always bipartisan, ever since it was founded in early 1960s."

In January, Secretary of State Marco Rubio paused all foreign assistance funded by or through the State Department and USAID, aligned with Trump's executive order to ensure programs were efficient and in step with the "America first" agenda.

The abrupt dismantling of USAID marked a historic retreat from U.S. soft power and upended the lives of its career civil servants, many of whom had spent decades in service to global stability.

Working in places from Afghanistan to South Africa, a former senior foreign service officer served under several presidents, beginning his career as a Peace Corps volunteer.

"I loved the development work so much that I wanted to make a career out of it," he said. "It's purposeful work. I just feel blessed."

But nothing prepared him for the shock of USAID's sudden dissolution.

"I don't think any of us expected this," he said. "I think the complete erasure of USAID is not in the United States' interest. I think it will have terrible impacts on millions of people overseas."

For him, USAID wasn't just a job to this former foreign service officer of more than 30 years. It was the quiet muscle behind American credibility.

"Diplomacy and development are complementary but completely different disciplines," he said. "The State Department is brilliant at diplomacy. But development? It's longer-term. It's relational. And I'm not confident they have the personnel or the tools to do it right."

He recalled rural communities in Colombia, saying that residents' biggest concern, although being located in conflict zones, was not the conflict -- it was roads. Through projects like helping to build roads, the United States was able to show up.

"Without decent, passable roads, as a small farmer, the odds are stacked against you," he said, explaining the importance of soft-power development.

A former USAID senior adviser to a mission in Asia described public service as her calling. Inspired as a teenager by her education, an encounter with a development official and early roles that centered on infrastructure development. She served in some of the world's most fragile environments, From Afghanistan to Uganda.

"In Afghanistan, endless rockets came into our compound, tried to kill us," she recalled. "But this hurt more. This was worse in every way possible because it was coming from within those very people I was serving."

In January as the new Trump administration took office, she and thousands of colleagues were abruptly dismissed. She had just arrived at what was supposed to be her dream overseas post.

"I didn't even get to finish my tour," she said. "I was recalled and told I was no longer needed."

The emotional toll was compounded by erasure.

"Every record of everything I've worked on is gone -- every policy paper, every report, every project," she said.

Similarly, another former USAID official shared his extensive experience before turning to working in development. Crossing from the private sector to public service, it was the agency's mission that inspired him most -- to use American development work as a tool for stability, goodwill and shared prosperity.

"It was a wonderful experience," he said. "Professionally, it was the most meaningful work I've done -- and personally, it was great for our family."

His duty stations spanned from Iraq to Uganda and Thailand. He witnessed development ripple outward-- from better seed varieties feeding a nation to electricity transforming a household.

"I was able to be in a home and actually flip the lights on -- for the first time they had access to electricity," he said. "It changed their life. It gave them added security, it helped their children do homework at night without burning kerosene and it helped them make a little extra money by letting their neighbors use their power to charge their phones."

What hurts most, he said, was not just the shutdown but rather its execution.

"If the administration had said, 'We want to move in a different direction,'" he suggested that most people would have disagreed, but if it were handled professionally, they would have understood.

Instead, he said, he and his colleagues were labeled criminals and radicals, and that was the basis for shutting the programs down.

He said he believes the negative impact on U.S. credibility, fragile alliances and the mental health of career public servants will last years.

"We built this up for 60 years to be a machine, and yes, it was bureaucratic and it was slow, but it did a lot of good work. The biggest challenge was the layer upon layer of excessive oversight," the former official said.

The Trump administration has said that USAID's core functions are to be absorbed into the State Department, including foreign assistance, humanitarian relief and development aid.

One former senior State Department official who frequently worked with USAID, and who asked to speak on background to candidly discuss internal fallout, questioned the ability of the State Department to absorb USAID's missions, given how vital the agency was in serving as the soft power arm of the United States.

By empowering civil societies and helping build democracy from the bottom up, he said he believed USAID positively influenced development, entrusted its partners and helped stabilize regions.

He said they way staffers were terminated was deeply troubling. After spending their careers as public servants, advancing U.S. interests often in difficult and dangerous conditions, employees were given little warning and treated as though they had done something wrong.

The former official said he fears USAID's closure will have long-term consequences on America's global influence and credibility. He still encourages young people passionate about international development to continue working abroad with nongovernmental organizations and civil society groups -- and to remain hopeful.

Trump had clashed with USAID during his first term, accusing it of promoting values that conflicted with his administration's agenda. But few expected the agency's total elimination during his second term.

The decision drew swift backlash from allies, humanitarian organizations and several retired diplomats, who warned it would leave a vacuum in places where U.S. presence already was fading.

17. Leadership Infighting Emerges in Chinese Military Mouthpiece

​I look forward to the assessments from China hands.

Politics

Leadership Infighting Emerges in Chinese Military Mouthpiece

PLA Daily articles hint big changes afoot in Chinese government and military

https://www.asiasentinel.com/p/leadership-infighting-china-military-mouthpiece?utm

Our Correspondent

Jul 30, 2025

The night has a thousand eyes. Photo from Xinhua

In keeping with Mao Zedong’s famed maxim that “power comes out of the barrel of the gun,” the Chinese leader is normally the chairman of the Central Military Commission, comprising a handful of officials who control the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Currently that is President Xi Jinping, although over recent weeks the Chinese leader has disappeared and reappeared in public view, with many meetings chaired not by him but by subordinates, triggering fresh scrutiny over whether he may be forced to relinquish at least some of his power.

Those questions have triggered new analysis of a spate of articles on the front page of the print version of the PLA Daily, the military mouthpiece, explicitly talking of internal conflict within the top military leadership. A July 22 front page commentary by an unnamed commentator, for instance, even said major changes are occurring in the ruling Chinese Communist Party and PLA, announcing that “Currently, there are complex and deep changes in the global situation, the country, the party and military” and adding that “Our military faces complicated political challenges.”

Party members, especially cadres, must not be ambiguous in their stance, the commentary admonished, “and even more, not speak out of two mouths and be two-faced.” Cadres, it continued, must change their thinking and truly root out wrong thinking. They must strictly carry out the policies of the Central Military Commission chairman and struggle against all politically incorrect people. The prime responsibility of cadres is loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party, it declared, which didn’t mention Xi.

A day before, a front-page commentary said the Central Military Commission recently issued new rules to “completely eliminate poisonous influences” and rectify political thinking. This by an unnamed commentator didn’t name anyone associated with the ‘poisonous influence’ or mention Xi, which raises the question whether the Communist leader or a rival faction is the source of poisonous influence.

Previously, Chinese government statements calling for the eradication of ‘poisonous influences’ have named the sources, like Zhou Yongkang, formerly China’s top law enforcement official who is serving life imprisonment for corruption.

A PLA Daily front page article on July 27 by a writer named Wang Jian used a historical analogy to allude to infighting at the very top of China’s leadership. The article cited Zhang Guotao, a Chinese Communist leader who, on October 5, 1935, set up an alternate leadership in rivalry with Mao. As the article related, Zhang Guotao tried to win over Zhu De, the top military leader under Mao, but Zhu De refused. The article praised Zhu De’s loyalty to Mao. Subsequently, Zhang Guotao and Mao went their separate ways, with Zhang Guotao defecting to the rival Nationalist party in 1938, then finally retiring to subsequently die in Canada. Again, the PLA Daily article of July 27 did not mention Xi.

Some articles ignore Xi, others support him

“Now some commentators seem to be snubbing Xi, as in a PLA Daily article recalling the fissure between Mao and Zhang Guotao. If the PLA Daily is calling for unity, it is not necessarily unity under Xi,” said Willy Lam, a senior fellow of the Jamestown Foundation, a US think tank.

The infighting within China’s top brass, as made explicit in the above articles, confirm an Asia Sentinel report on June 5 that the nation’s military leadership is in civil war. Admiral Miao Hua, an ally of Xi, has been removed from the Central Military Commission, said the report. The question arises as to which top brass is opposing Xi.

A Xinhua website currently lists five members of the Central Military Commission, including Xi as chairman, followed by two vice chairmen, General Zhang Youxia and General He Weidong. The disappearance of General He, an ally of Xi, means he is effectively no longer on the commission. At the cremation ceremony of General Xu Qiliang, a former Central Military Commission vice chairman, in Beijing on June 8, General He did not attend nor send a wreath, indicating he is seriously ill, in prison, or dead.

The remaining two members of the commission are General Zhang Shengmin and General Liu Zhenli. Zhang Shengmin is believed to be an ally of Zhang Youxia, while Liu is possibly an ally of Zhang Youxia, as Asia Sentinel reported on June 5. Accordingly, a faction led by General Zhang Youxia in the Central Military Commission may possibly be struggling against Xi.

A PLA Daily front page commentary on July 23 praised two late generals, Tan Zheng and Huang Kecheng. The commentary, written by an unnamed commentator, lauded Tan for not “blindly obeying” and “blindly agreeing” with superiors. Tan was praised for “struggling against wrong thinking in the party.” Huang criticized Mao’s 1950s economic disaster, the Great Leap Forward, for which he was stripped of his military and political posts. Huang was persecuted during the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s but rehabilitated in the late 1970s. The commentary said cadres should “dare to confront contradictions” and “fearlessly expose problems.” This commentary also did not mention Xi.

Even though the political picture in China is unclear, the fact that some commentators in PLA Daily did not mention Xi “is definitely a big minus for Xi,” said Lam. However, some recent front-page articles continue to express support. For example, most of the July 30 front page articles do mention Xi, including a commentary which mentions him, saying cadres should not enjoy special privileges and must teach their relatives not to take advantage of the cadres’ positions.

“The article quotes Xi, but does not mention Xi thought,” Lam observed.

The PLA Daily has carried articles from Xinhua which do mention Xi. For instance, the paper on July 29 published on its front page an article approved by Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang, which reported Xi gave “important instructions” in tackling the heavy rains affecting certain parts of China.

These commentaries carry more weight than Xinhua articles, Lam said, adding that Xi exerts tighter control over the newspaper. “Xi’s grip (of the PLA) has become less tight. It began with his losing total control of the appointments and dismissals of top generals,” he said.

As an example, the Chinese government announced that two former defense ministers, Wei Fenghe and Li Shangfu, were expelled from the party and faced charges on the same day, as Asia Sentinel reported on June 29.

18. Trump Administration Told Taiwan’s President to Avoid New York Stopover

Is this ​an indication of the direction of our China policy?

Trump Administration Told Taiwan’s President to Avoid New York Stopover

The Taiwanese leader canceled U.S. transit visits after being urged to change his plans, two officials said. Washington has been in talks with Beijing over trade and a possible summit.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/30/world/asia/trump-taiwan-china.html

President Lai Ching-te of Taiwan in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, last month. He suffered a political setback on Saturday when a recall campaign aimed at removing several opposition lawmakers failed.Credit...Chiangying-Ying/Associated Press

By Amy Chang ChienChris Buckley and Edward Wong

Amy Chang Chien and Chris Buckley reported from Taipei, Taiwan

July 30, 2025

Updated 5:58 a.m. ET

President Lai Ching-te of Taiwan had planned to make brief stops in New York and Dallas next month, en route to and from Latin America, hoping to demonstrate the island’s strong ties with the United States in defiance of China.

But the Trump administration, which is focused on delicate talks with Beijing over trade and a possible summit, told Mr. Lai to cancel his proposed stopover in New York, according to two officials familiar with the plans, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private discussions between the two governments. Mr. Lai canceled his whole trip.

The hints of tension between Taipei and Washington come at a sensitive moment for Mr. Lai. He suffered a serious setback over the weekend when a sweeping recall campaign aimed at removing 24 opposition lawmakers failed to dislodge any of them. Taiwan is also among the economies facing a Friday deadline for tariff negotiations with the United States.

Mr. Trump’s desire for steady relations with China, and potentially to secure a summit with President Xi Jinping, may have influenced his administration’s position on Mr. Lai’s travel plans. Mr. Trump has said he is open to visiting China to meet with Mr. Xi.

Confirmation of Mr. Lai’s travels would have riled China, which held trade negotiations with Mr. Trump’s team in Stockholm this week. China considers Taiwan to be part of its territory and sees the United States’ support for Taiwan as meddling in a domestic issue. Beijing routinely objects to Taiwanese leaders’ visits abroad, particularly to the United States.

Want to stay updated on what’s happening in China and Taiwan? Sign up for Your Places: Global Update, and we’ll send our latest coverage to your inbox.

Matthew Pottinger, who was the longest-serving deputy national security adviser in the first Trump administration, criticized the apparent decision by American officials to “bend over backwards” in the face of Chinese objections to transit stops by the Taiwanese leader. He noted that such visits were common during the first Trump term — he himself had met with the Taiwanese president on a visit to New York — and during the Biden administration.

“Beijing will pocket this concession and ask for more,” Mr. Pottinger said.

According to the two officials familiar with the planning, Mr. Lai called off the trip after Trump administration officials told him to revise his itinerary for the United States, and, in particular, to forgo the visit to New York, which was viewed as more high profile. The news about the Trump administration’s objections to Mr. Lai’s travel plans was earlier reported by The Financial Times.

On Monday evening Mr. Lai’s spokeswoman, Karen Kuo, said that the president had no plans to travel soon. Mr. Lai needed to focus on dealing with damage in southern Taiwan from a typhoon, as well as trade talks with the Trump administration, Ms. Kuo said. She said the reports of U.S. obstructions were “inaccurate” and “purely speculative.”

While Mr. Lai’s office had never publicly confirmed the trip, three Taiwanese officials had in recent days and weeks privately described his plans to stop in New York and Dallas as part of his travels to Paraguay, Guatemala and Belize, three of Taiwan’s diplomatic partners in Latin America.

David Sacks, a fellow for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations who studies U.S.-Taiwan relations, pointed out that such U.S. stops were coordinated with Washington. “The idea that Taiwan would plan a trip for its president to visit three of its diplomatic partners while transiting through the United States, all without approval from senior American officials, strains credulity,” he said.

The White House National Security Council did not reply to a request for comment. Tammy Bruce, a State Department spokeswoman, told reporters on Tuesday that because Taiwan had not announced any travel plans by Mr. Lai, any discussion about it was “a hypothetical.”

Mr. Lai’s predecessor as president, Tsai Ing-wen, visited New York in 2023, during the Biden administration.

Ms. Tsai also met in California with Kevin McCarthy, then the speaker of the House, the third-ranking post in the U.S. government. That was the highest-level in-person meeting for a leader of Taiwan in the United States since Washington switched diplomatic relations from Taiwan to the People’s Republic of China in 1979.

The United States maintains political, economic and security ties with Taiwan, and allows the island’s president to make stops on the way to and from other countries — but Washington has sometimes set limits. In 2006, President Chen Shui-bian canceled a plan to travel through the United States after Washington denied him permission to stop in New York.

Taiwanese officials had made arrangements for Mr. Lai to give a speech in New York, and he was expected to attend an exhibition of Taiwanese technology and products in Dallas, according to two researchers who had heard about the plans from diplomats.

Asked about the reports that the Trump administration had blocked Mr. Lai’s plans for visiting the United States this time, a spokesman for the Chinese government’s Taiwan affairs office reiterated that Beijing “adamantly opposes” any such visits at any time.

Amy Chang Chien is a reporter and researcher for The Times in Taipei, covering Taiwan and China.

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

Edward Wong reports on global affairs, U.S. foreign policy and the State Department for The Times.

19. The New Model of Privateering

C​onclusion:

State and non-state actors will continue to contest the control of the maritime domain by disrupting trade routes and creating global security concerns. The U.S., with its allies and partners, should consider the benefits of a prospective maritime strategic plan that integrates this new privateer concept to counter emerging threats, such as the Houthi rebels in the Red Sea. Utilizing this new form of privateering within U.S. law and UNCLOS, the U.S. would disrupt illicit activities and threats to the sovereignty of U.S. allies and partners, such as the “little blue men” in the South China Sea. If the U.S. does not shift its conventional mindset to counter the emerging threat of private sector involvement in maritime security, as seen in China’s current applications, it will continue to see state and non-state actors shaping the rules of war to hinder the U.S. from achieving its strategic goals. The chartering of private vessels for sealift capabilities, as the new privateers model, is a viable tool that needs to be considered and can be adapted across all domains to support the National Security Strategy.

Essay| The Latest

The New Model of Privateering

https://smallwarsjournal.com/2025/07/30/the-new-model-of-privateering/

by Enrique Zelaya

|

07.30.2025 at 06:00am

The maritime domain has always held strategic and economic significance in regional security, but recent actions of both state and non-state actors are creating instability. The Yemen-based Houthi rebels have attacked merchant shipping vessels in the Red Sea through piracy, disrupting international trade for more than 44 countries. Additionally, China’s irregular fishing fleet, which doubles as paramilitary units, dubbed “little blue men” by the Philippines, seeks to advance China’s territorial claims in disputed areas of the South China Sea. This gray zone aggression by state and non-state actors disrupts regional security through armed coercion that falls below the threshold of outright warfare. To maintain a competitive advantage, U.S. strategic planners should develop irregular strategies to deter state and non-state actors’ armed coercion tactics within the maritime domain.

The reintroduction of privateering offers a compelling approach to today’s maritime domain challenges by helping the United States regain economic competitiveness and by creating regionally strategic security dilemmas for its adversaries. This essay explores a new model of privateering, defined by the time-chartering of civilian vessels for sealift capability operating under the direct command structure of the U.S. government. This will enable the monitoring, detection, and interdiction of illicit maritime threats. This essay will also highlight how the new model of privateering provides a viable legal means of countering threats from state actors like China, as well as non-state entities such as transnational criminal organizations and violent extremist organizations.

The purpose of this new model of privateering is to provide offensive options to safeguard U.S. interests and enhance maritime domain awareness to enable regional security. This essay will define traditional maritime privateering and examine historical examples. It will also examine current laws against privateering, and modern applications that enable strategic advantage. Grounded in this analysis, it will provide a new U.S. military maritime concept to safeguard U.S. interests in an increasingly contested maritime environment.

Piracy versus Traditional Privateering

The confusion between piracy and privateering is based on a widespread practice during the late 17th and 18th centuries, in which European states contracted private ships to conduct warfare. The Max Planck Encyclopedias of International Law describe a privateer as a “privately-owned vessel, outfitted as a warship (Warships), authorized by a recognized national government, through the issuance of a commission,” also known as letters of marque. By providing letters of marque, European states could supplement their navy with non-flagged privately owned vessels. These vessels would operate autonomously as an offensive tool to attack enemy vessels during wartime or protect commercial goods against state or non-state actors. Leveraging privateers through legal means bolstered the European states’ capability to protect trade routes and defend territorial waters to compete against strategic competitors.

Piracy is not the same as privateering because it focuses on utilizing forms of violent and non-violent actions to achieve personal goals not supported by a state. Article 101 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) defines piracy to consist of the following:

(a) any illegal acts of violence or detention, or any act of depredation, committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship or a private aircraft, and directed: (i) on the high seas, against another ship or aircraft, or against persons or property on board such ship or aircraft; (ii) against a ship, aircraft, persons or property in a place outside the jurisdiction of any State;

(b) any act of voluntary participation in the operation of a ship or of an aircraft with knowledge of facts making it a pirate ship or aircraft;

(c) any act of inciting or of intentionally facilitating an act described in subparagraph (a) or (b).

An excellent example to explain the UNCLOS definition of piracy is the Houthi rebels illegally attacking cargo ships, creating a blockade off the coast of Yemen to disrupt maritime trade in support of the Hamas war against Israel. Actions of piracy are, in fact, illegal criminal actions of a non-state actor creating instability within a region by utilizing private ships to achieve their own goals not aligned with the State government.

Privateers Enhancing National Security in the War of 1812

During the War of 1812, in order to protect economic trade, the U.S. Government turned to privateers. U.S. privateers’ success in capturing or destroying enemy merchant convoys drove British insurance rates to rise, and deprived Great Britian’s economy of badly needed goods. The disruption of Britain’s trade routes allowed the United States to protect its commercial trade and enabled privateers to profit from the capturing of enemy merchant ships. Privateering was a means of armed corrosion to conduct economic warfare that allowed the U.S. to gain an economic strategic advantage.

The volunteer force of the U.S. privateers was essentially a legalized maritime militia to bolster the U.S. Navy’s small fleet to counter the larger and more powerful English Royal Navy. Between 1812 and 1815, the U.S. Government issued more than 600 letters of marque that increased U.S. maritime influence and forced the English Royal Navy to remove warships from their blockade to protect their merchant ships. The decision of the U.S. Government to leverage the private sector as part of the military strategic plan was the vital factor that enabled the economic survival of the United States during the War of 1812. Without the support of privateers, the United States would not have been able to deter against a strategic competitor and secure its maritime domain.

Maritime Laws against Privateering

The Declaration Respecting Maritime Law of 1856 sparked Great Britain and France to adopt the treaty, ending the use of privateering for warfare and establishing new rules of naval warfare to benefit states with naval supremacy. This treaty allowed warring states to utilize neutral states or private merchant ships to transport commercial goods through blockades. However, it also prevented the use of un-flagged vessels for naval warfare. The United States, which declined to sign the treaty after assessing it would weaken U.S. capabilities to project naval power, would later agree to respect the principles of the Declaration and focus on building up its Navy. In effect, the treaty of 1856 established a new model of naval warfare, restricting state actors with weaker naval powers from leveraging private vessels to achieve a maritime advantage.

The UNCLOS reinforced the definition of naval warships that can take part in international conflicts, but conflicts outside international warfare provide opportunities to leverage the private sector to support national maritime security. The Department of Defense Law of War Manual defines non-international armed conflicts (NIAC) as being conflicts not declared between states, ranging from civil war, guerrilla warfare, terrorism, and low-intensity conflicts. NIAC allows the U.S. Government to utilize naval warships and vessels from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), U.S. Coast Guard (USCG), and private sector vessels contracted by the state to counter illicit maritime threats. The future success of U.S. maritime security will require the leveraging of all assets of national power, including collaboration with the private sector, to prevent the ongoing trend of transnational criminal organizations and terrorist activities from reaching the homeland.

Modern Applications of Privateering

China has been expanding its maritime influence by integrating its People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) with the civilian sector to create a new application of privateers through the use of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) and the Spratly Backbone Fishing Vessels (SBFVs). The PAFMM are professional Maritime Militia Fishing Vessels (MMFV) specifically built and outfitted with military capabilities to augment military operations. The SBFVs, on the other hand, are domestic fishing vessels that meet specified dimensions and receive subsidies and bonuses to operate in designated areas. China uses the PAFMM and SBFVs to assert China’s maritime claims by using grey zone aggression to assert China’s sovereignty in disputed waters. China’s integration of its irregular fishing fleet within its military structure has established a new version of privateering that uses commercial vessels as quasi-military forces, or militia, to conduct operations below the threshold of military aggression to advance China’s ambitions in the South China Sea.

Harnessing U.S. Private Sector

Expanding U.S. maritime domain security requires an irregular approach to harnessing the private sector stakeholders as the new privateer framework. SpaceX is a current example of how the U.S. government collaborates with the private sector to expand space domain awareness to support national security and space transportation. The U.S. military has partnered with SpaceX to enhance secure communication and intelligence capabilities and provided NASA with commercial crew space transportation to the International Space Station. The example of SpaceX’s integration into U.S. national/military power, provides a framework for the maritime domain. This would involve chartering private sector vessels and aligning them with the appropriate agencies or DoD command structure to counter national security threats.

The New Model of Privateering

Time-chartering private vessels for sealift capabilities would amplify the efforts of the DHS and DoD in conducting NIAC operations to counter cartels in the western hemisphere and piracy in the Red Sea. It would also enable U.S. partners in the South China Sea to protect their sovereign waters. The CBP and USCG with their limited vessels are responsible for patrolling over 95,000 miles of U.S. coastline while the U.S. Navy deploys forward alongside our partners and allies to preserve freedom of the sea. The time-chartered vessels operated by their civilian crews would carry CBP, USCG, or U.S. Navy personnel to amplify the U.S. ability to monitor, detect, and interdict potential threats. The timed-chartered vessels would be appropriately flagged and marked while aligned with the CBP, USCG, or U.S. Navy, and their crew would fall under the direct control of a small contingent force of appropriate agencies to ensure the UNCLOS is respected. The command structure of the new privateer model would be very similar to the U.S. Navy’s Military Sealift Command (MSC) which focuses on providing global maritime transportation but not offensive options to counter threats. When MSC uses time-chartered, privately owned vessels, they are operated by the contracting company’s crew but carry DoD personnel to execute government functions and are subject to the command of MSC. By applying the new privateer model, the U.S. would have the additional ships needed to increase its maritime domain awareness to counter global threats while reducing the required costs of building and maintaining a fleet.

Challenges

At first glance, chartering commercial vessels to support U.S. maritime security may resemble China’s use of SBFVs. China’s utilization of civilian fishing fleets is a form of offensive deception to hide their true intent of occupying other states’ Exclusive Economic Zones as a tool to assert their territorial rights not supported by international laws. On the contrary, the U.S. application of civilian vessels is a lawful deterrence measure a state can employ to protect its sovereign right against state and non-state actors. Another challenge is changing the conventional mindset of deterring grey zone aggression and applying an irregular capability to counter threats to stay below the threshold of conflict. Continual collaboration between the DHS and DoD, as seen within U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), is the way forward to amplify U.S. national power. However, it must also include the private sector to create new solutions to current problems.

Conclusion

State and non-state actors will continue to contest the control of the maritime domain by disrupting trade routes and creating global security concerns. The U.S., with its allies and partners, should consider the benefits of a prospective maritime strategic plan that integrates this new privateer concept to counter emerging threats, such as the Houthi rebels in the Red Sea. Utilizing this new form of privateering within U.S. law and UNCLOS, the U.S. would disrupt illicit activities and threats to the sovereignty of U.S. allies and partners, such as the “little blue men” in the South China Sea. If the U.S. does not shift its conventional mindset to counter the emerging threat of private sector involvement in maritime security, as seen in China’s current applications, it will continue to see state and non-state actors shaping the rules of war to hinder the U.S. from achieving its strategic goals. The chartering of private vessels for sealift capabilities, as the new privateers model, is a viable tool that needs to be considered and can be adapted across all domains to support the National Security Strategy.

Tags: Houthi Rebels, piracy, privateer, South China Sea

About The Author

• 
  
• Enrique Zelaya
• MAJ Enrique G. Zelaya is a U.S. Army Special Forces Officer with 18 years of combined military experience in Conventional and Special Operations Forces (SOF). MAJ Zelaya’s experiences span two Areas of Responsibility (AOR) to support the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) and counter-illicit drug trafficking in the U.S. Southern Command. His expertise in Joint, Interagency, and multinational military operations has provided a profound understanding of the need for collaboration and integration to counter strategic competitors.

20. From Georgia to Ukraine: Seventeen Years of Russian Cyber Capabilities at War

​Excerpts:

The cases of Georgia and Ukraine, however, show that cyberattacks can effectively disrupt government operations and sow uncertainty even if they do not yield decisive results on the battlefield. Disinformation campaigns can further sway public opinion in Russia’s favor. The Kremlin effectively exploits the lingering anti-Western sentiments of Cold War generations, who still represent a significant portion of the electorate and political leadership in the post-Soviet zone. These sentiments are also reflected in a recent Friedrich Ebert Stiftung survey, which shows that more than a quarter of Ukrainians blame the United States for the war, 15 percent blame the EU, and 66 percent think Ukraine should avoid international involvement.

Russia, of course, is not alone in developing advanced cyber capabilities. Other major powers are closely observing and learning. China, for instance, is augmenting its government-based cyber arsenal and hiring a private network of hackers, which can be a growing threat to the United States. The US Justice Department has already charged twelve Chinese contract hackers and law enforcement officers for their involvement in global computer intrusion campaigns in March 2025.

In less than two decades, wartime cyber operations have evolved from rudimentary disruptions to sophisticated attacks on critical infrastructure and coordinated efforts aimed at undermining Ukraine’s defense capabilities. While the digital domain may not yet determine the outcome of war, it has increasingly blurred the line between civilian and military targets—from disinformation campaigns targeting ordinary citizens to espionage infiltrating government institutions. And because cyber operations do not begin or end when the shooting does, this is the war front that never really goes offline.

From Georgia to Ukraine: Seventeen Years of Russian Cyber Capabilities at War - Modern War Institute

mwi.westpoint.edu · by Ketevan Chincharadze · July 30, 2025

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In August 2008, as Russian tanks rolled into Georgia’s Tskhinvali Region, not self-proclaimed South Ossetia, Georgian government websites were under cyber siege. Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, defaced portals, and data theft disrupted communications as Georgian officials tried to urgently reach Western leaders, some on vacation, others attending the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony.

For the first time in history, a state had unleashed coordinated cyberattacks along with military operations. In post-Soviet, developing Georgia, with limited digital infrastructure and nascent social media, the attacks received little public attention and had minimal impact on combat operations. Seventeen years later, however, technological advancement and growing digital dependency have dramatically amplified the scale of cyber threats. The ongoing war in Ukraine illustrates this trend.

Russia’s Cyber Experiment in Georgia

In the weeks leading up to the Russo-Georgian War, Russian hackers attacked Georgia’s digital ecosystem to sow chaos within the Georgian government and society as Russian troops were amassing along the northern border. This marked the dawn of modern hybrid or gray zone warfare, which blends conventional military force with unconventional tactics, such as cyberattacks.

In July 2008, millions of DDoS requests overwhelmed Georgian websites in an attempt to disable both government and civilian servers. Close to the invasion, hackers began using techniques such as SQL injections, a more advanced assault, which enables attackers to bypass website protections and directly penetrate servers with malicious queries.

Numerous websites were defaced, and some even used photo manipulations to compare Georgia’s then president Mikheil Saakashvili to Adolf Hitler. Hackers targeted key political, governmental, and financial platforms, including the websites of the Georgian president, the National Bank of Georgia, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They also exploited lists of public email addresses and infiltrated government networks to extract potentially sensitive information.

Experts have suggested that Georgian internet traffic was rerouted through Russian telecommunications firms, whose servers also hosted malware used in the attacks. Additional evidence indicates that attackers manipulated an informal online poll on CNN’s website to portray Russia’s combat operations in Georgia as a legitimate peacekeeping mission. Russian bloggers then rapidly spread the poll across the country, urging their readers to visit CNN’s website and select the response supporting Russian intervention. As a result, 92 percent of predominantly Russian participants voted in favor of the peacekeeping narrative before CNN ultimately removed the poll.

In 2008, according to the World Bank, only 10 percent of the Georgian population used the internet, compared to 82 percent in 2023. With such limited public reach at the time, the attacks were primarily aimed at demoralizing the government, diverting attention from military operations, and stealing intelligence. However, as internet access expanded across the country, so did Russia’s influence on the public.

Moscow started using disguised, low-profile content to subtly shape public opinion and obtain user data without informed consent. In2020, for example, Facebook removed News-Front Georgia, a Kremlin-linked outlet that had been actively spreading pro-Russian and anti-Western sentiments through an organized network of inauthentic accounts. According to the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED), the network included twelve fake profiles that disseminated pro-Russian content in thirty-one Facebook groups with over 521,000 members, in a country of just 3.7 million.

ISFED also uncovered twenty-six fake Facebook accounts and pages, disseminating Kremlin-backed Sputnik Georgia’s content across forty-one public groups, reaching 1.2 million users. The operation used so-called soft content, such as posts about gardening, astrology, or local celebrities, to build trust with users before inserting links to Sputnik’s articles with Kremlin-aligned narratives.

Russia has been steadily expanding its overt and covert operations since 2008. The annexation of Crimea and the ongoing war in Ukraine further demonstrate Moscow’s continued advancement of its digital arsenal for modern warfare.

Advanced Cyber Operations in Ukraine

Strategically, the Kremlin began small in Georgia and significantly scaled its military and cyber warfare in Ukraine. The 2008 rudimentary attacks an experimental foundation, evolving into broader assaults on Ukraine’s communications and energy sectors in 2014, and ultimately escalating into a global threat targeting Ukraine and its allies during the full-scale invasion. However, much of Russia’s strategy still follows a familiar playbook first tested in Georgia.

Just like in Georgia, Russia’s first wave of cyber operations predated the 2014 annexation of Crimea. The attacks on the information systems of Ukrainian state institutions and private enterprises came during the 2013 mass protests that would become known as the Maidan Revolution. In mid-2013, Operation Armageddon targeted Ukrainian government, law enforcement, and military officials to steal sensitive information through phishing emails that tricked victims into clicking malicious links. Just three days before the Crimean status referendum, on March 13, 2014, Russia launched an eight-minute DDoS cyberattack on Ukrainian computer networks and communications to distract public attention from its military presence in Crimea.

Unlike in the Russo-Georgian War, Russian cyberattacks extended beyond the annexation of Crimea. In 2015, Ukraine experienced two assaults on three regional power distribution entities, also known as oblenergos, which impacted approximately 225,000 customers. In a US context, this would be proportionate to attacking the Omaha Public Power District, the Nebraska Public Power District, and MidAmerican at the same time. The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency concluded that the oblenergo “unscheduled power outages” were perpetrated by “Russian nation-state cyber actors.”

By 2015, researchers had identified two prominent Russian hacking groups involved in Russia’s cyberattacks against Ukraine: APT29 (also known as Cozy Bear, Cozy Duke, or Nobelium) and APT28 (also known as the Sofacy Group, Tsar Team, Pawn Storm, or Fancy Bear). These groups also played an important role during Ukraine’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

Following the pattern established in 2008 and 2014, Russian hackers intensified reconnaissance efforts in Ukraine far ahead of the invasion. This included actions by APT29, which has been linked to the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service. In the lead-up to the invasion, government and university websites were defaced, spear-phishing campaigns targeted the energy sector, and DDoS attacks hit the Ministry of Defense and major banks. At the same time, coordinated disinformation campaigns portrayed Ukraine as an oppressor of the Russian-speaking majority in the country’s east, echoing the CNN poll manipulation in 2008 aimed at framing Russian troops as peacekeepers in Georgia’s breakaway South Ossetia.

Hours before the invasion, GRU Unit 74455, also known as Sandworm, the same Russian military intelligence group behind the 2017 NotPetya attacks, deployed a wiper malware called FoxBlade against Ukraine’s digital infrastructure. Victor Zhora, a prominent Ukrainian cybersecurity official, called the attack “a really huge loss in communications in the very beginning of the war.”

Hacking communication infrastructure to gain a military advantage is central to Russia’s war strategy in Ukraine. In the weeks following the Sandworm incident, Russia made another attempt to shut down Ukraine’s internet access by targeting three major telecommunications providers—Triolan (March 9), Vinasterisk (March 13), and Ukrtelecom (March 28). SpaceX’s early delivery of Starlink terminals helped restore communications across Ukraine, and Russian forces quickly responded by trying to hack, jam, and disrupt Starlink’s operations, though with limited success.

Russia’s assaults also extended beyond Ukraine’s borders to its allies—a significant step up from earlier practices. According to Microsoft, “By mid-2021, Russian actors were targeting supply chain vendors in Ukraine and abroad to secure further access not only to systems in Ukraine but also NATO member states.” This practice intensified as the war escalated.

A coordinated cyberattack on Viasat satellite modems disrupted satellite communications across Ukraine and parts of Europe on February 24, 2022, the day of the invasion. The operation crippled Ukrainian communications, including internet access for thousands in Ukraine, and disrupted the KA-SAT satellite internet service across Germany, France, Hungary, Greece, Italy, and Poland. In Germany alone, more than 5,800 wind turbines were affected due to the loss of satellite connectivity. The EU publicly linked the attack to Russia.

Microsoft reported an increase in Russian cyber espionage throughout 2023 in at least seventeen European countries. It also identified a new GRU-linked threat actor, Cadet Blizzard, active since February 2023, which targets organizations in Latin America and Europe, particularly in NATO countries supplying military aid to Ukraine.

From Georgia in 2008 to Ukraine in 2022, Russia transformed its cyber experiments into a sophisticated global threat. In July 2022, eight distinct Russian malware strains were deployed to breach forty-eight Ukrainian government agencies and enterprises, averaging two to three attacks per week.

Since the war, Moscow has used nine new families of wiper malware and two new ransomware variants, targeting more than one hundred Ukrainian government and private sector entities, including the Prestige ransomware, deployed in October 2022 in Ukraine and Poland. By late April 2022, Microsoft had recorded 237 cyber operations targeting Ukraine, including destructive attacks, service disruptions, espionage efforts, and coordinated disinformation campaigns.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg. In 2023, Shane Huntley, a senior director of Google’s Threat Analysis Group called Russian cyber operations “aggressive” and “multi-pronged,” while the general manager of Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center, Clint Watts, cautioned that Russia was continuously innovating with new malware. Further reports indicate that the Kremlin complements these cyber operations with extensive disinformation campaigns, blaming the West for the war in Ukraine and pushing pro-Kremlin narratives through more than one hundred thousand social media pages and Telegram channels.

The ongoing war in Ukraine, so far, represents the most vivid example of how cyber capabilities can complement activities in other warfighting domains. However, the overall impact of cyberattacks on Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine is still uncertain.

Can Cyberattacks Win Wars?

Despite the significant expansion of Russia’s cyber operations from Georgia to Ukraine—even earning Russia a reputation for having some of the world’s most formidable hackers—cyberattacks have not yet had a decisive impact on the war in Ukraine.

When Russian forces wanted to disrupt civilian infrastructure, they routinely bombed hydroelectric plants and other critical energy and water facilities across the country. In March 2024, Russia launched eighty-eight missiles and sixty-three Iranian-made Shahed drones against Ukraine’s largest dam, leaving over one million people without electricity. The most severe internet disruptions have also resulted from such missile strikes rather than cyberattacks on Viasat satellite modems. Therefore, conventional kinetic operations continue to dominate Russia’s operational approach to warfighting.

The cases of Georgia and Ukraine, however, show that cyberattacks can effectively disrupt government operations and sow uncertainty even if they do not yield decisive results on the battlefield. Disinformation campaigns can further sway public opinion in Russia’s favor. The Kremlin effectively exploits the lingering anti-Western sentiments of Cold War generations, who still represent a significant portion of the electorate and political leadership in the post-Soviet zone. These sentiments are also reflected in a recent Friedrich Ebert Stiftung survey, which shows that more than a quarter of Ukrainians blame the United States for the war, 15 percent blame the EU, and 66 percent think Ukraine should avoid international involvement.

Russia, of course, is not alone in developing advanced cyber capabilities. Other major powers are closely observing and learning. China, for instance, is augmenting its government-based cyber arsenal and hiring a private network of hackers, which can be a growing threat to the United States. The US Justice Department has already charged twelve Chinese contract hackers and law enforcement officers for their involvement in global computer intrusion campaigns in March 2025.

In less than two decades, wartime cyber operations have evolved from rudimentary disruptions to sophisticated attacks on critical infrastructure and coordinated efforts aimed at undermining Ukraine’s defense capabilities. While the digital domain may not yet determine the outcome of war, it has increasingly blurred the line between civilian and military targets—from disinformation campaigns targeting ordinary citizens to espionage infiltrating government institutions. And because cyber operations do not begin or end when the shooting does, this is the war front that never really goes offline.

Ketevan Chincharadze is an international security analyst from Georgia and the founder of FYI, one of the country’s popular independent analytical platforms. She is also a junior research fellow at the Casimir Pulaski Foundation in Poland and has researched cyber warfare with the US Army War College. She has previously worked with the Aspen Institute Congressional Program in Washington, DC and the NATO Liaison Office in the South Caucasus. Ketevan holds an MA in international security from the Josef Korbel School of Global and Public Affairs at the University of Denver.

The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.

Image credit: mil.ru

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mwi.westpoint.edu · by Ketevan Chincharadze · July 30, 2025

21. The United States Should Act Now to Mitigate Conflict Escalation on the Moon

Important work done by professors affiliated with... think tanks.

​Excerpts:

Our exercise serves as a cautionary tale: The United States and other leading spacefaring nations should create mechanisms and procedures in real time to avoid conflict and escalation. The tabletop exercise highlighted the importance of developing widely accepted technical criteria for safety zones and establishing both national and international procedures for proposing, deconflicting, and registering them. Preventing conflict related to activities on the moon will depend on the perceived legitimacy of these procedures. Stakeholders could create these procedures under the U.N. Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space working groups or another neutral forum to define the operational parameters of safety zones, including size, duration, purpose, and notification protocols. Another proposal was for an international registry of lunar activities, including planned landings, infrastructure, and declared zones — akin to how the International Telecommunication Union manages orbital slots and spectrum. These are issues that could potentially be considered within the Action Team for Lunar Activities Consultation formed earlier this year within the U.N. Committee for the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.

Notably, many participants supported a phased approach to lunar governance: First, encourage consensus among like-minded actors (such as Artemis Accords signatories), and second, broaden the dialogue to include states outside that coalition. In our exercise, participants identified the United Arab Emirates as a promising convening power, able to host discussions with both developing and major spacefaring nations. This suggestion is similar to calls from other analysts for the United States to partner with “capable mid-tier partners” that are increasingly influential players in space.

Our exercise reinforced an important lesson. The perceived legitimacy of rules in space, as on Earth, is tied to the perceived fairness and transparency of the procedures used to create them. With no agreed-upon process for resolving lunar conflicts, underlying mistrust can exacerbate tensions between great powers with advanced space programs and those countries with developing space programs. The need for a rules-based order that also integrates commercial entities has never been higher. One such venue could be the U.N. Office for Outer Space Affairs Action Team on Lunar Activities Consultation. This Action Team could be a useful venue as it allows for information sharing and expert level input, including the perspectives of a range of public and private stakeholders, under the auspices of the United Nations.

With increasing activity at the Lunar South Pole, the window for building this process is closing. If international governance procedures are not in place, we will be left to manage conflict with less credibility and fewer tools.

The United States Should Act Now to Mitigate Conflict Escalation on the Moon - War on the Rocks

Mariel Borowitz, Lincoln Hines, and Lawrence Rubin

July 30, 2025

warontherocks.com · July 30, 2025

On June 25, 2024, China’s Chang’e 6 mission safely returned to Earth, becoming the first mission in the world to retrieve lunar samples from the far side of the moon. This feat represents one of many national and commercial efforts targeting the Lunar South Pole to explore a region that is believed to be rich in water ice, receives high levels of sunlight, and which may contain other strategically valuable rare earth materials such as titanium, aluminum, iron, and magnesium. As such, the Chang’e 6 mission represents the first of what will likely be many future missions.

Countries and companies seek to gain access to what is increasingly viewed as prime real estate for future space operations that may enable future scientific discovery and allow for significant commercial gain. However, this increase of lunar activities may very well spark an international crisis due to the absence of clearly defined rules and norms related to the moon. As more state actors and private firms develop plans and capabilities to establish a presence on the moon, the window for addressing these challenges prior to a crisis is closing. The United States and its allies should seek to engage China, Russia, and other spacefaring nations in an inclusive dialogue and put procedures in place to share information on potential norms and best practices, technical criteria, mechanisms, and procedures for engaging in lunar activities. This dialogue should incorporate information and experience from commercial actors involved in lunar activity, and it should remain flexible as we continue to learn about the lunar environment.

While China’s Chang’e 6 is remarkable for its scientific value, this mission also carries with it a reminder of the looming challenges surrounding geopolitical competition in lunar space. This competition raises a host of questions: Who can use and claim ownership to lunar resources? What rules and procedures should be established to avoid armed conflict between spacefaring actors? The answers to the questions have clear policy implications. Without a clear legal framework or norms, competition among commercial and national actors could trigger conflict in and among spacefaring actors.

BECOME A MEMBER

Stress-Testing the Existing Space Governance Framework

To explore these critical issues — together with our colleagues Svetla Ben Itzhak, Gregory Miller, and James Clay Moltz — we led a tabletop exercise that envisioned a plausible crisis in 2029. This exercise, which included American regional and space experts with non-governmental and government experience, presented the following scenario: An Indian private company, Chandra Ltd., lands near Shackleton Crater and declares a 50-kilometer “safety zone” around its operations. This exercise was designed to intentionally invoke the language of “safety zones” articulated in the U.S.-led Artemis Accords, and which has been criticized by both Russia and China. Moreover, the exercise introduced a twist: By using a fictional Indian space company, it became clear that the language of the Artemis Accords created challenges not only for China and Russia but also for the United States. In the scenario, two other commercial entities, one American and one Chinese, had previously announced plans to land in the same region that had been covered within the Indian space company’s designated safety zone.

This fictional crisis was designed to stress-test the existing space governance framework and examine how a multi-stakeholder environment might respond. What we found was instructive: Clear rules did not emerge from the crisis. Instead, the focus was on the process of developing rules that were inclusive, fair, and adaptable. Moreover, the exercise raised important questions about the role of private actors in shaping lunar governance and suggested the importance of third parties with greater perceived neutrality in developing guidelines for preventing future conflict. More broadly, these findings suggest, as we highlight in our recent paper, that while there is flexibility and willingness to cooperate on developing a new lunar governance framework, states might not yet have well-formed views for negotiations. States are just learning about this evolving environment in which the strength of the norms around governance is unclear.

The Heart of the Matter: Safety Zones in a Legal Gray Area

The Artemis Accords, a non-binding set of principles developed by the United States and its partners and signed by over 50 countries to enhance the governance of civil exploration and the use of outer space, encourage the use of safety zones to promote transparency and reduce the risk of harmful interference with the activities of other actors. However, the accords do not specify the process of how to use a safety zone or how even to define one, beyond general guidance to leverage commonly accepted scientific and engineering principles. The concept of safety zones has proved controversial to other major spacefaring actors such as China and Russia, with some Chinese analysts characterizing it as a form of colonization and Roscosmos director Gen. Dmitry Rogozin likening it to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Hyperbole aside, the contention is that a country could make de facto territorial claims, restricting the access of other actors to strategically valuable sites, under the guise of safeguarding scientific operations. At an even more fundamental level, the foundational Outer Space Treaty, upon which the Artemis Accords is grounded, requires parties to avoid harmful interference with others’ activities and leaves key terms such as “due regard” undefined.

This ambiguity leaves room for diverging interpretations. In our scenario, the U.S. team, which was divided into military and civil-commercial teams, viewed the safety zone as a useful, albeit imperfect, deconfliction tool. The U.S. team, however, worried that overly broad or unilateral declarations could amount to de facto territorial claims, thereby undermining the Outer Space Treaty. Participants representing India defended the declaration as a necessary operational step, arguing it was technical in nature and consistent with international norms. They asserted that Chandra Ltd.’s actions reinforced the Artemis Accords. In sharp contrast, the Chinese and Russian teams rejected the safety zone, arguing that such claims lack legal standing subject to review within an inclusive international environment and body. This position adopted in a fictional tabletop exercise mirrors Russia and China’s real-world opposition to the Artemis Accords. In the exercise, the Russian and Chinese teams were concerned not just about the size of the zone but about the precedent it set and the absence of a multilateral process to govern it. They saw Chandra Ltd.’s actions as an example of how a commercial company could exploit a governance structure to benefit the United States.

Commercial Actors at the Forefront — and Under Scrutiny

The exercise also shed light on challenges surrounding the role of private actors in lunar governance. While participants playing the roles of American and Indian representatives tended to see commercial actors as essential stakeholders — capable, innovative, and already embedded in state policy — the Chinese and Russian teams rejected their authority to establish operational norms. For them, the notion that a private company could constrain the activities of other states or companies, even under the guise of safety, was both legally and politically unacceptable.

As private missions increase in number and complexity, and as governments rely on commercial partners to achieve national objectives, this legal gray zone is becoming increasingly muddled and unstable. This reflects not only the exponential growth role of the commercial sector, which now accounts for the most launches worldwide, led by SpaceX, but also a broader challenge in the evolving field of space law. Under Article VI of the Outer Space Treaty, states are responsible for the activities of non-governmental entities. However, the treaty does not define the scope of that supervision or what constitutes adequate authorization and continuing oversight. Geopolitical competition among the United States, Russia, and China raises the stakes even further. At a broader level, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s opposition and threats to Starlink’s operation in Ukraine was one of the first major events to question the relationship between commercial actors and national assets, raising questions about whether a country could be held responsible for the actions taken by private companies.

One of the most important findings from the tabletop exercise was that absent shared procedures, space norms will be shaped by precedent rather than principle. In world politics, there is no central authority to enforce law and thus compliance is more closely related to the costs of defying power, politics, and peer pressure. These dynamics form the basis of customary international law and mean that states will oppose a behavior that could establish legal norms unfavorable to their interests. Thus, if activities that become precedent contradict principle and go unchallenged, these activities can redefine what is considered lawful.

The exercise also exposed a political dimension to commercial activity: It matters who makes the first move. The outcome of this exercise may have been very different, as many participants acknowledged, if the declarant had been a U.S., Russian, or Chinese company. India’s perceived status as a relatively neutral space actor muted some reactions, as the only major competitor represented was China.

Takeaways

Our exercise serves as a cautionary tale: The United States and other leading spacefaring nations should create mechanisms and procedures in real time to avoid conflict and escalation. The tabletop exercise highlighted the importance of developing widely accepted technical criteria for safety zones and establishing both national and international procedures for proposing, deconflicting, and registering them. Preventing conflict related to activities on the moon will depend on the perceived legitimacy of these procedures. Stakeholders could create these procedures under the U.N. Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space working groups or another neutral forum to define the operational parameters of safety zones, including size, duration, purpose, and notification protocols. Another proposal was for an international registry of lunar activities, including planned landings, infrastructure, and declared zones — akin to how the International Telecommunication Union manages orbital slots and spectrum. These are issues that could potentially be considered within the Action Team for Lunar Activities Consultation formed earlier this year within the U.N. Committee for the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.

Notably, many participants supported a phased approach to lunar governance: First, encourage consensus among like-minded actors (such as Artemis Accords signatories), and second, broaden the dialogue to include states outside that coalition. In our exercise, participants identified the United Arab Emirates as a promising convening power, able to host discussions with both developing and major spacefaring nations. This suggestion is similar to calls from other analysts for the United States to partner with “capable mid-tier partners” that are increasingly influential players in space.

Our exercise reinforced an important lesson. The perceived legitimacy of rules in space, as on Earth, is tied to the perceived fairness and transparency of the procedures used to create them. With no agreed-upon process for resolving lunar conflicts, underlying mistrust can exacerbate tensions between great powers with advanced space programs and those countries with developing space programs. The need for a rules-based order that also integrates commercial entities has never been higher. One such venue could be the U.N. Office for Outer Space Affairs Action Team on Lunar Activities Consultation. This Action Team could be a useful venue as it allows for information sharing and expert level input, including the perspectives of a range of public and private stakeholders, under the auspices of the United Nations.

With increasing activity at the Lunar South Pole, the window for building this process is closing. If international governance procedures are not in place, we will be left to manage conflict with less credibility and fewer tools.

BECOME A MEMBER

Mariel Borowitz, Ph.D. is an associate professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology, director of the Georgia Tech Center for Space Policy and International Relations, and head of the Nunn School Program on International Affairs, Science, and Technology.

Lincoln Hines, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is also a faculty affiliate at the Nunn School’s Center for Space Policy and International Relations and a 2025–2026 Wilson China Fellow at the Wilson Center.

Lawrence Rubin, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology and an associate fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Image: U.S. Space Force

warontherocks.com · July 30, 2025

22. Reclaiming U.S. Engagement in Latin America: Strategy Beyond Competition

​A view from South America.

Conclusion:

Latin America and the United States share a bond forged by history and ideals—a bond rooted not in dominance or charity, but in the belief that freedom, dignity, and prosperity are best secured through strong democratic institutions.

Today, as great power competition intensifies, and transnational organized crime becomes more sophisticated and destructive, one truth remains clear: without strong democratic institutions, there can be no enduring equality, true development, or lasting respect for human rights.

These institutions do not strengthen themselves. They require commitment—from within our nations and from partners who value them. They require accountability, standards, and shared responsibility to uphold them, especially in the face of corruption, criminal infiltration, external influence, and rogue regimes like those in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.

Influence is never guaranteed by history alone. It is secured through presence, commitment, and the wisdom to act in ways that strengthen the institutions keeping our societies free. Latin America does not need economic aid—it needs a strong strategic partnership with the global power whose history, democratic ideals, and respect for sovereignty most align with its own. That power is, and has always been, the United States.

Reclaiming U.S. Engagement in Latin America: Strategy Beyond Competition

irregularwarfare.org · by Alberto José Mejía Ferrero · July 30, 2025

Editor’s Note: The following is an adapted version of a speech delivered by Gen. Alberto Mejía (Ret.) at the Irregular Warfare Initiative’s South America in Competition Conference, held on July 16–17, 2025.

Introduction

Two and a half centuries ago, thirteen colonies declared independence from an empire, forging a new nation built on liberty, self-determination, and democracy. Not long after, those same ideals ignited hearts across Latin America. Leaders like Simón Bolívar and José de San Martín drew inspiration from the American Revolution to pursue freedom for their own people, even if their struggles took different paths under different conditions.

Throughout history, despite many differences, Latin America and the United States have shared an enduring admiration for democracy and sovereignty. The United States has long stood as a beacon of possibility, illuminating a path toward prosperity, stability, and human dignity. That is why, despite tensions and disagreements, partnership with the United States has always held deep meaning for Latin American nations.

Recognizing Latin America’s Intrinsic Value to U.S. Security and Prosperity

For the past two decades, the United States largely took its alignment with Latin America for granted, directing strategic attention elsewhere. Countries aligned with post-9/11 counterterrorism priorities – like Colombia – benefited from close partnerships and targeted support, while many others were left to navigate their challenges alone. Into this vacuum stepped China, advancing a strategy of deep economic engagement, often without conditions, slowly entrenching itself as a principal partner across the region.

Today, the United States is undergoing a period of strategic reassessment, adopting a more realist, realpolitik approach that prioritizes countering Chinese influence globally, including in Latin America. As this new strategy takes shape, it is important to remember that while great power competition now frames U.S. global strategy, Latin America is not only a theater of competition but also holds intrinsic importance in its own right.

Beyond Chinese influence, Latin America remains vital to US security and prosperity—from countering transnational organized crime and narcotrafficking, to securing critical trade routes, to upholding the democratic values that have long bound our nations together. Effective policy towards Latin America requires more than countering China. It requires recognizing and investing in the region’s intrinsic strategic value, and in the enduring partnerships that will shape its future stability and alignment.

US and PRC influence

For much of the last century, US engagement with Latin America was defined by values-based, conditional diplomacy. During the Cold War, alliances formed around anti-communism. Later, cooperation focused on fighting narcotrafficking and insurgency. In the post-9/11 era, partnerships prioritized counterterrorism and regional stability. Most recently, migration has dominated bilateral agendas.

This approach produced notable successes. For example, Plan Colombia stands as a testament to what determined partnership can achieve when both sides are committed. With substantial US bipartisan support, Colombia broke the FARC, reduced violence, stabilized its economy, and emerged as one of the United States’ closest security allies in the hemisphere. These achievements culminated in Colombia’s designation as a major non-NATO ally and its recognition as a Global Partner of NATO—milestones reflecting its transformation into a reliable and capable security partner on the international stage.

However, this model—prioritizing issue-based engagement often framed in ideological terms—while effective in moments of crisis, did not always foster the deep, multidimensional partnerships needed for long-term strategic alignment. As US attention shifted to other strategic theatres, Latin America came to be seen as stable, if not static. In many policy circles, an unspoken assumption emerged that the region was securely anchored within the US sphere of influence, reinforced by cultural, ideological, and historical bonds.

Today, we see renewed efforts to reemphasize Latin America as a strategic priority. These efforts are welcome and necessary. Yet US diplomatic bandwidth remains stretched by multiple urgent crises elsewhere—from Europe to the Middle East to the Indo-Pacific—creating opportunities for other powers to deepen their presence in the hemisphere.

China saw this opening and acted decisively. Beginning with infrastructure investments and energy deals in the early 2000s, its engagement grew rapidly. By 2020, China had become the largest trading partner for countries such as Brazil, Chile, and Peru, and a major financier for Argentina, Ecuador, and Venezuela.

Unlike US approaches, China’s strategy was not based on ideological alignment or governance standards. Its financing came without requirements on democracy, human rights, or institutional reform, and with promises of rapid delivery. For governments facing fiscal constraints or political instability, this approach was appealing. Over time, Chinese economic statecraft embedded itself deeply in Latin America’s infrastructure, trade, telecommunications, and energy sectors.

Even Colombia, long considered Washington’s closest ally in the region, has felt these shifts. While Colombia’s strategic and military partnership with the United States remains strong, recent years have seen increasing Chinese trade, investment, and bids in infrastructure and energy projects. These developments are not yet as pronounced as in Argentina or Brazil, but they mark a drift that cannot be ignored.

PRC intent in South America

Chinese intentions are often opaque, unfolding over decades rather than years. In these confusing times, with the global order shifting at unprecedented speed, perhaps only history will reveal the full purpose behind China’s growing presence in Latin America. What is clear today, however, is that Chinese economic engagement carries implications far beyond trade balances or infrastructure projects. When a country’s principal investor and trading partner shifts from the United States to China, its economic incentives, political alignments, and potentially its security posture change.

We are already seeing these effects. Chinese companies hold significant stakes in strategic sectors such as energy, mining, ports, and telecommunications. In Argentina, despite President Milei’s ideological preference for Washington, economic realities have forced continued close financial ties with Beijing. In Brazil, Chinese investment in energy and agribusiness has created a relationship that is increasingly structural rather than merely transactional.

Even in Colombia, Chinese companies are bidding for major infrastructure projects and expanding in technology and energy. While still limited compared to Argentina or Brazil, these moves signal a diversification of economic dependencies. Over time, such shifts could alter government decision-making, not out of ideological affinity, but due to structural economic leverage.

These shifts in alignment are compounded by evolving security threats within Latin America itself. Transnational organized crime is becoming more complex, interconnected, and technologically sophisticated. These networks now engage not only in narcotrafficking, but also cybercrime, illicit financial flows, human trafficking, and environmental crimes on a global scale. They exploit weak institutions, destabilize communities, and corrode democratic governance.

As China embeds itself economically in the region, its interests increasingly intersect with these governance vulnerabilities. Strategic competition thus becomes not only about infrastructure or trade, but also about the integrity of institutions underpinning regional security.

For the United States, this means a region historically considered its strategic backyard may no longer align with its security or diplomatic priorities. This does not mean Latin American nations will become Chinese satellites. But if their democratic institutions weaken under the dual pressures of organized crime and external leverage, their capacity to cooperate with the United States on security, counter-narcotics, and regional stability will be severely undermined, with direct implications for US interests at home and abroad. This challenge only intensifies when national leadership fails to act with strategic clarity or responsibility.

Colombia as a Case Study

Colombia today exemplifies the risks of strategic drift. For decades, Colombia was regarded as a success story of US-Latin American cooperation. Plan Colombia, despite its controversies, achieved what many considered impossible: reducing insurgent violence, weakening powerful narcotrafficking cartels, and stabilizing the economy.

Today, Colombia faces significant challenges in adapting its defense posture to meet emerging threats such as cyber-enabled crime, hybrid threats, and the evolving landscape of transnational organized crime. Most concerning is Colombia’s posture toward both internal and external challenges. The Colombian government remains silent on China’s growing presence, allowing major infrastructure bids involving Chinese companies to proceed with minimal public scrutiny or strategic assessment. At the same time, efforts to erode domestic institutions in Colombia have weakened the foundations sustaining security, governance, and Colombia’s international credibility. These choices further weaken the foundations sustaining security, governance, and Colombia’s international credibility.

This failure of leadership has broader implications. As transnational criminal networks become more sophisticated and interconnected—leveraging global financial systems, encrypted communications, and advanced logistics—weakened institutions leave Colombia vulnerable to internal fragmentation and external influence. These groups thrive in environments of strategic drift, filling governance voids, undermining institutions, and aligning with external actors when it serves their interests.

For the United States, this is not simply a Colombian problem. Colombia has long been its most reliable partner in Latin America—a partner that cooperated on security matters and advocated for democratic stability and regional integration. Weakness in Colombia undermines regional security and US interests directly, providing fertile ground for organized crime to expand and for strategic competitors to entrench themselves in ways that will be difficult to reverse.

Key strategic considerations

This is not a story of inevitable decline. It is an opportunity for the United States to build a renewed partnership with Latin America that reflects today’s realities while remaining anchored in our shared democratic ideals. The following recommendations offer a way ahead.

First, the US must adopt a posture of continuous, multidimensional engagement throughout Latin America. Presence matters. Latin American nations notice when Washington appears only during crises. Sustained diplomatic, economic, and security cooperation, driven by respect and mutual interest, builds the trust necessary to counter external influence.

Second, the US and its Latin American allies should work to strengthen military-to-military cooperation. Security partnerships are among the most enduring forms of bilateral relations. Joint and combined training, capacity-building, intelligence sharing, and operational coordination enhance mutual readiness, build professional bonds, and reinforce shared standards. This cooperation must also evolve to address emerging threats—cyber-enabled crime, hybrid warfare, and the use of new technologies by transnational criminal networks.

Third, all parties should invest in democratic institutions and justice systems. Organized crime thrives where governance is weak. Supporting judicial reform, anti-corruption initiatives, and institution-building reinforces rule of law and democratic resilience – the ultimate safeguards not only against criminal and external influence, but also against the rise of authoritarian regimes like those in Cuba, Nicaragua or Venezuela.

Fourth, the US and its Latin American allies must promote intra-regional cooperation. While Latin America is not a block, and each country has its nuances, there are domains where regional collaboration is essential. The fight against narcotrafficking and organized crime in the Amazon basin is one example. A potential trilateral agreement between the United States, Colombia, and Ecuador could significantly enhance coordinated efforts against narcotics production and trafficking corridors along their shared borders.

Likewise, a multilateral framework involving Amazonian countries could strengthen joint operations against environmental crime, illegal mining, human trafficking, and arms flows. These complex challenges demand transnational coordination mechanisms, intelligence fusion, and shared operational frameworks to achieve lasting impact.

Fifth, all parties should bolster highly developed capabilities among Latin American partners. Several countries have advanced capacities in intelligence, special operations, aviation, and counterterrorism. Leveraging and supporting these capabilities creates regional leadership anchors, enabling more effective burden-sharing and collective security.

Sixth, the US and its Latin American allies must address threats at their earliest stages. Prevention is always more effective and less costly than crisis response. Early interventions – in governance, security sector transformation and modernization, economic resilience, and institutional strengthening – reduce the risk of state capture by organized crime and diminish the appeal of external actors offering conditional or opaque support.

Finally, it is imperative that the US and its Latin American allies reaffirm a commitment to principled, realistic partnerships. Latin Americans do not expect the US to solve their problems, nor do they wish to be lectured. They seek a partner who listens, understands, and invests in long-term stability, prosperity, and security—a partner with shared values who recognizes that economic growth, institutional strength, and security are interconnected, each reinforcing the other.

These are strategic options that, if pursued wisely, could revitalize US-Latin American relations, counterbalance external influence, and address the growing threat of organized crime that undermines regional stability and US strategic interests alike.

Conclusion

Latin America and the United States share a bond forged by history and ideals—a bond rooted not in dominance or charity, but in the belief that freedom, dignity, and prosperity are best secured through strong democratic institutions.

Today, as great power competition intensifies, and transnational organized crime becomes more sophisticated and destructive, one truth remains clear: without strong democratic institutions, there can be no enduring equality, true development, or lasting respect for human rights.

These institutions do not strengthen themselves. They require commitment—from within our nations and from partners who value them. They require accountability, standards, and shared responsibility to uphold them, especially in the face of corruption, criminal infiltration, external influence, and rogue regimes like those in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.

Influence is never guaranteed by history alone. It is secured through presence, commitment, and the wisdom to act in ways that strengthen the institutions keeping our societies free. Latin America does not need economic aid—it needs a strong strategic partnership with the global power whose history, democratic ideals, and respect for sovereignty most align with its own. That power is, and has always been, the United States.

General Alberto José Mejía Ferrero (Ret.) is the former Commander of the Colombian Army and Colombian Military Forces (2015–2018) and a former Ambassador of Colombia to Australia and New Zealand. With over four decades of experience in irregular warfare and special operations, he led a major transformation of Colombia’s military and guided the forces through the peace process with the FARC. He has served as a consultant to the United States Institute of Peace and is a visiting professor at the University of Los Andes’ Escuela de Gobierno Alberto Lleras Camargo.

Views expressed in this article solely reflect those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Irregular Warfare Initiative, Princeton University’s Empirical Studies of Conflict Project, the Modern War Institute at West Point, or the United States Government.

Main Image: Image generated by ChatGPT using DALL·E, OpenAI (July 24, 2025).

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23. Taiwan Is Not Ukraine

​Conclusion:

In the end, Ukraine doesn’t teach that war is unwinnable. It teaches that victory costs more than most regimes can afford. That friction ruins precision. That morale changes battles. That logistics trumps slogans. And that staying power only works if it doesn’t destroy you first. The real danger for Beijing is not hubris—it’s the illusion that proximity and patience will deliver what Russia failed to achieve. That’s not strategy. It’s fantasy. And fantasy gets you killed.

Taiwan Is Not Ukraine

https://nationalsecurityjournal.org/taiwan-is-not-ukraine/

nationalsecurityjournal.org · by Andrew Latham · July 29, 2025

Key Points and Summary – While China may be learning from Russia’s brutal war in Ukraine that protracted invasions can eventually succeed, applying that lesson to Taiwan would be a “catastrophic miscalculation.”

-Taiwan is not Ukraine; it’s an “island fortress” separated by a treacherous strait, making any invasion a logistical nightmare the Chinese military has never attempted.

A Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor is launched from the Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska in Kodiak, Alaska, during Flight Experiment THAAD (FET)-01 on July 30, 2017 (EDT). During the test, the THAAD weapon system successfully intercepted an air-launched, medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) target.

-An attack would immediately pull in the United States and its allies, and holding the island against a mobilized population would be a recipe for a quagmire.

The Brutal Lesson From Ukraine That China Is Ignoring About Taiwan.

“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” The brutal wisdom of Mike Tyson could serve as the epitaph for Vladimir Putin’s initial war plan in Ukraine. And it should be engraved on every desk in Zhongnanhai.

The war in Ukraine—bloody, protracted, and still unresolved—has demolished the myth of swift conquest. If Beijing is seriously contemplating the use of armed force to take Taiwan, it would do well to pay close attention to the lessons offered by the Ukraine war: To wit, invasions may not be futile, but they are far messier, costlier, and more unpredictable than war planners tend to imagine.

Ukraine War: Russia Teaches a Brutal Lesson

Victory, of course, is always possible for the aggressor in war. But if Ukraine teaches us anything, it’s that in today’s world, victory doesn’t come cheap or clean. It comes—if it comes at all—through a long, brutal slog that tests more than firepower.

It tests political resolve, the staying power of national legitimacy, and the will to keep bleeding long after the slogans have gone stale. And maybe what Ukraine really drives home is something Clausewitz understood better than most: War isn’t neat. It’s not a formula. It’s a violent, unpredictable human storm—driven as much by fog, friction, and dumb luck as by any set of instructions sketched out in a staff college or command bunker.

Exercise Artemis Strike is a German-led tactical live fire exercise with live Patriot and Stinger missiles at the NATO Missile Firing Installation in Chania, Greece from Oct. 31-Nov. 09. Over 200 U.S. soldiers and approximately 650 German airmen will be participating in the realistic training within a combined construct, exercise the rigors associated with force projection and educate operators on their air missile defense systems. The 10th Army Air Missile Defense Command will deploy, operate and fire live missiles within a tactical scenario, under Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe operational readiness evaluation criteria.

Kyiv didn’t fall when Russia invaded. NATO didn’t fracture. And the Ukrainians didn’t roll over. They fought hard, and the West rallied, at least in the early stages. But now, as a fourth year looms, the momentum is shifting. Russia, drawing on manpower, artillery, and industrial-scale attrition, has clawed its way forward in the Donbas and southern Ukraine. Putin absorbed the early humiliation, adapted, mobilized, and sustained. Russia bleeds slowly, methodically, and is now edging toward a brutal kind of near-Pyrrhic victory. If the war continues to unfold as it has been recently, the Kremlin will likely prevail—not through a blitz, but through sheer endurance. Xi Jinping is watching—and learning.

Eyeing a Taiwan Takeover

At a minimum, Xi will have concluded that Taiwan, like Ukraine, will not collapse at first contact with the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Any fantasy of a fast knockout blow bringing Taiwan to its knees is exactly that, a fantasy, and a delusional one at that. But there’s a darker lesson emerging: Beijing may now have taken away from the Russian invasion of Ukraine the lesson that even a flawed invasion can succeed if the invader is prepared to absorb punishment, bleed slowly, and wait for outside support to erode. Russia has shown that autocracies can take a hit—economically, diplomatically, militarily—and keep going. Beijing may have learned that global market shocks, capital flight, and pressure on American treasuries are manageable. That in the end, it’s not about elegance or speed—it’s about who lasts longer. That logic—repugnant, cynical, and utterly real—seems to be one of the lessons Beijing is learning from the war in Ukraine.

But Taiwan is not Ukraine. It’s not a land power with vulnerable frontiers—it’s an island fortress, more than eighty miles from the Chinese mainland, across a treacherous strait that acts as both moat and shield. Geography isn’t just relevant here—it’s decisive. A cross-strait invasion would be the most complex opposed amphibious assault since 1945.

The PLA has never attempted anything remotely close to it, let alone under fire. Amphibious warfare is not an extension of China’s military tradition—it’s a logistical and doctrinal leap into the unknown. Meanwhile, Taiwan is not sitting still. It’s hardened, armed, and networked into a lattice of regional partnerships—from Japan to Australia to the Philippines. Its leadership is sober and hawkish. Its people, increasingly, know what’s at stake. A strike on Taiwan wouldn’t just trigger a regional crisis. It would be a global shock. Unlike Ukraine, the US wouldn’t have the luxury of standing at arm’s length. It would be pulled in immediately and directly.

On May 16th 2025, Montana’s 1-163rd Combined Arms Battalion hosted over a dozen British Army Soldiers of the Royal Wessex Yeomanry (RWxY) at the Limestone Hills Training Facility in a joint training event to help their armored crewmembers transition to the Challenger 3 tank which is currently in production. Training involved British armored crewmembers serving in their assigned roles on the M1A2 Abrams alongside our Montana National Guard Soldiers.

Like Ukraine, Taiwan faces a revanchist power claiming historical rights to its territory. Both are democratic, strategically vital, and symbolic in civilizational terms. But the strategic differences matter more than the surface echoes. Taiwan’s defenses are tighter, its alliances firmer, and its geography more defensible. It is already building what Ukraine had to improvise under fire: a dispersed, resilient, sensor-driven defensive grid built for asymmetric warfare. The comparisons are tempting. But they are shallow. And if war comes, it is those differences—not the analogies—that will define the outcome.

And if that distinction isn’t enough to give Xi pause, the operational nightmare of invading Taiwan should. One of the clearest takeaways from Russia’s campaign is that seizing ground is just the beginning. Holding it—against a dug-in, mobilized, and internationally supported population—is something else entirely. Putin forgot, and Clausewitz reminds us still: war is never a single, isolated act. It is always subject to “the play of chance and probability,” which exerts its own invisible discipline on even the most finely wrought plans. Beijing would need to execute simultaneous missile barrages to blind Taiwan’s defenses, achieve air superiority, and suppress counterstrikes.

Then it would have to land troops, armor, and supplies across a hostile sea and establish a beachhead before the US, Japan, or others could intervene. And even if the opening days went to plan, what then? Holding ground on an island of 23 million people who do not intend to surrender is a recipe for insurgency, sanctions, and global strategic blowback.

Geography buys Taiwan time. And time in this case is lethal—to China.

War Plans Might Fail

And let’s not forget: even the most coherent war plan is not immune to chaos. As Robert Burns put it more honestly than any modern general: “The best laid schemes of mice and men oft go awry.” What looks clean on the PowerPoint doesn’t survive first contact with enemy fire, shifting weather, logistical snags, or domestic political backlash. Beijing may believe it can script the tempo, shape the narrative, and control the outcome. That belief is not merely dangerous—it’s delusional. And the more tightly they cling to it, the more violently reality will snap them back.

But China is also absorbing more ambiguous signals. Sanctions don’t always cut deep. Propaganda can confuse. And America, though generous with arms and aid, has drawn a sharp line: no boots on the ground in Ukraine. Beijing might wager that the US would flinch again—that it would isolate Taiwan diplomatically and let it twist in the wind.

That, of course, would be a catastrophic miscalculation. The simple strategic fact of the matter is that Taiwan sits at the very core of America’s Indo-Pacific strategy. Its fall would shatter the first island chain, open the Pacific to Chinese naval projection, and shake every US alliance from Tokyo to Canberra. This isn’t about democracy or lofty ideals. It’s about hard-nosed geopolitics. If Taiwan goes, American credibility collapses. Maritime access evaporates. Forward basing options shrink. The entire deterrence and balancing structure unravels. That’s why the US won’t walk away—and why Beijing risks walking into a trap of its own making if it bets otherwise.

the USS Rodney M. Davis (FFG-60), an Oliver Hazard Perry-class guided missile frigate, was hit and sunk by anti-ship missiles.

It must also be noted that, despite being smaller than Ukraine, Taiwan is more prepared. It has adopted a so-called “porcupine” strategy, investing in drones, missiles, mines, and mobile launchers. It is digging in now, not waiting until the shooting starts. And it is doing so alongside the US, Japan, and Australia—partners who understand exactly what is at stake.

Even if Xi is willing to fight a long war, Taiwan won’t be easily subdued. And the domestic political costs to him of failure would be staggering. Putin has weathered disaster through narrative control and repression. Xi’s grip, though tight, rests on a different bargain—order, prosperity, and national resurgence. A failed invasion, a flood of body bags, a crashed economy, and global isolation would tear at that compact. The danger is that Beijing draws the wrong lesson from Ukraine: that persistence alone is enough. It isn’t. Legitimacy still matters. And legitimacy shatters faster than armies retreat.

Then there’s the nuclear question. Both Russia and China rely on the threat of escalation to cage Western response. It’s worked, to a point. But Taiwan is a far more dangerous flashpoint. US forces are already forward-deployed. A treaty binds Japan and the Philippines. A war over Taiwan wouldn’t be a proxy conflict. It would be a direct fight between nuclear-armed powers. The potential for miscalculation, spiraling escalation, and strategic catastrophe is far greater—and the margin for error far smaller.

The Ukraine Lesson for China

In the end, Ukraine doesn’t teach that war is unwinnable. It teaches that victory costs more than most regimes can afford. That friction ruins precision. That morale changes battles. That logistics trumps slogans. And that staying power only works if it doesn’t destroy you first. The real danger for Beijing is not hubris—it’s the illusion that proximity and patience will deliver what Russia failed to achieve. That’s not strategy. It’s fantasy. And fantasy gets you killed.

NRL is currently working with Naval Sea Systems Command, Naval Systems Engineering Directorate, Ship Integrity & Performance Engineering (SEA 05P) to transition the new pigment combination into a military specification. The most recent vessel to receive it was USS George Washington (CVN 73).

The real lesson is tragic, but it’s clear: wars of conquest are back. They don’t end quickly or cleanly. They sprawl. They spiral. They drag their makers into places they never planned to go. And they’re shaped—always—by Clausewitz’s third pillar: chance. No war, no matter how rational its aims, ever unfolds in a straight line.

If Xi believes he can escape Putin’s fate by striking faster or holding out longer, he might be right. But suppose he thinks seizing Taiwan will be quick, surgical, and strategically simple. In that case, he has missed the most important truth: that even the best-designed campaigns collapse when exposed to the chaos of war—and the irony of history.

History doesn’t repeat, goes Twain’s aphorism, but it sometimes rhymes. And in both Ukraine and Taiwan, the rhyme is tragic: empires overreach, defenders rise, alliances stir, and modern war shows once again that no plan survives contact with the enemy.

About the Author: Dr. Andrew Latham

Andrew Latham is a non-resident fellow at Defense Priorities and a professor of international relations and political theory at Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN. You can follow him on X: @aakatham. He writes a daily column for National Security Journal.

More Military

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nationalsecurityjournal.org · by Andrew Latham · July 29, 2025

​24. Taiwan’s Achilles’ Heel – Why the Island Should Shore Up its Energy Security and Resurrect its Nuclear Reactors

​Excerpts:

Taiwan can also learn from the U.S. example. President Donald Trump has supported a revival of civil nuclear power by signing executive orders that aim to simplify nuclear permitting and reestablish the country “as the global leader in nuclear energy.” Congress has furnished subsidies and grants to keep older nuclear plants operating. And the United States’ Nuclear Regulatory Commission has extended licenses of nearly all operating reactors from 40 years to 60 years, and in some cases, even 80 years. The U.S. technology sector is also resuscitating nuclear power to meet AI energy needs: Microsoft has signed a contract with Constellation Energy, an electric utility company, to reopen a reactor at Three Mile Island.

Taiwan could similarly restart the reactors it has closed over the past few years, including those at Maanshan and Kuosheng. Current and retired leaders of Taiwanese technology firms, such as Pegatron and United Microelectronics Company, have advocated for doing so. At the same time, the U.S. Department of Energy should hold technical talks with its Taiwanese counterparts on relicensing closed reactors, assessing seismic risks to nuclear plants, and managing spent fuel. And as the United States deploys its own third- and fourth-generation small modular reactors, which are safer and may be cheaper than earlier models, it should invite Taiwanese officials to witness the process so they can evaluate the technology’s suitability for the island.

Cooperation over energy security should go beyond the nuclear realm. The United States and Taiwan should jointly evaluate the possibility of starting new LNG export projects. They could also establish a working group, made up of people from the public and private sectors, to propose ways to speed up the development of gas storage and handle disruptions to LNG shipping.

The fate of Taiwan’s democracy may well rest in its ability to produce and store energy. If the island can stockpile more of it and resurrect its nuclear reactors, it would be in a much better position to withstand invasion or disruption. The United States should help Taiwan improve its energy security, not just for the island’s sake but for its own. Nuclear power could be key to keeping the lights on at the world’s chip factory.

Taiwan’s Achilles’ Heel

Foreign Affairs · by More by Jim Ellis · July 30, 2025

Why the Island Should Shore Up its Energy Security and Resurrect its Nuclear Reactors

July 30, 2025

A nuclear power plant in Pingtung, Taiwan, May 2025 Daniel Ceng / Getty Images

JIM ELLIS is Annenberg Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution and served 39 years in the U.S. Navy, including as Commander of the United States Strategic Command. He was CEO of the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations.

STEVEN CHU is Professor of Molecular and Cellular Physiology and of Energy Science and Engineering at Stanford University and served as U.S. Secretary of Energy from 2009 to 2013. He received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997.

• More by Steven Chu

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In May, Taiwan shuttered its last nuclear reactor, completing a process of denuclearization that had unfolded over four decades. In the mid-1980s, the island generated half its electric power from nuclear energy, an enterprise undertaken by the dictator Chiang Kai-shek in response to the oil shock of the 1970s. But once military rule ended, in 1987, antinuclear sentiment began to take hold. Taiwan’s early democratic activists feared that they could have a Chernobyl disaster of their own and associated nuclear power with Taiwan’s authoritarian past.

The 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan added to nuclear fears. In the following years, Taiwan’s government let licenses lapse for six functioning nuclear reactors—all with good track records—and halted the construction of two more. In doing so, they inadvertently undermined the island’s energy security. Today, the island imports 98 percent of its energy, in the form of oil, liquefied natural gas (LNG), and coal. This reliance on energy imports could easily be exploited, especially by China, which has its eyes on unifying with Taiwan. The Chinese navy and coast guard routinely rehearse cutting off the island’s ports, including from energy tankers.

Such a scenario would be a disaster not just for Taiwan but also for the United States. Taiwan supplies nearly all the advanced logic chips that U.S. technology firms use to power artificial intelligence. Chipmakers, both from Taiwan and elsewhere, are now trying to set up more advanced chip factories within the United States. But the trillions of dollars in capital and know-how already invested in Taiwan mean that, for the foreseeable future at least, the United States’ AI success or failure runs directly through the island.

Taiwan is, in some ways, already facing an energy crisis: Taiwan’s overtaxed electricity infrastructure is struggling to keep up with roaring AI chip production. The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company alone now uses eight percent of Taiwan’s power, almost half the amount consumed by all the island’s homes. If the United States wants to ensure it has access to the leading AI chips—and if it wants to avoid a messy geopolitical crisis in which China holds Taiwan’s energy imports captive—it should shore up Taiwan’s energy security by helping to improve its energy storage and encouraging the island to embrace nuclear power.

GRIDLOCK

Taiwan has spent years preparing for the threat of Chinese harassment. Taipei, for example, has doubled its defense spending over the past decade and now requires young men to serve a year of military service. It is surprising, then, that Taiwan has pursued energy policies that make itself so vulnerable to disruption. But the Taiwanese people, like those in many other democracies, see themselves as part of a global commons and have thought about their energy system largely through an environmental lens.

The island’s energy policy is aimed at moving away from nuclear and coal in favor of renewables and natural gas. In 2022, the government even set the ambitious goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. Such shifts were underscored by international pressure, especially from many of the U.S. companies that buy chips and other components from Taiwan; Apple, for instance, increasingly demands that local suppliers limit emissions.

Unfortunately, Taiwan’s green energy transition is faring poorly. Just 12 percent of Taiwan’s electricity mix came from renewables in 2024, falling short of the government’s intention to hit 20 percent by 2025. The culprits are varied: onerous local-content requirements, land use limitations, and broader rising costs. When it comes to construction, Taiwan is more like California than Guangdong, with many people objecting to having new energy infrastructure built in their backyards.

As a result, the island has been pushing much of its existing infrastructure to the brink. The utilization ratio for Taiwan’s two current LNG import terminals—in other words, the proportion of the facility that is used relative to its capacity—is over 90 percent, compared with 50 percent for the region’s average. That leaves Taiwan little flexibility to surge imports or repair facilities. A third terminal is set to come online this summer, but it is years behind schedule because of environmental protests.

When it comes to construction, Taiwan is more like California than Guangdong.

Adding to Taiwan’s energy insecurity is the fact that its power grid, while cost-effective, is also brittle. The grid must shift power generated in the less-populated south to demand centers in the north through three mountainous transmission lines. In normal operating conditions, the power grid’s reserve margins—that is, its buffer to generate extra electricity to meet unexpected shocks—regularly fall below ten percent, levels that would be concerning in the United States. The island struggles with blackouts, and the periodic threat of losing power stresses Taiwan’s high-tech manufacturers. For example, half of Taiwan’s chipmaking science parks faced rolling outages in May 2021.

Taiwan’s insecurity is also exacerbated by its limited capacity to store energy. The United States and Europe can, thanks to their geology, stockpile months’ worth of natural gas in depleted underground caverns, but the islands of East Asia—Japan, Korea, and Taiwan—must use tanks, which are much more costly. Taiwan’s neighbors have taken steps to address this issue. Japan, for instance, spent the past 50 years bolstering its energy security by building extensive storage and creating its own LNG tanker fleet, now the world’s largest, which both transports gas and acts as a form of floating storage. South Korea, meanwhile, maintains a 30-to-40-day supply of LNG to last through its cold winters. Taiwan, by contrast, can store enough for just ten days. With one LNG tanker unloading in a Taiwanese port every day and a half, a naval blockade, or even back-to-back typhoons, could quickly exhaust normal supplies.

In many ways, Germany serves as a useful cautionary tale for Taiwan: both closed well-functioning nuclear reactors, doubled down on a fragile natural gas import strategy, and hoped that renewables would grow fast enough to fill the gaps. In Germany’s case, it grew reliant on Russian fuel, and when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Berlin had to scramble to divest and find other sources. Taiwan, by contrast, still has time to adjust. Investments in grid resiliency and energy storage would help, as would restarting recently closed nuclear reactors.

PHONE-A-FRIEND

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the people of Taiwan have begun to understand that they must take their own security—including energy security—more seriously. They identify with Ukraine, which endures nightly assaults on its power grid. They also see that Ukraine, and Europe more broadly, has suffered economic costs because of energy disruptions. People in Taiwan seem to be changing their minds. According to a poll conducted in August 2024 by Taiwan’s CommonWealth Magazine, for example, nearly 70 percent of Taiwanese now wish to preserve nuclear power.

Yet in Taiwan’s spirited democracy, the antinuclear minority remains powerful and well organized. And there are few outside technical experts that Taiwan can turn to for advice on how to change course, in part because it is not a member of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s International Energy Agency, whose remit is to analyze and mitigate energy security risks.

Given the importance to the United States of Taiwan meeting emerging power needs, the U.S. government should step in to help Taiwan reconsider its energy options. Despite its extensive work in international energy affairs, for instance, the U.S. Department of Energy has largely ignored Taiwan because of its diplomatic status and Washington’s bureaucratic inertia. The U.S. Energy Information Administration, the agency responsible for energy statistics, last published a review of Taiwan’s energy system nine years ago. A more formal analysis of Taiwan’s energy tradeoffs, using the same sorts of sophisticated models the U.S. government uses for itself, would help Taiwan’s Energy Bureau assess risks and opportunities for changing its system.

The fate of Taiwan’s democracy may rest in its ability to produce and store energy.

Taiwan can also learn from the U.S. example. President Donald Trump has supported a revival of civil nuclear power by signing executive orders that aim to simplify nuclear permitting and reestablish the country “as the global leader in nuclear energy.” Congress has furnished subsidies and grants to keep older nuclear plants operating. And the United States’ Nuclear Regulatory Commission has extended licenses of nearly all operating reactors from 40 years to 60 years, and in some cases, even 80 years. The U.S. technology sector is also resuscitating nuclear power to meet AI energy needs: Microsoft has signed a contract with Constellation Energy, an electric utility company, to reopen a reactor at Three Mile Island.

Taiwan could similarly restart the reactors it has closed over the past few years, including those at Maanshan and Kuosheng. Current and retired leaders of Taiwanese technology firms, such as Pegatron and United Microelectronics Company, have advocated for doing so. At the same time, the U.S. Department of Energy should hold technical talks with its Taiwanese counterparts on relicensing closed reactors, assessing seismic risks to nuclear plants, and managing spent fuel. And as the United States deploys its own third- and fourth-generation small modular reactors, which are safer and may be cheaper than earlier models, it should invite Taiwanese officials to witness the process so they can evaluate the technology’s suitability for the island.

Cooperation over energy security should go beyond the nuclear realm. The United States and Taiwan should jointly evaluate the possibility of starting new LNG export projects. They could also establish a working group, made up of people from the public and private sectors, to propose ways to speed up the development of gas storage and handle disruptions to LNG shipping.

The fate of Taiwan’s democracy may well rest in its ability to produce and store energy. If the island can stockpile more of it and resurrect its nuclear reactors, it would be in a much better position to withstand invasion or disruption. The United States should help Taiwan improve its energy security, not just for the island’s sake but for its own. Nuclear power could be key to keeping the lights on at the world’s chip factory.

Foreign Affairs · by More by Jim Ellis · July 30, 2025

25. The Time Has Come for Trump’s America-First Realism

Support for Bridge Colby.

I strongly concur with the first sentence on the singular purpose (and I don't think anyone can disagree with that).

The rest is open for debate.

The Time Has Come for Trump’s America-First Realism​

Through the tireless efforts of officials like Elbridge Colby, the administration is implementing a foreign-policy paradigm that actually serves American interests.

Senator Eric Schmitt

Jul 30, 2025

12:05 AM

The American Conservative · · July 30, 2025

The singular purpose of American foreign policy should be to advance American interests.

It’s a seemingly simple and obvious statement, but it represents a significant break with the philosophy that has animated U.S. foreign policy for the past three decades.

As a senator deeply invested in our nation’s security, I’ve long argued that our leaders must embrace a new doctrine of American realism to confront the challenges of the 21st century. President Donald Trump’s “America First” approach has done just that, unapologetically putting American power—both military and diplomatic—to use in service of American interests on the world stage.

This shift in our nation’s global posture has already had a dramatic effect. Take the example of NATO. For decades, American presidents politely asked NATO allies to increase defense spending, only to be met with half-hearted responses and stagnant budgets. Dwight Eisenhower warned of a “dry well” in 1953, just four years after NATO’s founding. Lyndon Johnson pushed for burden sharing to offset American military expenses in Europe. George W. Bush pressed for greater burden-sharing during our post-9/11 wars. Barack Obama reiterated the call after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, with Defense Secretary Robert Gates bluntly warning against Europe’s “demilitarization.” Yet by 2017, only three allies had met the 2 percent GDP target agreed to in 2014.

But Trump demanded accountability and got results. By insisting that our European allies shoulder more of their own defense burden, Trump forced a long-overdue reckoning that culminated in a surge of European defense spending. At the 2025 NATO Summit, our allies committed to a new target of 5 percent of GDP on defense by 2035. European nations are now enacting significant increases in their military budgets. This shift, brought about in part by Trump’s leadership, will allow the United States to redirect as much as $100 billion annually from Europe to more pressing priorities in the Asia-Pacific.

Like it or not, Trump’s approach has bolstered transatlantic security in a way no recent president has managed. This isn’t bluster; it’s realism at work. The president is not preoccupied with what Charles Krauthammer described as “the vain promise of goo-goo one-worldism.” He does not think in terms of “liberal international norms” or Wilsonian universalism. His grand strategy is guided by real, material American interests—and he has none of his predecessors’ aversion to direct, candid, muscular assertion of those interests in dealings with our friends and foes alike. Tough love achieved what decades of diplomatic niceties could not.

But this story isn’t just about Europe, where large-scale conflict has already broken out with tragic consequences. Rather, it reflects a broader shift toward pragmatic realism in our alliances—a shift exemplified by men like Elbridge Colby.

As under secretary of defense for policy, Colby has spent the past two decades asking the hard questions that Permanent Washington has studiously avoided. His 2018 National Defense Strategy rightly identified China as our primary geopolitical threat, and his Marathon Initiative has emphasized the need for alliances grounded in clear commitments, not vague assurances. So why is the foreign policy establishment now feigning shock and outrage as he puts these principles into action?

A recent POLITICO piece, featuring numerous unnamed “sources” from inside or close to the administration, took Colby to task for his challenge to the reigning foreign policy consensus. One source bitterly remarked, “He has basically decided that he’s going to be the intellectual driving force behind a kind of neo-isolationism that believes that the United States should act more alone, that allies and friends are kind of encumbering.”

Colby’s realist approach is far from “neo-isolationism,” but it does stand in stark contrast to the Wilsonian idealism that has dominated our foreign policy elite for too long. Idealists have wagered American blood and treasure on the supposed goodwill of other nations, prioritizing international summits and diplomatic pageantry over hard-nosed strategy. They’ve spent years at Davos and the global security conferences building relationships that look good on paper but crumble under pressure. Meanwhile, before 2020, U.S. taxpayers covered roughly 70 percent of NATO’s defense spending; our Indo-Pacific partners were left with ambiguous roles, inviting miscalculation from adversaries like Beijing.

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Colby’s strategy is working. Australia is trending toward 3.5 percent of GDP in defense spending. Japan has approved a record-high defense budget of nearly $59 billion. Taiwan has boosted its budget by 8.5 percent amid escalating Chinese military exercises. The June 2025 naval tensions in the South China Sea underscore the urgency: Deterrence requires clarity, not cocktail-hour platitudes. By hardening our alliances now, Colby is attempting to prevent conflict, not courting it. Realism, grounded in national interest and the logic of deterrence, outperforms idealism’s wishful thinking every time.

The foreign policy establishment’s failure to ask these questions earlier reveals their priorities: galas over strategy, pageantry over preparedness. It’s time to move beyond that. A leaner U.S. presence in Europe, paired with a fortified Indo-Pacific coalition, sends the right signal to our adversaries. I commend Colby for leading this effort and urge my colleagues to embrace this pragmatic path.

The next war won’t be averted by toasts or speeches. It must be deterred by strength, resolve, and accountability. As Europe finally steps up and Asia braces for the long competition ahead, let’s ensure America’s foreign policy serves our people first. That is the legacy of Trump and Colby—a legacy we must secure.

The American Conservative · by Andrew Day · July 30, 2025

26.

What Kind of Great Power Will India Be? – Debating New Delhi’s Grand Strategy

​Excerpts:

Fortunately, there is a path forward, but it requires India to reconsider some elements of its grand strategy, especially its habit of running with the hares while hunting with the hounds. Great powers are marked by their capacity to make painful choices—great-power wannabes have to make tough choices, too. Attempting to constantly walk a tightrope because, in Rao’s words, it “may be the only stable ground” works only as long as the rope holds.

It should be consoling to New Delhi that a special relationship with Washington does not require an alliance centered on collective defense. Curtis emphasizes that a sturdy commitment to the Quad is itself a worthwhile first step. Yet India continues to object to what it calls the “securitization” of this coalition even though the United States and its partners are struggling to balance China militarily. It may well be that a long-term solution lies in constructing “a collective defense pact in Asia,” as Ely Ratner has argued recently in these pages. After all, if military balancing fails, little else that the Quad and others do matters very much.

But until such an Asian mutual assistance system can be institutionalized, India can work seriously with the United States to implement a strategy focused on cooperative defense aimed at checking Chinese aggression, dealing with crises, and preventing wars. Unfortunately, today, for all the transformations in the bilateral relationship during the last few decades, India is still reluctant to embark on such a course, leaving itself highly vulnerable to China.

What Kind of Great Power Will India Be?

Foreign Affairs · by Nirupama Rao; Dhruva Jaishankar; Lisa Curtis; Ashley J. Tellis · July 30, 2025

Response

Debating New Delhi’s Grand Strategy

July 30, 2025

At a rally in support of the Indian military, following the ceasefire between India and Pakistan, in New Delhi, May 2025 Priyanshu Singh / Reuters

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The Liminal Power

Nirupama Rao

Ashley Tellis’s recent essay, “India’s Great-Power Delusions” (July/August 2025), offers a searing critique of the country’s strategic posture. Tellis argues that India overestimates its influence on the world stage while lacking the economic heft, military capacity, and alliances to back its great-power ambitions. He warns that India’s attachment to strategic autonomy and multipolarity risks making the country irrelevant in an era of intensifying bipolarity, when the competition between China and the United States will shape geopolitics.

This thesis is well supported by observable gaps in India’s capabilities, but it flattens the rationale behind New Delhi’s foreign policy orientation. A more nuanced critique would require understanding India not as a delusional power but as a liminal one—a state standing on a geopolitical threshold, deliberately navigating ambiguity to preserve flexibility and autonomy in a global order that is not simply cleaving in two but fracturing in more complicated ways.

India’s foreign policy is best understood through the lens of liminality, the condition of existing between worlds rather than in a fixed role or within a bloc. India is not a classic great power, but neither is it merely a regional actor. It is a titan in chrysalis, whose $4.1 trillion economy, rapidly expanding defense capacity, and influence among many countries of the so-called global South signal not delusion, but a conscious avoidance of rigid alignments. Tellis sees India’s pursuit of multipolarity as a strategic liability. Instead, it is a form of adaptive realism, an intentional pivoting strategy necessitated by geography, history, and structural constraints in the international system.

The Logic of Being In Between

India’s geography alone justifies this cautious balancing act. Flanked by two nuclear adversaries—China to the north and Pakistan to the west—India cannot afford to align too closely with the United States without becoming more vulnerable to entanglement in great-power conflicts or retaliation from regional adversaries. Its borders are not buffered by oceans, as is the case for the United States; instead, they are live fault lines. This reality mandates engagement with rivals, particularly China. India’s relationship with China is a watchful one, marked by both détente and deterrence, a formula that seeks to manage competition without inviting conflict.

Tellis is correct in observing that India’s military capabilities, while expanding, do not yet provide it with an edge in deterring China. Nor does India currently project force beyond its near seas. What he underestimates, however, is India’s strategy of “distributed leverage”: a mix of defense modernization, diversified procurement, and regional engagement. India is not standing still; it is moving forward, not by mirroring great powers, but by leveraging minilateralism—smaller-scale collaborations between a few countries—and issue-based coalitions. These include the security partnership known as the Quad, featuring Australia, India, Japan, and the United States; the I2U2 partnership with Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States; and a trilateral initiative with France and the UAE. Such groupings are not substitutes for alliances but alternatives that provide security dividends without sacrificing India’s autonomy. This is not delusion. It offers a strategic architecture in tune with liminality.

Tellis also critiques India’s aversion to formal alliances, suggesting that strategic autonomy leaves New Delhi without reliable partners in a crisis. Here, too, context matters. India’s foreign policy carries the legacy of its postcolonial and Cold War experiences, particularly its ability to maintain autonomy amid competing superpower pressures. Its desire for multipolarity today is not naive, but a reflection of the global system’s changing structure. The U.S.-Chinese binary may define global military competition, but it does not exclusively determine the ideological commitments and economic priorities of governments around the world. India’s preference for flexible engagement resonates with this broader reality and positions it as a pivotal power—one that connects blocs rather than conforms to them.

Indeed, India’s strength lies in its role as a bridge, not a battering ram; it pursues consensus-building and reform from within the system rather than forceful transformation. Its leadership in the global South, exemplified by its push to bring the African Union into the G-20 in 2023 and its climate finance pledges, suggests a form of moral and institutional leadership that transcends conventional military metrics. India is not trying to dominate the world order—it is trying to reshape it from within by leading a coalition of middle and rising powers that are uncomfortable with both Chinese authoritarianism and Western paternalism. That strategy may be imperfect, but it is not incoherent.

Patience, Not Alignment

In economic terms, Tellis is right that India’s per capita GDP, infrastructure bottlenecks, and trade protectionism constrain its rise. But the trajectory matters. India’s recent gains in semiconductor production, its fast-growing digital infrastructure (such as India Stack, a platform providing the entire Indian population with essential digital services that handle identity information, personal data, and payments), and a projected $10 trillion GDP by 2040 point to a transformation in progress. Like the United States, which remained largely agrarian until the mid-nineteenth century and then transitioned during a period of rapid and significant industrialization to become an assertive global power in the late nineteenth century, India is building the institutional and material base for a more decisive role in the international order. Until then, strategic patience—not alignment—is its rational choice.

Tellis’s warning that India may not be able to shape the international order unless it chooses sides presumes a binary that India and many other countries reject. In a world increasingly defined by fragmentation rather than consolidation, the ability to adapt may be a greater asset than any fixed alignment. India’s tightrope walk is not a refusal to grow up—it is a recognition that in today’s world, the tightrope itself may be the only stable ground. In this light, liminality is not a symptom of underperformance; it is a form of power.

Tellis valuably points to gaps between India’s ambitions and its capabilities and the risks of overconfidence in New Delhi. But India is not deluded about its power—it is deeply aware of its constraints and is crafting a foreign policy to match. Rather than misreading its liminality as indecision, he should see it as purposeful and as a refusal to be cast in the mold of great powers past. India’s moment of full assertion may still lie ahead, but its ability to bend without breaking, to engage without surrender, is not a sign of strategic failure. It may, in fact, be India’s greatest strength.

NIRUPAMA RAO was India’s Foreign Secretary from 2009 to 2011. She also served as India’s Ambassador to China and the United States. She is the author of The Fractured Himalaya: India, Tibet, China, 1949–1962.

The Nimble Power

Dhruva Jaishankar

Tellis argues that India’s grand strategy misreads the international environment, that New Delhi is misguided in striving for multipolarity, and that it is short-sighted in its aversion to an alliance with the United States and its preference for strategic autonomy. These assertions mischaracterize India’s objectives and priorities and neglect to mention efforts by successive Indian governments that more accurately reflect India’s approach to international affairs. More surprisingly, Tellis sidesteps the fact that it is the United States that is today reluctant to engage in alliance-like commitments, not just with India but with most of its long-standing treaty allies. Washington is reconsidering the terms of its security guarantees in Europe, troop levels in South Korea, defense contributions to Japan, and the transfer of submarine technologies to Australia. Unlike many other partners in Asia or the Middle East, India does not seek aid, bases, or troops from the United States. Indeed, as U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Elbridge Colby wrote last September, “India is an ally in the old sense—to be regarded as an independent and autonomous partner. We need more of that kind of [ally], rather than dependencies.”

In many respects, Tellis is harking back to a world that no longer exists. The era of the United States overseeing a unipolar order is over. To be sure, the United States remains the world’s preeminent power, with its share of the global economy remaining steady at around 26 percent from 1991 to today. But Washington is now keen on resetting the terms of globalization and renegotiating its commitments in Europe and Asia. China, which now accounts for 17 percent of the global economy, has become a near peer competitor to the United States, and the two countries’ competition is playing out in virtually every domain. Despite noteworthy defense production increases in Europe, most advanced industrial economies are struggling with aging and declining populations, discord over immigration, strains to welfare systems, slowing innovation, and military dependence on the United States. Apart from the United States, the six other members of the G-7 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom) have seen their share of the global economy contract from 42 percent to 18 percent since 1991. Russia’s robust military operations in Ukraine and war-propelled economy belie the country’s frailties and a growing dependence on China. The world is witnessing a more contested Indo-Pacific, a more violent Middle East with several capable regional powers, and a multitude of countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America coming into their own.

A Strategy for the World as It Is

This is the global landscape that India will have to navigate as it rises. Since 1991, India has more than tripled its share of the global economy, to four percent, and is on track to become the third-largest economy by the end of the decade, albeit still far behind the United States and China for the near future. It has a relatively young and large workforce, even as total fertility has begun to fall below replacement levels. India’s geopolitical environment, although shifting and uncertain, is far more favorable than what it contended with in the past, when it had to deal with the partition of the subcontinent, dependence on Western powers for aid, internal separatist conflicts, and major wars without the benefits of food security, a nuclear deterrent, or global market access. Except for China and Pakistan, with which it has significant territorial disputes, India has largely cooperative partnerships with most major countries and regions, including Japan, Russia, the United States, Europe, and the countries of the developing world.

Nonetheless, challenges abound. With China, India faces a compound threat that includes a disputed and militarized border; an unsustainable trade deficit; intensifying competition in the Indian subcontinent and Indian Ocean region; broad Chinese military and diplomatic support for Pakistan; and resolute opposition at multilateral institutions, including the UN Security Council. From Pakistan, India continues to confront state-backed terrorism under the protection of Islamabad’s nuclear umbrella. Other recent developments have also shaped Indian decision-making. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed vulnerabilities in the country’s health supply chains. The 2020 border clashes with China underscored the importance of establishing greater economic independence from Beijing. The war in Ukraine highlighted India’s supply chain constraints when it came to defense production and energy and food security. These challenges have inspired determination—and purposeful action.

To address these issues, India has embarked on a strategy of domestic production and diversification intended to strengthen its security, improve its population’s prosperity and well-being, and advance critical national interests. It has redoubled defense industrialization efforts, resulting in an increase from almost negligible amounts to $2.5 billion in defense exports, including to countries such as Armenia and the Philippines. Its largest export destination for defense items is, in fact, the United States. India has also rolled out an industrial policy that includes almost $50 billion in subsidies and state-backed financing for the manufacturing and development of critical and emerging technologies. This has begun to reap dividends in the export of electronics and aerospace components, although other critical sectors, such as electric vehicle batteries, could prove more difficult to develop.

In its diplomacy, India has reprioritized its near neighborhood, extending financial, developmental, and trading benefits to other South Asian countries and revitalizing more productive regional institutions. It has attempted to counter Pakistan’s support for terrorism through both military means—by striking terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan—and nonmilitary means, such as suspending trade and water privileges. India has broadened economic, security, and connectivity cooperation with the Middle East, particularly with Israel and the Gulf Arab states, including as part of the new economic initiative known as the India–Middle East–Europe Economic Corridor. It has been working to preserve a balance of power in the Indo-Pacific by deepening security and diplomatic cooperation, bilaterally and through organizations, with other regional powers. And it seeks to advance its global governance objectives by attempting to revitalize multilateral bodies such as the United Nations, build new institutions such as the International Solar Alliance, and engage the countries of the global South on shared priorities such as the reform of global institutions and food, health, climate, and energy security. These are the outlines of India’s major international activities over the past decade or more.

The Necessity of Autonomy

In most instances, these undertakings complement U.S. objectives. The three Indian prime ministers who have governed the country since 1998 have made strenuous efforts to deepen cooperation with the United States. The U.S.-Indian partnership now extends to most domains of international policy, from energy and technology to defense and trade. India’s other closest global partners, apart from Russia, are all traditional U.S. allies, including Australia, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the European Union. The concern now is not diffidence in New Delhi, but diffidence in Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump has made it clear that in a world of “America first,” everyone is in it for themselves. Despite the broadening and deepening U.S.-Indian partnership, strategic autonomy is today both a necessity and an advantage for India.

Similarly, multipolarity is a natural aspiration for an India seeking to advance its own interests in a contested world. Indian policymakers see no viable alternatives: the world is not reverting to a unipolar world order led by the United States; an alliance is not on offer in a bipolar world of competing American and Chinese blocs; and a bipolar condominium of China and the United States would marginalize India. Multipolarity should also not be mistaken for a “partnerships with all states but privileged relationships with none,” as Tellis has characterized it. It means having privileged relationships with many as part of necessary diversification. India’s current priorities are evident in its flurry of recent activities and agreements, including joining the U.S.-backed Artemis Accords (regarding space exploration) and the Minerals Security Partnership (regarding critical minerals supply chains) in 2023 and concluding or advancing trade agreements with the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union this year. This is a grand strategy based not on wishful thinking but on a pragmatic reading of the evolving international order.

DHRUVA JAISHANKAR is Executive Director of the Observer Research Foundation America and the author of Vishwa Shastra: India and the World.

The Quad Power

Lisa Curtis

As Tellis makes clear, India’s long-held strategy of promoting a multipolar world order has become counterproductive for New Delhi. The concept of a multipolar order is seductive to Indian policymakers, who think India would have more influence if global power were dispersed. Such calculations may have made sense 25 years ago, when India, with its rapid economic growth, seemed poised to challenge China’s influence in Asia. In the last two decades, however, China has widened the power gap with India considerably, in economic as well as military terms. That deficit means that India’s vision of a multipolar order, in which power is evenly distributed among a handful of countries, is no longer realistic. Worse, seeking such an order now plays directly into China’s hands. China and Russia both push for a multipolar world to overturn international norms and institutions that have largely kept the peace in the Indo-Pacific for the last 50 years. Far from aiding India’s rise, multipolarity would only confirm Chinese hegemony in Asia and make India more vulnerable to Chinese aggression.

A shrewder policy would have India reaffirm the importance of the U.S.-led rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific region. Despite the growing economic gap between India and China, New Delhi can still play an important role in shaping geopolitical trends and acting as a counterweight to Beijing. The principal way India can both fend off China and ensure stability in its neighborhood is through the existing Indo-Pacific partnership known as the Quad.

Four the Win

The Quad, which consists of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, was first mooted in 2007 but then was brought to life in 2017 during the first Trump administration to encourage greater cooperation in dealing with the challenges of a rising China. It has since become critical to the security and stability of the Indo-Pacific as the partnership strives to maintain a free and open region in which countries are not subject to Chinese coercion. India must continue to invest in building the partnership by helping fund the Quad’s economic initiatives and by becoming more willing to support the Quad’s security-related activities, especially those that aim to ensure freedom of navigation in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea. New Delhi need not sacrifice its strategic autonomy to work closely with the Quad, but it should give the Quad pride of place in its foreign policy and deepen strategic and security ties with all three participating countries.

Notwithstanding its disruptions to the global trading system and lack of clarity on support for European security, the Trump administration is committed to advancing the Quad as a centerpiece of its Indo-Pacific strategy. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s decision to hold a meeting of Quad foreign ministers on his first day on the job sent a signal to China about the administration’s willingness to work with allies and partners to meet challenges in Asia. In July, the Quad foreign ministers held another meeting, in which they announced initiatives to secure and diversify critical minerals supply chains, improve cooperation on maritime law enforcement, mobilize government and private investment for port infrastructure projects, strengthen policies and regulations regarding undersea cables, and plan for global health emergencies.

India has warmed up to the Quad during the last five years, especially following the 2020 border clashes with China. It is still reluctant to advance the Quad’s military activities, and, unlike Australia and Japan, is not an alliance partner of the United States. But it should do more. The connections that run through India bridge the Indian and Pacific Oceans. New Delhi also brings economic weight and regional credibility to the partnership. The Quad’s other members should acknowledge that India feels vulnerable to China because of their ongoing border dispute; New Delhi therefore does not want the Quad to become anything that resembles a security pact. Still, the Quad can quietly engage in crisis contingency planning, as well as strengthen maritime security initiatives, which will help check China’s ambitions in the disputed waters of the South China Sea and elsewhere. The Quad-at-Sea Ship Observer Mission that recently sailed from Palau to Guam is an example of how the four countries can work together to check unlawful and aggressive maritime activities.

India’s Best Bet

India would have a better chance of achieving its great power ambitions if it shed its attachment to the illusion that a multipolar world order would better accommodate its rise. Indian policymakers must recognize that a multipolar world order simply means the rise of China and Russia at the expense of U.S. global influence and power. Rather than supporting this process, or standing by as it unfolds, India should help the United States thwart it. The best way for India to make up for its failure to keep pace with China’s economic growth and military might is to commit more fully to a rules-based order that it can help shape but is unlikely to lead. This means getting closer to the United States and investing heavily in the Quad.

LISA CURTIS is Director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. She served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for South and Central Asia at the U.S. National Security Council from 2017 to 2021.

Tellis Replies

In “India’s Great-Power Delusions,” I contend that India has made significant moves toward becoming a great power since the acceleration of its economic growth after reforms in 1991. Yet this performance has failed to match China’s post-reform record, ensuring that when both countries reach their respective centenaries as modern states around the middle of the century, New Delhi will still be substantially weaker than Beijing. Since the United States, even with conservative assumptions and despite its current dysfunction, will tower over both Asian giants, the case for New Delhi cementing a privileged partnership with Washington to balance Chinese power is compelling. New Delhi’s obsession with pursuing multiple strategic alignments to realize global multipolarity, however, undermines the forging of such a compact with the United States that would improve India’s security and elevate its status over the coming decades.

Consequently, Dhruva Jaishankar’s claim that I sidestep “the fact that it is the United States that is today reluctant to engage in alliance-like commitments, not just with India but with most of its long-standing treaty allies” may reflect a simple misunderstanding. My article focuses on the long-term trajectory of Indian and Chinese power and its resulting predicaments for New Delhi. U.S. President Donald Trump is, for the time being, certainly disdainful of U.S. alliances and partnerships. But this is his last term, and the challenges I highlighted for both India and the United States will survive Trump. Furthermore—and simply as a matter of fact—in the twenty-first century, successive U.S. administrations since that of President George W. Bush, including Trump’s first one, have sought an alliance-like relationship with India. Yet it is New Delhi that has invariably demurred for reasons that are understandable but not always defensible, especially when Indian policymakers should be concerned about the future balance of power in Asia.

Which leaves the question of what India should do still unanswered. Here, Nirupama Rao responds that India, “a titan in chrysalis,” cannot wed itself to any single great power, owing to its history and its ambitions. Rather, it must navigate “ambiguity to preserve flexibility and autonomy in a global order that is not simply cleaving in two but fracturing in more complicated ways.” But China has risen as a hostile superpower right on India’s doorstep, and India cannot protect itself by relying on either international institutions or its own resources. India, indeed, may be a titan in chrysalis, but it faces a pugnacious behemoth that it cannot deter on its own. This alone should inexorably propel New Delhi to consummate a new geopolitical alignment with Washington because the latter, too, is threatened by Beijing, albeit for different reasons and in different ways.

Rao defends India’s aversion to such a consummation by declaring that the country “cannot afford to align too closely with the United States without becoming more vulnerable to entanglement in great-power conflicts or retaliation from regional adversaries” and, as such, “seeks to manage competition without inviting conflict.” Although these fears are understandable, Rao’s contention glides over the fact that China (together with Pakistan) is already embroiled in active hostilities against India, threatening its frontiers, undermining its economic growth, and boxing it within the subcontinent. What New Delhi needs, therefore, is deterrence. The “security dividends” that Rao says may come from India’s economic and technological growth and its multiple foreign partnerships will not keep China at bay; only a clear geopolitical convergence that produces new forms of cooperative defense with the United States will allow India to stave off Chinese aggression.

And, yes, Washington remains both capable and interested—Trump’s current inhibitions notwithstanding—in exploring such an arrangement. Because U.S.-Chinese competition will outlast Trump’s presidency and will persist even if Trumpism survives his departure from office, future nationalist U.S. administrations will inevitably gravitate toward coalition strategies to neutralize Beijing. The United States, now and in the future, is still India’s best hope for successfully parrying China.

Above All Others

Jaishankar counters this argument in the first instance by describing India’s myriad efforts to modernize its economy and defense base and diversify its international partnerships. As impressive as these may be, they do not compare to China’s achievements. And that is precisely the point: India cannot balance China either on the strength of its own undertakings or in collaboration with other strategic partners—save the United States. Jaishankar then argues that New Delhi is already collaborating with Washington in historically unprecedented ways, pointing to the numerous current initiatives as proof.

But this story misses my underlying critique. Because India, even as it deepens its relationship with Washington, pursues, in Jaishankar’s words, “privileged relationships with many”—including with other U.S. competitors—the United States is inhibited from supporting India fully. Although Washington has declared its intention to treat New Delhi on par with its allies, the history of the last quarter century demonstrates that there are thresholds regarding political support, technology transfers, and intelligence sharing, for instance, that the United States simply will not cross because India often cavorts with American adversaries. Highlighting the many schemes that Washington and New Delhi have unveiled as part of their tongue-twisting declaration of a “Comprehensive Global and Strategic Partnership” ignores the fact that the United States is reluctant, and will justifiably continue to be reluctant, to aid India as long as New Delhi does not prize Washington as a select partner above all others.

Lisa Curtis drives this point home penetratingly when she observes that India’s desire to create “a multipolar world order simply means the rise of China and Russia at the expense of U.S. global influence and power.” Washington will not stand by mutely as India pursues such a policy. And Indian policymakers, being arch realists, should not expect the United States to support their country as they advance this goal. India cannot expect to come out ahead in its competition with China when the United States is inhibited in supporting New Delhi because many Indian policies run counter to American interests.

The Hares and the Hounds

Fortunately, there is a path forward, but it requires India to reconsider some elements of its grand strategy, especially its habit of running with the hares while hunting with the hounds. Great powers are marked by their capacity to make painful choices—great-power wannabes have to make tough choices, too. Attempting to constantly walk a tightrope because, in Rao’s words, it “may be the only stable ground” works only as long as the rope holds.

It should be consoling to New Delhi that a special relationship with Washington does not require an alliance centered on collective defense. Curtis emphasizes that a sturdy commitment to the Quad is itself a worthwhile first step. Yet India continues to object to what it calls the “securitization” of this coalition even though the United States and its partners are struggling to balance China militarily. It may well be that a long-term solution lies in constructing “a collective defense pact in Asia,” as Ely Ratner has argued recently in these pages. After all, if military balancing fails, little else that the Quad and others do matters very much.

But until such an Asian mutual assistance system can be institutionalized, India can work seriously with the United States to implement a strategy focused on cooperative defense aimed at checking Chinese aggression, dealing with crises, and preventing wars. Unfortunately, today, for all the transformations in the bilateral relationship during the last few decades, India is still reluctant to embark on such a course, leaving itself highly vulnerable to China.

Foreign Affairs · by Nirupama Rao; Dhruva Jaishankar; Lisa Curtis; Ashley J. Tellis · July 30, 2025

27. Army, Marine Corps, Navy have no plan to stop using M18, M17 pistols

Army, Marine Corps, Navy have no plan to stop using M18, M17 pistols

While some units in the Air Force have pulled the M18 from duty after a discharge killed an airmen last week, officials from the other services said they have no plans to modify or pause use of the pistol.

Patty Nieberg

Jul 29, 2025 4:55 PM EDT

taskandpurpose.com · by Patty Nieberg

The Army, Navy and Marine Corps are not planning to pause use of the M18 pistol as a primary, daily service sidearm for their troops, the services told Task & Purpose, even as units in the Air Force pull the weapon from service after an airman was killed when his M18 discharged last week.

The M18 pistol is produced by Sig Sauer as a military version of the company’s P320, a model that has drawn lawsuits and attention in recent years after incidents where users alleged that the gun fired on its own. In military usage, a law enforcement training agency in Washington recently chronicled at least six possible unintentional discharges on or associated with military bases involving the M18 or M17, a slightly larger version of the handgun.

Concerns about the handgun were heightened last week when Airman Brayden Lovan, 21, was killed when his M18 discharged at F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyoming, according to Air Force officials. The circumstances around how the weapon fired are under investigation. Lovan was a security forces airman assigned to the 90th Security Forces Squadron, a role that required him to regularly carry a sidearm.

In the wake of Lovan’s death, officials with Air Force Global Strike Command, which oversees most units at F.E. Warren, temporarily paused use of the M18 across the command, pending an investigation for “immediate safety concerns.” Since that announcement, several units under Air Combat Command, the service’s largest major component, have also stopped using the M18, though not the entire command. The Air Combat Command pause was first reported by The War Zone.

An airman fires a Sig Sauer P320-M18 handgun Sept. 24, 2021. Air National Guard photo by Senior Airman Hunter Hires.

Charles Hoffman, spokesperson for the Air Force Global Strike Command’s safety office, told Task & Purpose that during the pause, Air Force security forces will carry the M4 rifle. Global Strike Command has just over 27,000 active duty airmen — less than 9% of the entire active duty Air Force — but duty weapons are relatively common in its units. The command oversees all of the service’s nuclear weapons and the missiles and bombers tasked with delivering them. As such, armed personnel are a constant presence on Global Strike Command installations, and the command is infamous for its intense focus on security and safety issues.

“Sig has offered and will continue to offer any and all assistance necessary to the USAF’s investigation of the F.E. Warren incident,” Phil Strader, vice president of consumer affairs for Sig Sauer, told Task & Purpose in a statement.

Design used in all military branches

The M17, a full-size variant of the pistol, and the M18, a compact version, have been the military’s standard pistols issued to active and reserve troops for most of this decade, replacing the legacy M9 used since the 1980s. The two guns share firing components and vary mainly by the length of the barrel.

The Air Force announced in 2020 that all of its combat arms units would receive the M18, citing a “more consistent trigger pull” and adjustable grips for different hand sizes.

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The Air Force owns close to 75% of the military’s inventory of roughly 165,000 M18 pistols, according to data provided by the Army, Marine Corps, Air Force and procurement documents from the Navy. Exact numbers of M17s currently in use were not immediately available. The Army and Marine Corps indicated in testing and evaluation documents that they intended to buy several hundred thousand of the handguns. A January 2017 contract announcement included a $580 million contract with Sig Sauer to replace the Army’s M9 by 2027.

Officials from the Army, Navy and Marine Corps told Task & Purpose that those services have no plans to pause use of the weapons.

“We have not seen any evidence that indicates design or manufacturing issues are present,” Meghan Stoltzfus, a Marine Corps spokesperson, said in a statement to Task & Purpose. She added that the M18 was “rigorously tested” to Department of Defense standards and “subject to extensive lot acceptance testing” with oversight by the Defense Contract Management Agency, Army and Marine Corps.

Discharge issue discovered during Army testing

The Department of Defense discovered unexpected discharge issues with the Sig Sauer handgun when the Army began operational testing for the M18 almost a decade ago. The service found that during drop testing with an empty primed cartridge inserted, the gun’s striker struck the round’s primer and caused a discharge. Army officials directed the company to correct the problem by implementing lightweight components in the trigger mechanism, according to a fiscal year 2017 operational test and evaluation report.

Follow-on testing “validated” that the change “corrected the deficiency and the pistol no longer fired when dropped,” the report stated, adding that the new version with the changes was submitted for production.

Sig Sauer conceded the early issues with the Army pistol, noting that testing “above and beyond” national, state, global military and law enforcement standards found that “after multiple drops, at certain angles and conditions, a potential discharge of the firearm may result when dropped.”

Strader said the M17 and M18 pistols are required to be equipped with a manual thumb safety, which is an option for commercial P320s.

“With that said, regarding the lawsuits around this platform, no one, including our engineers and the plaintiff’s experts, have been able to replicate or prove a P320 can be fired by any method besides a trigger pull,” Strader said.

Lawsuits and law enforcement inquiries

The civilian version of the M18, the P320, has seen issues pop up in recent years, some of which have led to multi-million dollar lawsuits and decisions by local police departments to stop using the pistol. In November 2024, a Philadelphia jury awarded an Army veteran $11 million after his holstered Sig Sauer pistol went off while he was going down the stairs and caused a serious leg injury.

In June, Sig Sauer filed a lawsuit in Washington asking a state judge to reverse the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission’s decision to ban police recruits from carrying the P320. The commission’s working group of local law enforcement, training staff, and firearms instructors released a report in February on their decision to temporarily ban its use by police recruits.

In their report, the Washington commission cited six incidents since 2021 with “uncommanded” discharges involving the M17 and M18. The M18 incidents were:

• In 2023, a Japanese security guard at Camp Foster, Okinawa, “rested their right hand lightly on the rotating cover of a weapon holster” when their M18 discharged.
• Also in 2023, at Camp Pendleton, California, an officer in the armory stopped at a clearing barrel to empty their M18. The officer pulled the pistol out of the holster while it was on safe and removed the magazine. A round discharged from the M18 into the clearing barrel. The officer was “sure that they never touched the trigger of the M18,” and had “ample weapons handling training,” according to the report.
• In 2022, a service member was preparing for his shift at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, when his M18 discharged at his home. He was taken to the hospital for a penetrating gunshot wound with the bullet still “lodged in his knee,” according to the incident report.

With the M17, previous incidents included:

• A military police soldier at Fort Eustis, Virginia, in 2023 injured his foot after his pistol “inadvertently discharged” after making contact with another officer’s gun holster.
• The gun of an Army civilian attending a law enforcement course in 2020 at Leesville Police Range in Louisiana discharged while he drew the pistol from his holster.
• A service member attempting to holster his pistol in 2021 fired a round through his foot at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

Sig Sauer announced in 2020 it would offer free P320 upgrades that “improve its safety, reliability and overall performance.” The changes reduced the weight of the gun’s trigger, sear, and striker and added a mechanical disconnector, according to Sig Sauer’s website on the program. The company states that “minimal reported drop-related P320 incidents have occurred” in U.S. commercial and law enforcement markets in situations “that appear to be outside of normal testing protocols.”

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Patty Nieberg

Senior Staff Writer

Patty is a senior staff writer for Task & Purpose. She’s reported on the military for five years, embedding with the National Guard during a hurricane and covering Guantanamo Bay legal proceedings for an alleged al Qaeda commander.

taskandpurpose.com · by Patty Nieberg

28. 'Taking back what is theirs' — Ukrainian special forces successfully raid Russian-occupied island in Black Sea

'Taking back what is theirs' — Ukrainian special forces successfully raid Russian-occupied island in Black Sea

https://kyivindependent.com/taking-back-what-is-theirs-ukrainian-special-forces-successfully-raid-russian-occupied-island-in-black-sea/

July 29, 2025 11:04 pm

• 2 min read

by Abbey Fenbert

A boat carries Ukrainian special forces conducting a raid on the Russian-occupied Tendra Spit in the Black Sea on July 28, 2025. (Screenshot / HUR / Telegram)

Listen to this article2 min

This audio is created with AI assistance

Ukrainian special forces destroyed Russian weaponry and personnel during a combat operation on the Tendra Spit, an island off the coast of the occupied area of Kherson Oblast, Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) reported on July 29.

Tendra Spit is a shoal or a narrow island in the northern Black Sea southwest of the Russian-occupied Ukrainian mainland in Kherson Oblast.

"On the night of July 28, reconnaissance troops landed on the Tendra Spit and eliminated the position of the occupying forces along with personnel," HUR said in a Telegram post.

Ukrainian forces also destroyed a Russian "Zont" electronic warfare complex and "Rosa" radar station, according to HUR. The agency did not provide details as to Russian personnel losses.

HUR described the operation as a "daring landing" and said Ukraine sustained no losses during the raid. The Ukrainian flag was flown over the island.

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Video footage showing the planning and implementation of a Ukrainian combat operation on the Russian-occupied Tendra Spit conducted July 28, 2025. (HUR / Telegram)

The agency published a video illustrating the planning and implementation of the Tendra Spit operation.

"Now we are here, on our Ukrainian land," an operative is heard saying after successfully landing on the island.

"Ukrainians are returning and taking back what is theirs."

The operation was supported by partners and donors involved in "Boats for HUR," a project of the Diana Podolyanychuk Charitable Foundation, HUR said. The agency reported that new vessels provided through the project allowed Ukrainian special forces to "operate where they are not expected."

HUR previously carried out a raid on Tendra Spit in August 2024, destroying Russian armored vehicles, electronic warfare systems, and fortifications.

Trump says Russia tariffs will be imposed in 10 days

UkraineRussiaUkraine's military intelligenceBlack Seaoccupied Ukrainian territoriesRussian losses

Abbey Fenbert

Senior News Editor

Abbey Fenbert is a senior news editor at the Kyiv Independent. She is a freelance writer, editor, and playwright with an MFA from Boston University. Abbey served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Ukraine from 2008-2011.Read more

29. The Intoku Code: Delta Forces’ Intelligence Officer-Doing Good in Secret by Wade Ishimoto Reviewed by Professor Nancy E. Blacker

​An excellent book by a great American. Wade Isimoto is one of America's great unsung heroes. We can all learn from him (and fortunately many of us still do- his wise counsel is still sought by senior leaders).

Excerpt:

After the turmoil of Eagle Claw, Ishimoto goes “back to business,” as Chapter 15 is titled. He offers captivating insights into domestic incidents (e.g., the Branch Davidians) and international ones (e.g., the Khobar Towers bombing). He also lent his expertise to senior civilian leaders at the Pentagon and in the corporate sector. By the time readers finish this book, they will feel fortunate to have learned from Ishimoto’s deep well of expertise, knowledge, and warrior ethos. If I have one critique, it’s that the book may include too many names and details of people and places. While it is accessible to a general audience, readers who have served in the military or grown up in a military environment may find deeper resonance with its stories. Impatient readers might find the density of references overwhelming. That said, this is a fascinating, insightful, and important account of history as it happened. More than that, it offers a code to live by—and what could be better than that?

The Intoku Code: Delta Forces’ Intelligence Officer-Doing Good in Secret by Wade Ishimoto Reviewed by Professor Nancy E. Blacker

interpopulum.org · by ByProfessor Nancy E. Blacker · July 11, 2025

ISIN 1636244696, Casemate, October 2024, 545 pages, $14.40 (hardcover)

Wade Ishimoto’s book, The Intoku Code, is chock-full of stories from his fascinating career of selfless service. The book shares his watchword, “Intoku,” which he describes as “Japanese for doing good in secret.” His main message shines through each chapter, illustrated by people who do—and do not—embody the Intoku code or spirit. After reading the book, you cannot help but recognize the Intoku Code and begin to see it in your own mentors. His storytelling has a clear purpose: to ensure that the spirit of this code lives on, and that these personal anecdotes serve as lessons to influence leaders of character.

I met Wade Ishimoto once at the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) during a temporary duty (TDY) trip to Fort Bragg, North Carolina. When I heard he was on our agenda, I eagerly awaited his talk to learn firsthand what happened at Desert One during Operation Eagle Claw—the failed rescue of U.S. hostages in Iran. Captain (at the time) Ishimoto mesmerized our group with his candid narrative. He made us feel as if we were there, observing the operation live. Based on that experience, I jumped at the opportunity to read his book. I wasn’t familiar with the concept of Intoku during his lecture, but after reading The Intoku Code, I can say with confidence that he embodies it.

The book lays out his upbringing and early influences before joining the military. His first chapter, titled “The Forging of a Warrior,” tells you all you need to know about how he views his childhood and how he honors his elders—a quality I find admirable. Anyone who has been stationed in Hawaii and experienced its beauty and culture will recognize those elements in Ishimoto’s early years. The first part of the book is filled with youthful adventures, each rounded out with a resounding “so what” that imparts a lesson. He speaks of learning humility by hearing relatives’ stories of their impoverished upbringing, while also recognizing the value of hard work and kindness. For example, he recalls stories of his grandmother bleaching rice bags and sewing them into shirts for his father, and how his grandfather saved a neighbor’s home from burning during the attack on Pearl Harbor—acts of courage and selfless service. Growing up in a tight-knit family instilled in him the values of honor, teamwork, high standards, and tradition.

His accounts of joining the Army follow typical training escapades and convey his pride in being part of the institution. Whether in Vietnam, joining Special Forces, or helping to stand up Delta Force, Ishimoto consistently reinforces the mantra that leaders should take care of others. These chapters are filled with engaging anecdotes—some humorous, some tragic. Soldiers who’ve had similar experiences will no doubt recognize parts of themselves or their teammates in these stories. One of the most relatable leadership lessons he shares involves walking into a unit with low morale. He found highly trained Special Forces soldiers doing trivial work. After reflecting and observing, he and his master sergeant overhauled the team’s workload, making it more meaningful and productive, which significantly improved morale and self-esteem. This may sound like Leadership 101, but it’s not always the order of the day. Those who embody the Intoku Code find ways to bring purpose and discipline to their teams.

Embedded within these stories are fascinating insights into the origins of special operations as a recognized force under President Kennedy, and later the formation of Delta Force under then-Captain Charlie A. Beckwith and General Robert C. Kingston. Other names surface as the Delta concept matured, and Ishimoto’s remarkable memory pays homage to many of those who helped bring the organization from idea to full operational capability (1962–1977), underscoring the importance of perseverance. He emphasizes the value of relationship-building and interagency partnerships. Ishimoto notes, “Initial efforts to establish partnerships and relationships with the FBI, CIA, FAA, Secret Service, Army INSCOM, DOE, and DARPA proved to be beneficial as Delta developed into a mature organization.” He goes on to state that these were not the only organizations Delta engaged with as it found its footing. The chapter gives readers an honest view of the challenges involved in creating a new organization, testing new concepts, and implementing them in high-risk scenarios. Once again, Intoku principles permeate these examples.

The middle of the book provides a detailed account of Operation Eagle Claw. Ishimoto walks through the planning process, the tragic execution, and the aftermath, including an investigation and the Holloway Commission’s congressional report. One striking detail I had never heard elsewhere: upon returning to base after the loss of eight operators, some British allies had crafted a handwritten sign that read, “[T]hanks for the guts to try.” Other friends shared words only warriors can offer one another—words Ishimoto recognized as embodying Intoku.

After the turmoil of Eagle Claw, Ishimoto goes “back to business,” as Chapter 15 is titled. He offers captivating insights into domestic incidents (e.g., the Branch Davidians) and international ones (e.g., the Khobar Towers bombing). He also lent his expertise to senior civilian leaders at the Pentagon and in the corporate sector. By the time readers finish this book, they will feel fortunate to have learned from Ishimoto’s deep well of expertise, knowledge, and warrior ethos. If I have one critique, it’s that the book may include too many names and details of people and places. While it is accessible to a general audience, readers who have served in the military or grown up in a military environment may find deeper resonance with its stories. Impatient readers might find the density of references overwhelming. That said, this is a fascinating, insightful, and important account of history as it happened. More than that, it offers a code to live by—and what could be better than that?

interpopulum.org · by ByProfessor Nancy E. Blacker · July 11, 2025

​

​30. Beyond the Melting Point: Exodus, the Sequel

S​ome fascinating history.​

Beyond the Melting Point: Exodus, the Sequel

Published on

Jul 25, 2025

Contributors

Juliana Geran Pilon

https://www.civitasinstitute.org/research/beyond-the-melting-point-exodus-the-sequel

Summary

The Melting Point describes how, decades before the establishment of Israel, Jews scattered throughout the world for two millennia managed to rediscover one another.

‍

First released in the UK in 2024 to great acclaim,  has just been published in America, where an equally enthusiastic reception is all but guaranteed. The praise for its previously unknown young author, Rachel Cockerell, is well deserved. Having set out to explore her family’s roots, she soon stumbled upon a treasure. Their cosmopolitan odyssey turns out to have played a far greater role upon the stage of history than she had ever imagined.

In brief: After their parents emigrated from Russia, the author’s Lithuanian-born mother, Fanny, and her sister, Sonia, both married in England – the former to an Englishman, the latter to a Russian-born Zionist Jew. Fanny’s four children included Rachel’s father Michael; Sonia’s were Mimi, Judy, and Dan. Plot surprise: Rachel’s great-grandfather, who becomes the book’s main, if elusive, character, had been (unhappily, it seems) married before to Rivka, with whom he had a son, Emmanuel Jochelman. Changing his name to Emjo Bassche, he had emigrated to America at the age of 14; it would be his daughter, Jo, who introduced Rachel to Sonia and her family, who were by now in Israel.

It’s a complicated story that isn't very clearly conveyed. (Jews in exile - what do you expect….) Fortunately, this is not mentioned until the middle of the book. This allows Rachel to begin on a very high note. Most deeply moving is her revelation of the appallingly understudied and widely misunderstood origins of modern Zionism, whose purpose was to save their co-religionists from near-annihilation. 

It would be churlish, therefore, to fault this remarkable author for having missed the full significance of her own title, “Melting Point.” Its obvious reference to the problem of assimilation, immigration, and identity is indisputably critical, but not the main point, so to speak. The deeper story is nothing less than a twentieth-century follow-up of Exodus and its sequel, Numbers. The latter’s message is by Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut in these words: “The harsh environment of the wilderness led to Israel's spiritual development as a nation.” The “harsh environment” of this new book is the two-millennia prequel to the Holocaust.

Cockerell would undoubtedly agree, for she appreciates that any creation only gradually reveals itself to its author. As she admitted to Andrew Silow-Carroll of the (JTA) on April 24, 2025: 

It was only about a year in that I realized that this is the story of assimilation and of melting into the melting pot for Jewish immigrants. But I think it’s also a universal experience of leaving a place and arriving in a new place, and part of your identity changing or dissolving away. My family definitely melted into the melting pot of London. 

Except that a melting pot should not imply merging diverse cultures, languages, and creeds inside a homogenizing figurative Cuisinart into a bland gruel of meaning-less coexistence. A true Promised Land, albeit necessarily a territorial one, has its true locus within. She goes on: “You know, I think of myself as British, as a Londoner, more than I think of myself as Jewish or Russian or Russian Jewish.”

“Leaving a place and arriving in a new place”….. No refugee from pogroms or the SS or the KGB, usually leaving behind family members to all-but-certain extinction in unimaginable ways, could write so casually about the agony of heading into a place that is not merely “new” but utterly unknown, even nonexistent. Statelessness. Yet it is that very condition that is itself bonding, a cohesion molded through pain, a fusion, merging, steeling. This book describes how, decades before the establishment of Israel, Jews scattered throughout the world for two millennia managed to rediscover one another. They had to understand that they constitute a people, a nation - perhaps in their original homeland, but if need be, beyond its borders. 

It is to Cockerell’s great credit that she rewrote her book after realizing she had to allow the story to unfold naturally; she had to let the story write itself. An unusual work of expressionist nonfiction, “by collaging excerpts from primary documents” and personal interviews, her book has been deemed “ “ in sum, “.” All true.

That story begins with Theodore Herzl, a Hungarian-born German-speaking Reform Jew whose 1896 book Der Judenstaat ('The State of the Jews') was prompted by the Dreyfus Affair that had just exploded in France. Clearly, neither East nor West was safe for Jews, Herzl’s book intoned. The book exploded like wildfire. As Israel’s first president, Chaim Weizmann, would say of this latter-day Moses: “He became a monumental, mythical Jewish figure – something of a legend. … The [book’s] message was soon passed on to every town, great or small, in Poland and Russia in which a Jewish ghetto existed.” The larger world heard it too. The Jersey City News, with typical American optimism, would report: “That one watchword, the ‘Jewish State,’ has been sufficient to rouse the Jews to a state of enthusiasm in the remotest corners of the earth.” 

Far less widespread was any awareness of the agony fueling the ecstasy. Herzl, however, felt both, and with excruciating urgency. Wasting no time, he enlisted as his brother-in-arms (the Aaron to his Moses), the British-born son of Russian Jews, Israel Zangwill. The most famous Jew in the world. 

Never having met before, the two became fast friends almost instantly. They both had first-hand experience of the sectarian chasms bisecting the Diaspora. Born at the crossroads between east and west in Austro-Hungarian Pest, Herzl knew that the Ashkenazi Orthodox, mostly poor and rigid in their habits, had almost nothing in common with the successful, wealthy, German-speaking Jews who hoped for future assimilation into the gentile world (even as they often hated themselves for it). While the former were afraid to leave for fear of being polluted by apostasy, the latter’s contempt for their uncouth brethren blinded them to the antisemitic flood about to drown them all. 

Israel Zangwill not only understood but managed to convey it to Western audiences through his masterpiece Children of the Ghetto: A Study of a Peculiar People. Blending subtle humor with heart-wrenching tragedy, it created a sensation in both England and America upon its publication in 1892, to be exceeded only by his eponymous play, “The Melting Pot.” 

The two ideal partners set out to convene the first Congress of a movement Herzl called Zionist, which he defined as “a return to Judaism even before there is a return to the Jewish land.” Meeting first in Basel, Switzerland, in 1897, 1898, and 1899, then in London in 1900, and returning to Basel in 1901, it attracted no fewer than 500 delegates from every corner of the diaspora. All the while, pogroms intensified, the flood waters rising by the day.

And then, there was Kishinev. The brutal slaughter of defenseless Jews in that ancient Russian-Moldovan city on April 8, 1903, elicited this reaction from Theodore Roosevelt: “I have never in my experience in this country known of a more immediate and deeper expression of sympathy for the victims and of horror over the appalling calamity.” Zangwill: “The only solution of the Jewish question is to take the Jews out of Russia, and plant them in a soil of their own.” Now. 

But where? A few months later, at the historic Sixth Congress held in Basel, Herzl revealed that Kenya (which a British MP had casually mistaken for Uganda) might be a possibility. But it wasn’t up to him; he had to put it to a vote. As he had feared, the Jews who stood in greatest danger, Ashkenazim from Russia, would consider nothing but Palestine. They did so while falling on their knees, weeping. Such was the noble fodder of Hitler’s ovens.

Herzl was devastated. He was convinced that Palestine could never accommodate all the Jews facing genocide – millions perhaps? How could at least a temporary solution not be acceptable? Equally exasperated, Zangwill told the delegates bluntly: “We must have a home and a refuge for those of our brethren who are the victims of Kishineffs, and, if we wait much longer, who knows but that there will be none left alive to reach that home.” Was the Jewish world to be so divided against itself as to risk extinction? Herzl would never recover from the blow. Within a few months, he would be dead. Like Moses, he would not live to see the promised land.

The Congress was as split as its constituents, with one wing open to considering options other than Palestine, which would be called the Jewish Territorial Organization (ITO). David Jochelman managed to convince Zangwill to head it up. They would send a delegation to explore possibilities. As could have been predicted, it soon transpired that not only did the Uganda/Kenya option evaporate, so did every other. Having combed every continent, the ITO delegation concluded that the gentile world would never allot to the Jews even a sliver of territory to govern themselves. The world proved Pharaonic.

Only one nation was still left: the United States. For the last two centuries, nowhere else had Jews been as welcome. Having shared the covenantal creed that four decades later would inspire Israel’s Declaration of Independence, the United States had recently been declared by its martyred, who had, Abraham Lincoln, “an almost chosen nation.” 

Zangwill knew that Jochelman was perfectly suited to organize the orderly evacuation of Jews to America, but they needed money. Coincidentally (maybe), Zangwill had another good friend he had met in London, whose assets extended beyond intellectual and moral. Indeed, according to The Philadelphia Press, he was “the most powerful force of any of the so-called high-financiers of New York.” His name was Jacob J. Schiff. That he was the right man is clear from the description of his vision, published in The American Hebrew of 1907, of 

[a] people among the best in the land, proud of their American citizenship, thoroughly imbued with its spirit, with its obligations, with its high privileges, but just as proud of their religion – almost a new type – true Americans of the Jewish faith.

Unlike everywhere else, abandoning one’s religion was no requirement for citizenship. 

Now for a point of entry. By process of elimination, the choice fell upon Galveston, Texas. Strategically placed landing site for vessels carrying the endangered cargo, it was also the home of Zangwill’s former classmate and good friend: its rabbi, Dr. Henry Cohen. Alongside his kind wife, the rabbi’s reputation was legendary: “When people were in trouble, white or black, Jew or Gentile, aristocrat or plebeian, it was ‘the Rabbi’ who was first consulted.” A prototypical chosen good Samaritan.

Cockerell’s great-grandfather rose to the occasion despite being seriously ill. Having established some 150 offices throughout Russia to facilitate Jewish emigration, he thereby gained a place of honor among the prophets of the new state of Israel. But he, too, would die before its founding, in 1941 – an almost silent prophet.

His family’s subsequent odyssey takes up the rest of Cockerell’s unusual book. She turns first to the New York family of David’s son, born to his first wife, Rivka. Emmanuel Jockelmann (pen name: Emjo Basshe), a talented playwright and partner of John Dos Passos and two other Jewish writers, a protegee of the great philanthropist. Emjo married a philosemitic Southern-born Christian actress, whose daughter Emjo Basshe II (Jo), a journalist, whom Rachel discovered in Canada, where she had retired along with her husband, a gentile Columbia University professor.

Only then does Rachel turn to her own English family, home of Fannie and Sonia Jochelman, David’s daughters with his second wife Tamara, their respective husbands - the amiable Englishman Hugh Cockerell (Tamara’s) and the staunch Zionist Yehuda Behari, whom Sonia had promised to accompany to Israel when possible – and all of their children. Diverse personalities, political orientations, theological inclinations, whose idiosyncrasies alternately enlivened and soured their lives, they were a colorful mélange.

Though seen only superficially through snippets of interviews and background documentation, the reader is intrigued by their rambling lives, none of which is ultimately fulfilling for various reasons. But above all, what is clearly missing is any sense of Judaic identity. Even Jochelmann’s son-in-law, Yehuda Benari, who became the right-hand man to the great Ze’ev Jabotinsky, “knew absolutely nothing about Judaism,” according to his oldest daughter, Mimi. “He was brought up without it, so it was never part of his life.” 

Did he also fail to teach them history? As Mimi’s younger sister Judy told Cockerell, it wasn’t until years later, after they arrived in Israel, that “I realized they weren’t really kept adrift of what was going on: that the Arabs were being thrown out of their homes, and their country.” Today, the author says, “I don’t know who has claim to this land, I don’t think anybody really knows. But it’s obvious that the Palestinians didn’t leave, they were thrown out. Who would want to leave their home?”

She could have asked the same of the Jews expelled from Arab lands. But there is no mention anywhere in this otherwise fine book of the Balfour Declaration; the Arab rejection of the Partition Plan; the unprovoked wars of 1967, 1973, and constant terrorism; Oslo and the Intifada; Hamas, Iran. There is no hint that Cockerell knows. Maybe it just succumbed to the editor’s cut?

The book ends on a nostalgic note. In the Afterword, Cockerell writes that despite regular annual visits to Israel since 2018, she always feels “like an outsider.” But maybe less so as time passes. For as she admitted on May 5, 2025, to Casey Schwartz of the: “It made me realize everything that my side of the family didn’t have. Everything that my side of the family had lost.” Lost, but cherished still.

The answer for her and others like her in the Jewish diaspora may well be right there, in the motto to her book. Written by the one man whom Rachel says had “won a place in my heart, perhaps more than any other character," Israel Zangwill, it says: “If we cannot get the Holy Land, we can make another land holy."

That is the third Moses also wouldn’t live to witness the Jews’ national revival, which seemed – because it was – a sheer miracle. What would not surprise any of them is the massive escalation in antisemitism. But now the Jewish state is here. Its presence reminds the rest of the world that their long-suffering people’s mission extends to any nation that believes all human beings to have been created equal in God’s Image. All we need is family, memory, and the hope that someday no one need be a slave again. America, of all places, should get it.

Juliana Geran Pilon is Senior Fellow at the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization. Her latest book, An Idea Betrayed: Jews, Liberalism, and the American Left, has just been published.

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com