|
Quotes of the Day:
“But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.”
- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Is any man afraid of change? What can take place without change? What then is more pleasing or more suitable to the universal nature? And can you take a hot bath unless the wood for the fire undergoes a change? And can you be nourished unless the food undergoes a change? And can anything else that is useful be accomplished without change? Do you not see then that for yourself also to change is just the same, and equally necessary for the universal nature?"
- Marcus Aurelius
“I never learned from a man who agreed with me.”
- Robert A. Heinlein
1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, AUGUST 18 (Putin's War)
2. DOD’s Diplomats Don’t Need More Rank, Just Less Disdain
3. Ukraine and Proxy War: Improving Ontological Shortcomings in Military Thinking
4. Night of explosions rocks Russian-held areas far from front
5. The Bloody Uprising Against the Taliban Led by One of Their Own
6. The republic of fatwas | Opinion
7. FDD | Another Iran Deal? Looking Back and Looking Ahead
8. Russia’s spies misread Ukraine and misled Kremlin as war loomed
9. Opinion | Why China will become ever more dangerous as its baby bust worsens
10. U.S. Army Special Operations to receive nine more MH-47G Chinooks from Boeing
11. The war that changed the world
12. The United Nations Can Hold the Taliban Accountable
13. The China Trap: U.S. Foreign Policy and the Perilous Logic of Zero-Sum Competition
14. How Pelosi’s Visit to Taiwan Drove Chinese Public Opinion Toward Reunification by Force
15. What the Taliban Really Fear: A Resistance Movement Is Growing in Afghanistan—and It Needs International Support
16. Marine Corps will not stand down MV-22 fleet despite Air Force move
17. China’s drills to change US military assumptions
18. Russia’s New Naval Doctrine: A ‘Pivot to Asia’?
19. How the new Special Warfare Branch at AFRS is making a difference
20. 'Those treatments saved my life': The veterans who turn to psychedelic treatments for PTSD healing
1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, AUGUST 18 (Putin's War)
Map/graphics: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-august-18
RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, AUGUST 18
understandingwar.org
Karolina Hird, Layne Philipson, Angela Howard, Katherine Lawlor, George Barros, and Frederick W. Kagan
August 18, 7pm ET
Click here to see ISW's interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This map is updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.
There were no claimed or assessed Russian territorial gains in Ukraine on August 18, 2022 for the first time since July 6, 2022.[1] Russian and Ukrainian sources did not claim any new territorial gains on August 18. However, Russian forces still conducted limited and unsuccessful ground assaults across the eastern axis on August 18.
Russian sources reported explosions across Crimea—possibly caused by Russian air defenses, Ukrainian reconnaissance, or a Ukrainian attack—the night of August 18. Three local sources told Reuters that at least four explosions struck around Belbek Airbase in Russian-occupied Crimea, near Sevastopol.[2] The Russian-appointed governor of Sevastopol, Mikhail Razvozhaev, claimed that preliminary information indicated that Russian air defenses shot down a Ukrainian drone and caused no damage.[3] Video of a large explosion that circulated on social media in the immediate aftermath of the reported explosions was from a previous engagement on August 8 and is not from the vicinity of the airbase.[4]
Russian sources also claimed that Russian air defenses shot down a drone near the Kerch Bridge between Crimea and Russia on the night of August 18 as social media footage showed active air defenses in the area.[5] Ukrainian Presidential Advisor Mykhailo Podolyak had tweeted on August 17 that the Kerch bridge was illegally constructed and ”must be dismantled.”[6] The railway side of the Kerch bridge is an important target for Ukraine to disrupt Russian logistics capabilities into occupied Ukraine. Social media videos also claimed to depict active Russian air defenses at a Russian base in Nova Kakhova in southern Kherson oblast the night of August 18, suggesting a possibly coordinated series of Ukrainian attacks, if there were attacks, or drone overflights.[7]
ISW cannot independently verify whether Russian air defenses shot down a Ukrainian UAV, or whether any UAV was present in Kerch or Belbek. A Russian social media user posted video claiming to be at Belbek on the evening of August 18, showing no apparent evidence of a strike there.[8] Ukrainian forces will likely continue their campaign to strike Russian military targets in Russian-occupied Crimea to degrade Russian logistics capabilities and degrade Russian capabilities to sustain operations on the west bank of the Dnipro River, as ISW previously assessed.[9] However, it is unclear at the time of publication whether the reported explosions are due to Ukrainian attacks or reconnaissance, poor Russian handling of military equipment, successful Russian air defenses, or nervous Russian defenders who are likely steeling themselves for additional attacks in areas that the Russian military had believed until now to be out of the range of Ukrainian forces.
The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) appears to be setting information conditions to blame Ukrainian forces for future false flag operations at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (NPP). The chief of Russia’s Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Forces, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, claimed in an August 18 briefing that Ukrainian forces are preparing for a provocation at the Zaporizhzhia NPP and that the provocation is meant to coincide with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres’ visit to Ukraine.[10] Kirillov accused Ukrainian forces of preparing to stage this provocation in order to blame Russia for causing a nuclear disaster and create a 30km-wide exclusion zone around the NPP.[11] Kirillov’s briefing, which was amplified by the Russian MoD, coincides with reports that Russian authorities told Russian NPP employees to not come in to work tomorrow, August 19.[12] Leaked footage from within the plant shows five Russian trucks very close to one of the reactors at the NPP on an unspecified date, which may indicate the Russian forces are setting conditions to cause a provocation at the plant and to shift the information narrative to blame Ukraine for any kinetic events that occur on the territory of the plant.[13]
Key Takeaways
- There were no claimed or assessed Russian territorial gains in Ukraine on August 18, 2022 for the first time since July 6, 2022.
- Russian sources reported a series of unidentified and unconfirmed explosions across Crimea on the night of August 18.
- The Russian Ministry of Defense may be setting information conditions to blame Ukraine for a false flag attack at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
- Russian forces conducted ground assaults south of Siversk and northeast and south of Bakhmut.
- Russian forces continued conducting offensive operations north, west, and southwest of Donetsk City.
- Russian forces conducted an unsuccessful ground assault on the Zaporizhia axis.
- Ukrainian officials confirmed additional strikes on a Russian military base and warehouse in Kherson Oblast.
- The Kremlin is likely leveraging established Cossack organizations to support Russian force generation efforts.
- Russian occupation officials continued preparations for the long-term integration of occupied territories of Ukraine into Russia.
We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because those activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting. We will continue to evaluate and report on the effects of these criminal activities on the Ukrainian military and population and specifically on combat in Ukrainian urban areas. We utterly condemn these Russian violations of the laws of armed conflict, Geneva Conventions, and humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports.
- Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine (comprised of one subordinate and two supporting efforts);
- Subordinate Main Effort—Encirclement of Ukrainian Troops in the Cauldron between Izyum and Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts
- Supporting Effort 1—Kharkiv City
- Supporting Effort 2—Southern Axis
- Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts
- Activities in Russian-occupied Areas
Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine
Subordinate Main Effort—Southern Kharkiv, Donetsk, Luhansk Oblasts (Russian objective: Encircle Ukrainian forces in Eastern Ukraine and capture the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)
Russian forces did not conduct any confirmed ground attacks along the Izyum-Slovyansk line and shelled settlements near the Kharkiv-Donetsk Oblast border on August 18.[14] The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed that a Russian artillery strike targeted Ukrainian positions in Mazanivka (about 20km northwest of Slovyansk), confirming ISW’s control of terrain assessment that Ukrainian forces have pushed Russian troops out of the settlement.[15]
Russian forces attempted to advance on Siversk from the south on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops unsuccessfully attempted to advance from Mykolaivka (about 15km southwest of Siversk) to Vyimka (about 5km southeast of Siversk).[16] Russian sources claimed that Russian troops are continuing to fight along the eastern ring of Siversk in the vicinity of Serebryanka, Verkhnokamyanske, and Ivano-Darivka.[17] Russian troops also continued artillery and air strikes on Siversk and surrounding settlements.[18]
Russian forces continued ground attacks northeast and south of Bakhmut on August 18. Russian troops continued efforts to advance southwest on Bakhmut along the T1302 highway from Soledar and reportedly attempted to advance from Volodymyrivka to Soledar.[19] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops attempted to advance on Bakhmut from Pokrovske, about 10km east of Bakhmut.[20] Russian forces, reportedly including Wagner Group mercenaries, continued pushing north on Bakhmut from Klynove, Kodema, and Semihirya, all within roughly 15km of the southern outskirts of Bakhmut.[21] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces are attempting to advance on Bakhmut from the northern outskirts of Horlivka in the area of Holmivsky and Zaitseve.[22] Russian operations near Horlivka are likely intended to gain access to the T0513 Horlivka-Bakhmut highway, which indicates that Russian forces are likely attempting to advance on Bakhmut along three lines: from Horlivka to the southwest along the T0513, from Soledar to the northeast along the T1302, and from the Klynove-Vershyna area along the E40 highway.
Russian forces conducted a series of ground attacks on the northern and western outskirts of Donetsk City on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces attempted to advance towards Avdiivka (10km northwest of Donetsk City) from the direction of Verkhnotoretske and Novoselivka Druha—15km and 7km northeast of Avdiivka, respectively.[23] Russian forces also reportedly attempted to push west of their positions in Pisky towards Pervomaiske, about 10km west of Pisky.[24] Several Russian sources also posted footage claiming to show Russian troops consolidating positions in Marinka, which lies on the southwestern outskirts of Donetsk City.[25] Russian forces continued heavy artillery strikes against fortified Ukrainian positions in and around Avdiivka and west of Donetsk City to support ongoing ground attacks.[26]
Russian forces conducted a limited ground attack southwest of Donetsk City on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops unsuccessfully attempted to improve their tactical positions and advance from Taramchuk (25km southwest of Donetsk City) towards Vodyane (35km southwest of Donetsk City).[27] Russian sources claimed that Russian and Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) troops continued fighting near Vuhledar, about 45km southwest of Donetsk City.[28] Russian operations southwest of Donetsk City are likely focused on gaining access to the T0524 road that runs into Marinka and may be used to support Russian operations to push west of the current positions on the western outskirts of Donetsk City.
Supporting Effort #1—Kharkiv City (Russian objective: Defend ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to Izyum and prevent Ukrainian forces from reaching the Russian border)
Russian forces did not conduct any confirmed ground attacks along the Kharkiv City axis on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces focused on holding occupied positions and preventing Ukrainian counterattacks.[29] Russian forces deployed an unspecified number of additional electronic warfare systems and a battalion tactical group (BTG) in the Kharkiv City direction in an attempt to restore the combat capability of units already stationed around Kharkiv City.[30].Russian BTGs that have been engaged in combat are likely badly understrength and will add relatively little combat power. Volunteer battalions have deployed with very limited training and would add far less combat power than their numbers suggest. Russian troops continued remote mining near Lebyazhne (about 40km southeast of Kharkiv City), indicating Russian forces seek to restrain Ukrainian attacks in the direction of Russia’s ground lines of communication along the Izyum axis.[31] Russian sources continued to repeat previous unsubstantiated claims of Russian control of Stohnii, Baranivka, Odnorobivka, and Udy (all about 40km north of Kharkiv City and within 10km of the Ukraine-Russia border).[32]
Several Ukrainian sources reported major Russian missile strikes on four of the nine districts of Kharkiv City and on Krasnohrad (western Kharkiv Oblast) between August 17 and 18.[33] The missiles struck a dormitory and residential areas of Kharkiv City, caused major damage to civilian infrastructure, and killed and injured several civilians.[34] Russian forces also conducted airstrikes near Staryi Saltiv, Verkhnii Saltiv, and Baranivka (northeast of Kharkiv City) and continued to shell settlements surrounding Kharkiv City.[35]
Supporting Effort #2—Southern Axis (Russian objective: Defend Kherson and Zaporizhia Oblasts against Ukrainian counterattacks)
Russian forces conducted a limited and unsuccessful ground assault on the Zaporizhia axis on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces unsuccessfully attempted to advance from Yehorivka to Shevchenkove, both east of the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast administrative border.[36] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Russian forces reinforced an unspecified area along the Southern Axis with at least two battalion tactical groups (BTGs), indicating a continued Russian effort to reinforce the south in preparation for Ukrainian counterattacks. These BTGs are unlikely to increase Russian combat power materially.
Russian forces continued focusing on maintaining occupied lines and preventing Ukrainian forces from advancing along the Southern Axis on August 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces intensified aerial reconnaissance using UAVs on settlements in north and west Kherson Oblast, as well as in settlements in northern Zaporizhia Oblast.[37] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Russian forces conducted airstrikes on Lozove and Bila Krynytsia, both near the Ukrainian bridgehead across the Inhulets River, and Blahodatne, approximately 20km northwest of Kherson City.[38] Russian forces also continued shelling settlements along the entire line of contact using tank, tube, and rocket artillery.[39]
Russian forces continued to target settlements in Dnipropetrovsk and Mykolaiv Oblasts using artillery and missiles on August 18. Ukrainian officials reported that Russian forces used tube artillery to shell Nikopol, located across the Dnipro River from Russian-occupied positions in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, and other settlements throughout Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.[40] The Ukrainian Southern Operational Command reported that Russian forces launched two anti-radar missiles from a Su-35 aircraft in the Bakhtanka and Mykolaiv directions and continued shelling other settlements throughout Mykolaiv Oblast.[41]
Ukrainian forces continued targeting Russian logistics points and ammunition depots in Kherson Oblast. Kherson Oblast Administration Advisor Serhiy Khlan reported on August 18 that Ukrainian forces destroyed a Russian warehouse in Bilohirka, located near the Ukrainian bridgehead across the Inhulets River.[42] Khlan also reported that Ukrainian forces destroyed a Russian military base in Nova Kakhovka on August 17.[43]
Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts (Russian objective: Expand combat power without conducting general mobilization)
The Kremlin is likely leveraging established Cossack organizations to support Russian force generation efforts. Formal Russian Cossack organizations are paramilitary formations that perform state services, including law enforcement and military administrative tasks, in accordance with Russian Federal Law.[44] Russian daily newspaper Kommersant reported that the All-Russian Cossack Society formed a 250 man-strong Cossack “Terek” detachment which is currently completing its preparations to deploy to Ukraine.[45] The Terek detachment reportedly includes military specialists with scout, sniper, and machine gunner experience with personnel drawn from Stavropol Krai, Dagestan, North Ossetia, Kabardino-Balkaria, and the Chechen Republic. It is unclear whether there are established Cossack organizations in predominantly Muslim federal subjects, such as Chechnya and Dagestan, from which ”Cossacks” might be recruited given that Cossack culture and history are traditionally hostile to Islam.[46] Russian Cossack organizations may be helping train Russian recruits due the ineffectiveness or limitations of other more conventional Russian recruitment organs. Kommersant additionally reported that the All-Russian Cossack Society has deployed seven volunteer units (of unspecified echelon) to Ukraine, is preparing three volunteer units for deployment, and has over 6,000 Cossacks supporting the war in Ukraine in unspecified capacities.
Russian occupation forces continue efforts to mobilize Ukrainian citizens into military units. Vladimir Novikov – one of the pro-Russian militia leaders in Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia – told RIA Novosti on August 18 that the Russian occupation administration in Zaporizhzhia Oblast is forming a “volunteer army” (of unspecified size) to capture the remainder of occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast.[47] Russian occupation forces will likely intensify efforts to mobilize Ukrainian citizens in Zaporizhia Oblast as they have in occupied eastern Ukraine.[48]
Russian volunteer units and forcibly mobilized Ukrainian citizens are unlikely to generate effective Russian combat power due to their low morale, poor equipment, and lack of training. Mari El Republic Governor Yuri Zaitsev stated that of approximately 430 Mari Eli residents who deployed to Ukraine in volunteer formations, at least 58 died.[49] This report suggests that the unit likely suffered a total casualty rate (killed and wounded) of 40 percent given the normal ration of three wounded-in-action for every fatality. A Ukrainian citizen who was mobilized in Luhansk on August 3 to fight for Russian forces (and who Ukrainian forces captured no later than August 18) testified that Russian forces provided him with a shirt, an old iron helmet, and no shoes and stated that his infantry unit had no armor support and had to walk on foot during combat.[50]
Activity in Russian-occupied Areas (Russian objective: consolidate administrative control of occupied areas; set conditions for potential annexation into the Russian Federation or some other future political arrangement of Moscow’s choosing)
The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported on August 18 that Russian occupation authorities are planning to conduct door-to-door “surveys” of households in occupied Melitopol from September 11-17 in lieu of in-person voting for the Kremlin’s sham annexation referendum.[51] The Resistance Center claimed that Russian forces are conducting such easily falsifiable surveys because the referendum will have low turnout and urged Ukrainian civilians to evacuate occupied areas before the referendum takes place to avoid participation. The Center also reported that Ukrainian partisan activity forced the Russian military to transfer forces away from the front lines to secure the sham referendum.[52]
Russian occupation authorities are taking steps to restore some industrial, housing, and media capacity in occupied Ukrainian territory. These reconstruction efforts appear to be largely in service of Russian government campaigns to create administrative capabilities in occupied areas, to enhance or reinforce Russian logistical supply lines, and to wage an information war in occupied parts of Ukraine, thereby acclimating Ukrainian civilians to the Russian occupation. “Reconstruction” efforts do not appear to be meeting even basic needs of civilians in occupied areas, who face the approaching winter without heat in parts of the country.
- Administrative campaign: The Mariupol City Council reported on August 17 that Russian occupation officials are conducting an inventory of housing in Mariupol to identify properties whose owners fled the Russian invasion.[53] The Council reported that occupation officials intend to give this housing to Russian officials, their families, and collaborators. Offers of free housing are one way the Kremlin is likely attempting to incentivize Russian bureaucrats to move to occupied areas and administratively support the integration of occupied Ukrainian territory into the Russian Federation as well as to change the demographics of the area in Russia’s favor.
- Logistical campaign: The Mariupol City Council and local Telegram channel Mariupol Now reported on August 18 that Russian occupation authorities are working to restore Mariupol’s port to facilitate the export of metal products from Mariupol to Russia.[54] Restoration of the port could also be used to reinforce Russian logistics lines—Mariupol mayoral advisor Petro Andryushchenko reported on August 17 that a ferry from the Russian city of Yeysk to Mariupol began service but will be used for military purposes.[55] Andryushchenko warned that Russian forces hid ammunition within the ferry. Deputy Russian Defense Minister Timur Ivanov claimed on August 18 that Russian occupation officials were prioritizing reconstruction in Donbas and restoring drinking water in cities like Donetsk—measures that are likely required to incentivize Russian administrators to move to the area or to house Russian forces for any period of time.[56]
- Propaganda and population control campaign: The Central Election Commission head for United Russia, the political party of Russian President Vladimir Putin, attended the grand opening of the Russian-run Tavria television channel in Kherson and framed channel employees as “information troops” who are “extremely important” to the Russian invasion. He emphasized that “Tavria is here forever, like Russia.”[57] Russian occupation officials will likely attempt to use state-run propaganda outlets like Tavria to conduct information operations against Ukrainian civilians in occupied southern Ukraine as public services worsen and partisan attacks continue. For example, the Ukrainian mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Federov, stated on August 18 that there is no gas for heat in Melitopol.[58] Federov said that Russian propagandists provide three different stories for how civilians can stay warm this winter—construction of a gas pipeline from Crimea, construction of a pipeline from Berdyansk, and importing coal supplies—but that no work is being done on the alleged pipelines. Zaporizhia Occupation Administration Head Yevheny Balitsky stated on August 18 that occupation authorities are working to provide fuel to ”preferential categories” of residents—likely those who cooperate with occupation authorities.[59]
Note: ISW does not receive any classified material from any source, uses only publicly available information, and draws extensively on Russian, Ukrainian, and Western reporting and social media as well as commercially available satellite imagery and other geospatial data as the basis for these reports. References to all sources used are provided in the endnotes of each update.
[10] https://telegra dot ph/Tezisy-nachalnika-vojsk-radiacionnoj-himicheskoj-i-biologicheskoj-zashchity-VS-RF-general-lejtenanta-Igorya-Kirillova-na-brifing-08-18; https://t.me/mod_russia/18813; https://t.me/mod_russia/18814; https://t.me/mod_russia/18815; https://t.me/mod_russia/18816; https://t.me/mod_russia/18817; https://t.me/mod_russia/18818
[11] https://telegra dot ph/Tezisy-nachalnika-vojsk-radiacionnoj-himicheskoj-i-biologicheskoj-zashchity-VS-RF-general-lejtenanta-Igorya-Kirillova-na-brifing-08-18; https://t.me/mod_russia/18813; https://t.me/mod_russia/18814; https://t.me/mod_russia/18815; https://t.me/mod_russia/18816; https://t.me/mod_russia/18817; https://t.me/mod_russia/18818
[44] http://pravo.gov dot ru/proxy/ips/?docbody=&nd=102103268
[45] https://www.kommersant dot ru/amp/5515184
[47] https://ria dot ru/20220818/svo-1810351059.html
[49] https://www.idelreal.org/a/31994397.html ; https://smotrim dot ru/article/2897662
[51] https://sprotyv.mod.gov dot ua/2022/08/18/rosiyany-hochut-provesty-svij-referendum-za-misczem-prozhyvannya/
[52] https://sprotyv.mod.gov dot ua/2022/08/18/totalnyj-sprotyv-rosiyany-zmusheni-zabyraty-lyudej-z-peredovoyi-dlya-zabezpechennya-provedennya-referendumu/
understandingwar.org
2. DOD’s Diplomats Don’t Need More Rank, Just Less Disdain
DOD’s Diplomats Don’t Need More Rank, Just Less Disdain
When U.S. visitors treat military attachés like mere functionaries, they undermine a crucial mission.
defenseone.com · by Raymond Powell
An open letter to U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin III.
Dear Mr. Secretary,
You recently announced the downgrade of five military attaché positions currently held by general officers. Having been neither a general officer nor assigned to the affected embassies, I won’t weigh in on the merits of that decision.
Rather, as a two-time attaché at the O-6, or colonel, level, I can offer a way to improve the effectiveness of your military diplomats around the world, regardless of rank—and it won’t cost a penny. That’s because the host nation ultimately doesn’t care what rank the attaché holds; they care that he or she is well-informed and influential within America’s power centers.
As you’re well aware, the vast majority of our senior defense official/defense attaché positions are not held by general officers. Yet the position carries weighty responsibilities: to act as the “principal DoD official in a U.S. embassy as designated by the Secretary of Defense,” as “the Chief of Mission's principal military advisor,” as “the senior diplomatically accredited DoD military officer,” and as “the single point of contact for all DoD matters” related to the diplomatic mission.
Our military diplomats are generally received in this spirit when they arrive in country, armed with introductory letters from yourself as Secretary. These letters formally request that your counterparts accept the attaché as your in-country representative, and they are received with appropriate solemnity.
Unfortunately, this dignified reception often marks the apex of their credibility. Their perceived relevance is subsequently whittled away by waves of senior Defense Department visitors and their staffs, far too many of which send tacit but clear messages by disregarding, excluding, or pushing attachés to the margins of foreign engagements.
When U.S. defense luminaries openly treat your attachés as little more than aiguilette-wearing protocol officers and note-takers, host nations take notice.
I recall an instance on which I accompanied a senior Australian officer to the U.S. for an official counterpart visit. During the trip, despite specific instructions to the contrary, one four-star officer’s staff summarily removed my place setting before their meeting, judging that my rank did not merit my inclusion. Meanwhile, the setting for my Australian counterpart—a two-star general—was left in place.
Having experienced such indignities before, I walked in anyway. Fortunately, I was not ejected, though I was conspicuous as the only one at the table without a place setting. More importantly, a clear message was sent to the Australians: the U.S. defense attaché is relatively unimportant.
You could view this as simply a faux pas that bruised a colonel’s ego, but I assure you this experience is hardly unique. Every military attaché not of general officer rank has a book of such stories. They thus learn to be bold—even brash—in service of their duties.
This is because there’s much more at stake than attaché self-esteem. Their mission effectiveness turns on their access to senior host-country officials, which itself depends on their credibility as well-informed, trusted interlocutors to our own senior leaders. An attaché who is seen as a protocol functionary will eventually cease to be anything more.
Nor is the damage limited to the Defense Department. Ambassadors are frequently exasperated by senior defense visitors who diminish the embassy’s role within the countries where they act as the president’s representative. In their eyes, disregarding the attachés equates to disregarding the U.S. diplomatic mission itself.
The problem in Australia was so acute and persistent that the U.S. ambassador was compelled to act. He issued his own polite but pointed letter to “strongly insist” on the matter: “[E]xcluding U.S. Mission personnel from your meetings sends a very negative message to our hosts about the relevance of my team as trusted interlocutors. Remember, we’re here after you leave, and access and credibility are the coin of the realm for a diplomat! Therefore, when senior Australian officials see that you value and are working closely with my officers, you really help open doors for us.”
The effect of this letter—which we then conveyed to every inbound delegation—was dramatic in its positive local effect, but the larger issue is systemic and worldwide.
But you, sir, can fix it.
A simple policy issued over your own signature would greatly improve the mission effectiveness of the entire attaché corps. Like the ambassador’s letter, such a policy would instruct senior DoD officials and their staffs on how and why to involve attachés in their foreign engagements in ways that elevate them in the eyes of their assigned nations’ leaders.
The formula is simple: tell them to bring your attachés into their meetings, seat your attachés in their vehicles and prominently at their tables, and express to their host-nation counterparts how much your attachés' counsel is valued.
It really is that straightforward. Issuing such guidance—and then ensconcing it in appropriate DOD Instructions such as C-5105.32 Defense Attaché Service—would help your military diplomats not only to avert the slights, but to build the credibility and access they need to accomplish the mission you sent them to perform.
Improving their in-country access and credibility will have the added benefit of improving the quality of information and advice the attaché corps is able to convey back to you and to all of our nation’s senior leaders and policy makers.
Because, Mr. Secretary, your attachés’ mission effectiveness really does depend less on the rank they wear on their uniforms than on the value that you and your own senior officials are perceived to place upon them.
And that’s something you can fix.
Raymond Powell is a fellow at Stanford University’s Distinguished Careers Institute in Palo Alto, California. He recently concluded a 35-year career in the U.S. Air Force, during which he served as his country's Air Attaché in Vietnam and Senior Defense Official/Defense Attaché in Australia.
defenseone.com · by Raymond Powell
3. Ukraine and Proxy War: Improving Ontological Shortcomings in Military Thinking
Graphics at the link: https://www.ausa.org/publications/ukraine-and-proxy-war-improving-ontological-shortcomings-military-thinking?utm_source=pocket_mylist
Conclusion:
Proxy wars must always be at the fore of warfare studies because they dominate both international and non-international armed conflict. Further, proxy war’s nuance is important to understand because misunderstandings can cue missteps, from the policy level all the way to the tactical level of war. Providing a clear taxonomy for proxy war, as this paper does, helps overcome ontological shortcomings that also contribute to poor showings in proxy war.
Looking to the future, as the international system continues to rely on a rules-based international order, the student of warfare should expect to see a few trends in future war. First, in cases in which maligned state actors attempt territorial conquest vis-à-vis another state, one should anticipate a pragmatic response from third-party actors. If the third party elects a proxy war strategy, one should expect it to employ the traditional model against adversaries that it expects to defeat relatively soon. However, if the third party assesses a longer, more costly war, but goes with a proxy strategy, one should anticipate the technology diffusion model (see Figure 3).
Second, the method of identifying a proxy is less a selection process than it is assessing the available actors and evaluating one’s capacity to create a proxy from the groups of fighters, partisans or like-minded people, then being able to transition it into a coherent force that can be put in the field to combat an adversary. In most cases, proxy selection is pragmatic and dynamic—it is based on how available resources allow for the quickest solution.
Finally, the student of warfare must expect proxy wars to continue at a regular clip in the cycle of violence that permeates the modern world. Proxy war provides policymakers, strategists and practitioners with quick, relatively cheap and low-risk (to oneself) options for the continuation of policy aims. The flexibility of proxy war strategies means that they will remain at the fore of international and non-international armed conflict for the foreseeable future.
Ukraine and Proxy War: Improving Ontological Shortcomings in Military Thinking
by Lieutenant Colonel Amos C. Fox
ausa.org · August 16, 2022
In Brief
- Though often overlooked or misinterpreted, proxy war is an important component of armed conflict. Policymakers and practitioners must understand the nuance of proxy war to avoid making missteps in policy and practice.
- A proxy war can take the form of the more-recognized traditional model or of the technology diffusion model. In the traditional model, a principal actor uses a proxy for the day-to-day rigors of combat against an enemy. But in the technology diffusion model, a principal actor provides its agent with financing, weapons, training and equipment.
- Recognizing proxy war’s subcategories, and not misidentifying them as either a coalition or an alliance, is crucial to crafting policy, strategy, plans and doctrine.
Introduction
Proxy war is an underappreciated component of warfare. In many cases, proxy war is omitted from discussions of international armed conflict, relegated to non-international armed conflict and the realm of non-state actors. This taxonomy is incorrect because it overlooks the ways in which state actors use other state actors, in addition to non-state actors, to engage in proxy war.
Further, Western militaries and pundits alike tend to place proxy war in a category outside the bounds of acceptable practice. Instead, they often label proxy war a nefarious activity conducted by cynical strategic actors.1 To be sure, a quick scan of U.S. Army doctrine, for instance, yields scant mention of proxy war, and when proxy war is mentioned, it is applied to non-state actors and how an adversary operates.2 This is also an incorrect categorization of proxy war.
These two ontological misconceptions are the primary factors derailing a clear understanding of how proxy war fits both within warfare and within war as a whole. The ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War provides the defense and security studies communities a ripe opportunity to review their understanding of proxy war and to rectify ontological incongruencies.
The Russo-Ukrainian War demonstrates that proxy wars are not solely the action of cynical, revanchist actors operating through non-state actors. Rather, it is a striking example of how state actors fight proxy wars through other state actors. To that end, multiple Western nations are engaged in a proxy war against Russia to support and defend democratic ideals, the rule of law and the international system.3 However, to see beyond proxy war’s ontological misgivings, and square the circle, a solid theoretical foundation is required. This paper, building on existing proxy war literature, seeks to provide that foundation by introducing two forms of proxy war: the traditional model and the technology diffusion model. This paper builds on those two forms of proxy war and asserts that each form contains two subcategories: state actor and non-state actor. In short, this paper adds to the existing literature on proxy war by injecting four new named and categorized subjects into the field’s taxonomy to overcome the ontological shortcomings of proxy war.
Proxy Wars—A Taxonomy
A proxy war is armed conflict, whether international armed conflict or non-international armed conflict, in which one side (or more) uses an intermediary as its primary combat force to achieve its strategic aims.4 Within proxy wars, five basic strategic relationships exist: coercive, exploitative, transactional, cultural or contractual.5 Those relationships guide the interaction between principal and proxy (see Figure 1). Further, the unique structure of each strategic relationship governs what a principal can expect from, and accomplish with, its proxy. These five relationships come to life in proxy war’s two basic forms—the traditional model and the technology diffusion model (see Figure 2).
Figure 1: Five Models of Proxy War (Enlarge)
Figure 2: Two Forms of Proxy WarTraditional Model
Proxy war’s traditional model results from a principal actor using a proxy for the day-to-day rigors of combat against an enemy. This is the most common form of proxy war and what most people envision when “proxy war” is mentioned. The use of combat advisors, especially at the tactical level, is one of the primary indicators of this form of proxy war. Iran’s use of Iraq-based Shia militia groups to combat the U.S. military during both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Inherent Resolve are recent examples of this form of proxy war, something to which the U.S. military can easily relate.6
Two subcategories exist within the traditional model. The first subcategory occurs when a state actor uses a non-state actor as its proxy. This category aligns with the Iranian model described in the previous paragraph and is the most recognizable form of proxy war.
The second subcategory is less common than the previous, but still pervasive. The second subcategory results from a state actor enlisting another state actor as its proxy, whether explicitly or implicitly, to fight against a common foe. Although it is easy to confuse this subcategory as a coalition or an alliance, it differs in that the principal does not fight alongside the proxy; instead, it provides the proxy with combat support. Combat support often comes in the form of planning, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), targeting, strike and logistics. This category is also characterized by the use of combat advisors, although many of those combat advisors are far closer to the front or fulfill a dual role, both advising and carrying out combat support.
As David Lake notes in a contemporary work on proxy war, the United States’ support to the post-Saddam government of Iraq typifies this subcategory.7 In post-Saddam Iraq, the United States developed, financed, equipped and trained the Iraqi security forces.8 The United States then used the Iraqi security forces to combat Iranian interference in Iraq and to lead the U.S. effort to snuff out the growing post-Saddam insurgency.9 The Iraqi security forces fought alongside and, later, in front of U.S. forces during this war.10 That is not to say that the U.S. military did not conduct unilateral operations, because it did. However, as the war progressed, the U.S. military relied more on the Iraqis for combat operations and took a back seat, offering advice, training and logistical support.11
Operation Inherent Resolve, on the other hand, also provides an example of the traditional model’s state actor/state actor subcategory. Despite being outfitted with friendly terms and phrases such as “partner” and “advise and assist,” the United States’ operational and tactical level reliance on the Iraqi security forces to combat the Islamic State meets the definitional requirements of a proxy war.12 U.S. forces provided combat advisors and planning and logistics advisors, and they covered discrete capability gaps for the Iraqis, to include ISR, targeting and precision strike. All of these factors combine to meet the standard for a traditional principal-proxy relationship.13
To reiterate, the traditional model is the most common form of proxy war. Within this model, two subcategories exist—one in which a state actor fights through a non-state actor, and the other in which a state actor fights through a state actor. It is important to remember that the state actor/non-state actor subcategory can be mistaken as a coalition or an alliance, but proxy relationships are discernible by the degree to which participants share tactical and existential risk.14 In situations in which the risk is offloaded to one actor, and the other actor (or actors) remain(s) relatively clear of harm’s way, the situation is likely a proxy war and not a coalition or an alliance.15
Technology Diffusion Model
The technology diffusion model is proxy war’s second form. This model results from the principal providing its agent with financing, weapons, training and equipment instead of indirectly fighting through the proxy. This model is often a third-party actor’s pragmatic response to the actions of an aggressor state against a weaker actor. Further, this form of proxy war is useful for opportunistic principals interested in seeing an adversarial state actor fail in a third-party conflict. The technology diffusion model is often indicated by operational and strategic combat advising, but also by the use of technical advisors. Technical advisors often operate in third-party countries and train and educate the proxy on the use of foreign-supplied equipment and weapons. The technology diffusion model also has two subcategories.
The first subcategory is the result of a principal providing a non-state actor with financing, weapons, training and other equipment to combat an enemy, but not taking an active role in the fighting itself. This subcategory is fairly common. The United States’ support for the mujahideen during the Soviet-Afghan War (1979–1989) is perhaps one of the best-known examples of this model.16 The U.S. Stinger missile came to be seen as a meme of U.S. involvement in that war, as the Stinger missile decidedly assisted the mujahideen defeat of the Soviet Union. Moreover, Russia’s support to the Taliban and its affiliates during the U.S. war in Afghanistan (2001–2021) is another example of this proxy arrangement.17
On the other hand, the second subcategory results from the principal providing another state actor with financing, weapons, training and other equipment to combat an enemy, but not taking an active role in fighting. From a historical standpoint, the United States’ support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) is an example of this situation.18 However, the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War is a more tangible illustration of this subcategory.
From a technology diffusion standpoint, the United States has provided Ukraine military aid exceeding $4.6 billion since February 2022.19 As recently as 31 May 2022, President Biden reiterated the United States’ commitment to Ukraine’s survival and, conversely, the thwarting of Moscow’s policy aims in Ukraine.20 The most recent aid package, valued at $700 million, includes High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), towed 155 millimeter artillery, a panoply of unmanned aerial systems and a wide variety of other weapons and related equipment.21 Furthermore, American combat advisors trained Ukrainian soldiers in Germany on the use and upkeep of the U.S.-provided combat equipment, to include its towed artillery.22
It is important to note that the donation of money, equipment and weapons does not necessarily equate to an actor engaging in proxy war. Stated or unstated, an actor’s involvement meets proxy war criteria mainly based on the intent behind its contributions and the degree of its support. It is also important to remember that press releases, open-source documents and doctrines often obfuscate intent and methods and instead focus on communicating a narrative. To that end, because a state actor is not using the phrase “proxy war” does not mean that they are not engaged in that activity. In both cases, resource commitment and intent—not words—are the surest way to discern if an actor has committed to a proxy war or if it is just providing a needy international actor with support.
Conclusion
Proxy wars must always be at the fore of warfare studies because they dominate both international and non-international armed conflict. Further, proxy war’s nuance is important to understand because misunderstandings can cue missteps, from the policy level all the way to the tactical level of war. Providing a clear taxonomy for proxy war, as this paper does, helps overcome ontological shortcomings that also contribute to poor showings in proxy war.
Looking to the future, as the international system continues to rely on a rules-based international order, the student of warfare should expect to see a few trends in future war. First, in cases in which maligned state actors attempt territorial conquest vis-à-vis another state, one should anticipate a pragmatic response from third-party actors. If the third party elects a proxy war strategy, one should expect it to employ the traditional model against adversaries that it expects to defeat relatively soon. However, if the third party assesses a longer, more costly war, but goes with a proxy strategy, one should anticipate the technology diffusion model (see Figure 3).
Figure 3: Anticipated Applications
Second, the method of identifying a proxy is less a selection process than it is assessing the available actors and evaluating one’s capacity to create a proxy from the groups of fighters, partisans or like-minded people, then being able to transition it into a coherent force that can be put in the field to combat an adversary. In most cases, proxy selection is pragmatic and dynamic—it is based on how available resources allow for the quickest solution.
Finally, the student of warfare must expect proxy wars to continue at a regular clip in the cycle of violence that permeates the modern world. Proxy war provides policymakers, strategists and practitioners with quick, relatively cheap and low-risk (to oneself) options for the continuation of policy aims. The flexibility of proxy war strategies means that they will remain at the fore of international and non-international armed conflict for the foreseeable future.
★ ★ ★ ★
Lieutenant Colonel Amos C. Fox is an officer in the U.S. Army. He is a PhD candidate at the University of Reading (UK), Deputy Director for Development with the Irregular Warfare Initiative, and he is an associate editor with the Wavell Room. He is also a graduate from the U.S. Army’s School of Advanced Military Studies at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he was awarded the Tom Felts Leadership Award in 2017.
-
Amos Fox, “In Pursuit of a General Theory of Proxy Warfare,” Land Warfare Paper 123 (February 2019): 3–5.
-
Fred Kaplan, “Everyone Is Starting to Admit Something Frightening about Ukraine,” Slate, 29 April 2022.
- Vladimir Rauta, “Proxy War and the Future of Conflict: Take Two,” RUSI Journal (2020): 4–5.
- Amos Fox, “Strategic Relationships, Risk, and Proxy War,” Journal of Strategic Security 14, no. 2 (2021): 6–19.
-
Jeanne Godfroy et al., The U.S. Army in the Iraq War, Volume 2: Surge and Withdrawal, 2007–2011 (Carlisle Barracks, PA: United States Army War College Press, 2019), xxxiii–xxxvi; Phillip Smyth, “The Shia Mapping Project,” Washington Institute for Near East Peace Policy, 20 May 2019.
- Dave Lake, “Iraq, 2003–2011: Principal Failure,” in Proxy Wars: Suppressing Violence Through Local Agents, ed. Dave Lake and Eli Berman (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019), 238–48.
- Jeanne Godfroy et al., The U.S. Army in the Iraq War, Volume 1: Invasion, Insurgency, Civil War, 2003–2006 (Carlisle Barracks, PA: United States Army War College Press, 2019), 169–88.
-
“Proxy Warfare in the Greater Middle East and Its Periphery,” New America.
-
“Operation Together Forward I,” Institute for the Study of War; “Operation Together Forward II,” Institute for the Study of War.
- Godfroy et al., U.S. Army in the Iraq War, Volume 2, 459–70.
-
Frank Hoffman and Andrew Orner, “Dueling Dyads: Conceptualizing Proxy Wars in Strategic Competition,” Foreign Policy Research Institute, 30 August 2021.
-
The White House, “Letter to the Speaker of the House and President Pro Tempore of the Senate Regarding the War Powers Report,” 8 June 2022.
- Fox, “Strategic Relationships, Risk, and Proxy War,” 17–18.
- Fox, “Strategic Relationships, Risk, and Proxy War,” 17–18.
- Christian Parenti, “America’s Jihad: A History of Origins,” Social Justice 28, no. 3 (2001): 31–38.
- Charlie Savage, Eric Schmitt and Michael Schwirtz, “Russia Secretly Offered Afghan Militants Bounties to Kill U.S. Troops, Intelligence Says,” New York Times, 26 June 2020.
- Lake, “Iraq, 2003–2011,” 238–40.
- Dan Lamonthe et al., “U.S. Defends Supplying Advanced Rocket Systems to Ukraine,” Washington Post, 1 June 2022.
- Joseph Biden, “President Biden: What America Will and Will Not Do in Ukraine,” New York Times, 31 May 2022.
-
Antony Blinken, “$700 Million Drawdown of New U.S. Military Assistance for Ukraine,” U.S. Department of State Press Release, 1 June 2022.
- Stephen Losey and Joe Gould, “From Howitzers to Suicide Drones: Pentagon Seeks Right ‘Balance’ on Training Ukrainians on New Arms,” Defense News, 9 May 2022; Jim Garamone, “US Troops Train Ukrainians in Germany,” DOD News, 29 April 2022; Andrew Kramer and Maria Varenikova, “Powerful American Artillery Enters the Fight in Ukraine,” New York Times, 23 May 2022.
ausa.org · August 16, 2022
4. Night of explosions rocks Russian-held areas far from front
Night of explosions rocks Russian-held areas far from front
Reuters · by Tom Balmforth
- Summary
- U.N. chief met Zelenskiy, Turkey's Erdogan in Lviv
- Moscow rejects calls for demilitarised zone around plant
- Blasts near Russian air base in Crimea
KYIV, Aug 19 (Reuters) - Explosions erupted overnight near military bases deep within Russian-held areas of Ukraine and in Russia itself, an apparent display of Kyiv's growing ability to wreak havoc on Moscow's logistics far from front lines.
Ukraine also issued a new warning about a frontline nuclear power station where it said it believed Moscow was planning a "large-scale provocation" as a justification to decouple the plant from the Ukrainian power grid and connect it to Russia's.
In Crimea - the peninsula Russia seized and annexed in 2014 - explosions were reported near an air base in Belbek, on the southwest coast near Sevastopol, headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet. On the opposite end of the peninsula, the sky was also lit up at Kerch near a huge bridge to Russia, with what Russia said was fire from its air defences.
Inside Russia, two villages were evacuated after explosions at an ammunition dump in Belgorod province, near the Ukrainian border but more than 100 km (60 miles) from territory controlled by Ukrainian forces.
Kyiv has cultivated an atmosphere of ambiguity around such explosions by withholding official comment on incidents in Crimea or inside Russia, while hinting that it was behind them, using long-range weapons or sabotage.
Russian officials reported no one hurt in Crimea or Belgorod. They said they had shot down drones in Belbek and Kerch, and confirmed that they had ordered the evacuation of two villages in Belgorod where they were investigating the cause of a fire.
"It certainly looks bad - or good - dependent on the perspective," tweeted former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt, with video showing huge flames and smoke in the night sky, purportedly at the Russian base in Belbek. Reuters could not confirm the authenticity of the video.
Closer to the front, Kyiv also announced a number of strikes overnight behind Russian lines in southern Kherson province, including at a bridge at the Kakhovska Dam, one of the last routes for Russia to supply thousands of troops on west bank of the Dnipro River.
"The Ukrainian armed forces treated the Russians to a magical evening," Seriy Khlan, a member of Kherson's regional council disbanded by Russian occupation forces, wrote on Facebook.
Ukraine hopes its apparent new-found ability to hit Russian targets behind the front line can turn the tide in the conflict, disrupting supply lines Moscow needs to support its occupation.
In recent days, it has been issuing warnings to Russians, for whom Crimea has become a popular summer holiday destination, that nowhere on the peninsula is safe as long as it is occupied.
Last week, a Russian air base on the Crimean coast was hit by simultaneous blasts that destroyed warplanes and left huge impact craters visible from space. Tourists were photographed at nearby beaches, staring up from cabanas at huge mushroom clouds in the sky.
1/12
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres attend a meeting, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Lviv, Ukraine August 18, 2022. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY.
Ukraine has been making use since last month of advanced rockets supplied by the West to strike behind Russian lines. The overnight explosions in Crimea and Belgorod are beyond the range of ammunition Western countries have acknowledged sending so far.
NUCLEAR WARNING
Ukraine's nuclear power operator said on Friday it suspected Moscow was planning to decouple the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant from Ukraine's grid, a complex operation that Kyiv says could cause a disaster at Europe's largest atomic plant.
The power station is held by Russian troops on the bank of a reservoir; Ukrainian forces control the opposite bank.
Moscow has rejected international calls to demilitarise the plant and accuses Kyiv of shelling it. Kyiv denies this and says Russia is using the plant as a shield for forces that fire at Ukrainian-held cities, which Russia denies. Reuters cannot independently verify the military situation at the plant.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonia Guterres, visiting Ukraine, repeated his calls to demilitarise the plant after talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Thursday.
"The facility must not be used as part of any military operation. Instead, agreement is urgently needed to re-establish Zaporizhzhia's purely civilian infrastructure and to ensure the safety of the area," Guterres said.
Russia has said Ukraine might carry out some kind of "provocation" at the nuclear plant during Guterres's visit, which continues on Friday. Kyiv has called that an ominous indication that Russia itself might be preparing to stage an incident to justify cutting the plant from the Ukrainian grid.
Zelenskiy said after meeting Guterres that they had agreed parameters for a possible mission to the plant by the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.
"Russia should immediately and unconditionally withdraw its forces from the territory of Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, as well as stopping any provocations and shelling," Zelenskiy said.
Meanwhile, Russian forces have stepped up their shelling of civilian areas of Kharkiv, Ukraine's second largest city, in recent days, in what British intelligence described as an apparent attempt to force Ukraine to keep troops in the area.
Seventeen people were killed and 42 wounded in two separate Russian attacks there in the past two days, the regional governor said on Thursday. Five more rockets hit the city early on Friday killing at least one person, he said. Moscow denies targeting civilians.
Thousands of people have been killed and millions forced to flee since Russia launched its invasion on Feb. 24, saying it aimed to demilitarise Ukraine and protect Russian speakers on what President Vladimir Putin called historical Russian land. Ukraine and Western countries view it as a war of conquest aimed at wiping out Ukraine's national identity.
Reporting by Reuters bureaux; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Philippa Fletcher
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Reuters · by Tom Balmforth
5. The Bloody Uprising Against the Taliban Led by One of Their Own
There seems to be some resistance potential. What is anyone doing about it (or with it)? Is it supportable?
Excerpts:
After the fighting ended, Mahdi and dozens of his men escaped into the mountains, eluding the Taliban’s helicopters, Humvees and troops. Twenty-five of his men were killed in the fighting, according to his adviser, Rezayee, while hundreds of others hid their weapons and melted back into their villages.
“The war is not over,” Rezayee said in a phone interview two weeks after the battle. “We promise that this is not the end.”
But the fight did not last long.
This week, Taliban security forces recognized Mahdi — his face clean shaven in an attempted disguise — trying to flee across the border into Iran, according to Inayatullah Khwarazmi, the spokesman for the Taliban’s Ministry of Defense, and one of Mahdi’s advisers.
The spokesman said the Taliban killed him. The adviser said the remaining rebels were on the run.
Mahdi’s uprising was over.
The Bloody Uprising Against the Taliban Led by One of Their Own
In northern Afghanistan, hundreds of Shiite Muslims joined an uprising led by a former Taliban commander. Times journalists spent time with the rebels massed to defend themselves.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/18/world/asia/afghanistan-uprising-taliban-mahdi.html?
By Christina Goldbaum and Najim RahimPhotographs by Kiana Hayeri
BALKH AAB, Afghanistan — The rumbling of engines echoed across the valley at dusk, as scores of men with mismatched camouflage and mud-caked Kalashnikovs descended into the town in northern Afghanistan.
Many had driven hours down the snow-capped mountains to reach the town and join forces with Mawlawi Mahdi Mujahid, a former Shiite commander within the mostly Sunni Taliban who had recently renounced the new Taliban government and seized control of this district.
For months, the Taliban had tried to bring him back into their fold, wary of his growing clout among some Afghan Shiites eager to rebel against a movement that persecuted them for decades. Now, Taliban forces were massing around the district he controlled — and Mahdi and his men were readying to fight.
“If the Taliban do not want an inclusive government, if they do not give rights to Shiites and to women, then we will never be able to have peace in Afghanistan,” said one fighter, Sayed Qasim, 70. “As long as we have blood in our body we will fight.”
The clashes in Sar-i-Pul Province in June were the latest in a conflict brewing across northern Afghanistan in which a smattering of armed factions have been challenging the heavy hand of the Taliban government — a harsh reminder that Afghanistan has not yet escaped the cycles of violence and bloodshed that defined the country for the past 40 years.
We visited the rebels in Sar-i-Pul in June, getting a rare glimpse into one of these armed groups that, though limited and relatively small, has defied Taliban rule. Interviews with Mahdi, his fighters and villagers paint a portrait of a resistance driven by the grievances of minorities living under an authoritarian government, and by the tortured mind-set of Afghan men who have known only war and are determined to fight.
Image
A rebel outpost near Qom Kotal mountain in June.
Taliban officials have sought to play down any uprising in order to maintain an image of popular support and of providing peace and security to the country. And it is unlikely that any of the eight or so resistance groups that have emerged so far can pose a legitimate threat to the Taliban’s control of the country. The ragtag militias are ill-equipped and underfunded and have been unable to attract backing from any major foreign power.
Still, the Taliban, intent on stamping out any vestige of dissent, have been consistently brutal. The new government has flooded resistance strongholds with thousands of soldiers who have committed summary executions of captured fighters and tortured residents they believe support the armed opposition, according to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
The crackdown is the latest sign that much like their first regime, the new government relies on force and intimidation to crush any form of dissent. But the brutal tactics risk alienating Afghans already on edge because of the country’s collapsed economy and a return to the Taliban’s hard-line Islamist rule.
The Embers of an Uprising
Early one morning in June, Mahdi gathered a handful of advisers in his home in the center of Balkh Aab and peered out the dirtied window. Outside, the town seemed to buzz with nervous anticipation. Dozens of armed men milled along the muddied main drag, drinking tea and smoking cigarettes as they waited on their marching orders.
Two weeks earlier, Mahdi had seized control of this untamed slice of northern Afghanistan — prompting Taliban forces to mass along its borders. Now a Taliban offensive seemed imminent and the brisk mountain air carried a palpable sense of unease. Most of the district’s 40,000 residents were Hazaras, an ethnic minority of predominantly Shiite Muslims whom the Taliban consider heretics and massacred by the thousands during their first rule.
The 33-year-old rebel leader had grown up in a village not far from here and joined the Taliban after a stint in prison where he found brotherhood among the Talib prisoners who railed against the corruption of the former government. A rare Hazara member of the southern Pashtun movement, the Taliban showcased Mahdi in propaganda videos as proof of the movement’s inclusivity — a move most saw as little more than a publicity stunt.
Editors’ Picks
Image
Mahdi, at center in white, met Taliban fighters in prison and decided to join them. But they had a falling out last year.
But after the Taliban seized power, Mahdi fell out with the new rulers. Most locals say he defected because of a dispute with the Taliban over revenue from Balkh Aab’s lucrative coal mines. By his own telling, Mahdi left the movement in protest, disillusioned with how the insurgents-turned-rulers treated Hazaras.
“After the Islamic Emirate came to power, the Hazaras have suffered the most,” he said in an interview in Balkh Aab. Hazaras “cannot spend their entire lives like this, whether or not they want to now, one day the people will stand against the Islamic Emirate,” he added.
For many residents, Mahdi’s motives didn’t seem to matter. Hundreds of Shiite men eager to take up arms against the Taliban flocked to his new resistance militia in the spring. They were a mix of former policemen, soldiers and veterans of the Fatemiyoun forces, an Iranian-backed militia that fought in Iraq and Syria. To them, his defection offered a rallying cry — proof that no Hazara, even one who had fought on the Taliban’s behalf, would ever be accepted in a country under their control.
Reporting From Afghanistan
“The Taliban must recognize Shiite and Hazara, and participate in the system,” said Mohammad Jawid, 27, who joined Mahdi’s militia this spring. “Otherwise we are here and we will fight for our rights.”
Mr. Jawid huddled among dozens of Mahdi’s men in a small concrete building perched on the edge of the Qom Kotal mountain at the district’s northern flank. The men had slept in shallow caves desperate for any protection from the bitter cold winds and wet pounding of snow.
Inside the building, dozens of men sat on the floor, their weapons sat stacked in the corner and the smell of smoke from a bonfire outside filled the room. Many of the rebels were in their 60s and 70s, with deep creases etched into their brows and ammo belts wrapped around their waist. They had spent their lives fighting first the Soviets and then the Taliban, watching as men like Mahdi switched from enemy to ally, then enemy and ally yet again.
“Do we have rights? Are we not Afghan? For how long can we live like this?” one man shouted from the doorway, as if to rally the cold, shivering militants. “If the fight starts in Balkh Aab, then there will be a fight in Afghanistan!”
Image
Mahdi’s fighters sheltering after a snowstorm in June. Hundreds of Shiite men eager to take up arms against the Taliban flocked to his new resistance militia in the spring.
Later that night along the district’s southern border, some of Mahdi’s advisers gathered at a rebel safe house on the shores of one of the district’s many rivers. One of the advisers, who, fearing retribution, preferred to go by his surname, Rezayee, arrived on a motorcycle and changed out of his military fatigues into the traditional Afghan salwar kameez.
Sitting on a floor cushion, he smiled and asked us: “So, do you have any advice on how to start a war?”
The Battle for Balkh Aab
For all of his impassioned talk of Shiite rights and an enduring stronghold of resistance, Mahdi’s opponent was a weathered insurgent group that would soon apply the full brunt of their decades fighting a global superpower on Mahdi’s ragtag team of men — with gruesome results.
The Taliban launched their offensive in late June, sending thousands of troops through the knee-high snow and jagged peaks to Mahdi’s stronghold on the Qom Kotal mountain. As they opened fire on their positions across the escarpment, helicopters repurposed from the Western-backed government and packed with armed Taliban soldiers orbited overhead. Their tan and green camouflage cut across the pale gray sky as the bone-rattling sound of their rotor blades mixed with the crescendo of automatic fire.
The high-pitched shrieks and heavy thuds of rockets echoed across the mountain and into the valleys below throughout the night, striking terror into the nearby villages. Thousands of residents — once more trapped in a conflict they wanted no part in — loaded the few loaves of bread, water and blankets they had onto the backs of donkeys and began the hourslong walk to safety into nearby mountains, where they listened to the depressingly familiar soundtrack of war.
“The people were hungry and thirsty and the children were crying — we did not know what would happen,” said Reza, 27, a resident who fled.
Despite being outgunned and outmanned, the rebels thought their knowledge of their district’s terrain would give them the upper hand. The area is a labyrinth of mountains and canyons that rise out of the earth as if to swallow any invading force. Entering the district center requires navigating a maze of roads often made impassable by boulders, flash floods and snowstorms that pound the mountains with ice year-round.
Image
Even in June, the mountains in the rebels’ district were glazed with ice.
But the Taliban found two residents to help them navigate the little-known footpaths into the center of the district, outflanking Mahdi’s forces as he concentrated his ragtag group of fighters at Qom Kotal, according to rebel fighters, residents and a Taliban official.
As dawn broke the following morning, Mahdi’s men found the farms and riverbeds surrounding the district center crawling with Taliban soldiers. They opened fire on the unsuspecting rebels who had destroyed the main roads into the town days earlier — a futile attempt to keep the Taliban forces at bay.
For two days, the town was engulfed in running gun battles between the Taliban and Mahid’s men. Shops that lined its main thoroughfare burned. Mud brick homes and at least one Shiite shrine were transformed into defensive positions. As the fighting raged, the Taliban repaired the destroyed roads and sent a convoy of armored vehicles to hold the territory they seized.
In the twilight hours of the Battle for Balkh Aab, the Taliban turned to one of their tried and true weapons — a suicide bomber — to try to flush the last remaining rebel holdouts from the town. The rebels had taken position in one of the homes along the main drag, its metal gate peppered with pockmarks from the fighting. Shell casings littered the surrounding wheat fields, waiting to be discovered by farmers desperate to return to their harvests.
In a lull between bursts of fire, the suicide bomber approached the rebels on foot. But before he could reach their position, Mahdi’s men opened fire and he detonated. The only casualty was the bomber and a donkey who had wandered into the frontline.
Still, the last of Mahdi’s men were surrounded by Taliban soldiers. No rebel reinforcements were on the way. Their only options were to surrender, and face what felt like certain death, or retreat. Either way, the uprising was over.
The Aftermath
After the fighting subsided, an eerie quiet fell over the district. Many of the villagers refused to return home from the mountainside, terrified the Taliban would exact revenge on them. The few who did return walked into scenes of carnage.
Dozens of bloodied bodies of Mahdi’s fighters and Taliban soldiers lay strewn across gardens, farmland and dirt roads in the district center, according to interviews with nearly a dozen locals and a local Taliban official.
A 65-year-old man had been killed after he went to collect the body of his son, a militant with Mahdi who was fatally wounded in the fighting. Both of their bodies were thrown in an open pit in the district center. Nearby, the blood from the donkey killed by the Taliban suicide bomber splattered the ground.
Image
Mahdi surrounded by his fighters at his headquarters.
One resident of Takshar village near the district center barely looked up as he returned home, he said, terrified of making eye contact with the hundreds of Taliban soldiers standing idly on the road. He asked not to be named, out of fear of Taliban retribution.
As he reached his front gate, the man froze: Lying on the ground were the bodies of three of his male relatives who had stayed behind to guard their home against looters, he said. The man grabbed a shovel and dragged their bullet-ridden and bloodied bodies into shallow graves.
On his way back to the mountains, the Takshar resident stumbled upon four more bodies in a nearby alley, he said. Three looked like Mahdi’s fighters, but he recognized the fourth as an old homeless man, Noor Ahmad, known by the nickname Noorak. He stood there for a moment, torn between the urge to bury them, too, and fear of staying too long around the Taliban.
He decided to drag the bodies under the shade of the tree — at least there they would not rot as quickly there, he thought.
After the fighting ended, Mahdi and dozens of his men escaped into the mountains, eluding the Taliban’s helicopters, Humvees and troops. Twenty-five of his men were killed in the fighting, according to his adviser, Rezayee, while hundreds of others hid their weapons and melted back into their villages.
“The war is not over,” Rezayee said in a phone interview two weeks after the battle. “We promise that this is not the end.”
But the fight did not last long.
This week, Taliban security forces recognized Mahdi — his face clean shaven in an attempted disguise — trying to flee across the border into Iran, according to Inayatullah Khwarazmi, the spokesman for the Taliban’s Ministry of Defense, and one of Mahdi’s advisers.
The spokesman said the Taliban killed him. The adviser said the remaining rebels were on the run.
Mahdi’s uprising was over.
Image
After the fighting ended, Mahdi and dozens of his men escaped into the mountains, before Mahdi was captured and killed this week.
Christina Goldbaum reported from Balkh Aab, Afghanistan, and Najim Rahim from Houston. Kiana Hayeri contributed reporting from Balkh Aab, and Safiullah Padshah from Kabul.
6. The republic of fatwas | Opinion
Conclusion:
Khomenei's Islamic revolution in 1979 succeeded in reestablishing the power of the clergy and the potency of the fatwa. For decades, his successor Ali Khamenei has insisted that Khomeini's fatwa against Salman Rushdie is valid. Khamenei understands the transnational power of the fatwa. He uses it to impose his will on how millions of Muslims think, talk, and act in lands far from Iran. This week, a fatwa inspired an American to try and murder another American. The plot failed. Will the next victim be so lucky?
The republic of fatwas | Opinion
MARK DUBOWITZ AND SAEED GHASSEMINEJAD , FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES
ON 8/18/22 AT 6:30 AM EDT
Newsweek · · August 18, 2022
Last week, a Shiite American of Lebanese origin, 24-year-old Hadi Matar, attempted to murder the Indian-born British-American author Salman Rushdie. Matar's social media posts display staunch support of the Islamist regime in Iran and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. Reports indicate Matar was in contact with elements of the Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its Quds Force terrorist arm. Matar was executing former Iranian Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini's three-decade-old fatwa, issued as a death sentence against Rushdie because of the author's publication of The Satanic Verses, a work of fiction that radical Islamists saw as an affront to Islam and the Prophet Muhammed.
Khomeini has been dead since 1989, but his fatwa is not.
The Islamic Republic is a republic of fatwas, where "mujtahids"—those who have earned the right to issue fatwas—run or supervise the day-to-day operation of the regime under the "Vali Faqih," or "the guardianship of the Islamic jurist," the system's chief mujtahid. Today, that is Khomenei's successor, Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei. Mujtahids review any law in the country to ensure they do not run afoul of the Sharia law. Mujtahids dominate the judiciary. The supreme leader's representatives are present in every major organization and, through fatwas, the regime governs every aspect of life in Iran, from banking to hijabs, from foreign policy to family law.
Fatwas are not limited to geographical boundaries. Khomeini's fatwa to murder Rushdie, issued in 1989, was not just about Rushdie. It was about reshaping the world outside Iran's border through the power of fatwa, which connects a mujtahid to any Muslim who follows him anywhere in the world. Khomeini's successor as supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, created armies of Shia militia groups across the region through this relationship. It is through the power of fatwa that Khomeini from his grave reached Hadi Matar, born and raised in America, and inspired him to murder Rushdie.
Fatwas have shaped the history of modern Iran. In the early 19th century, Shiite clerics issued a fatwa to force the reluctant Fath Ali Shah to enter the second Russo-Persian war in 1826. Russia defeated Iran and imposed the treaty of Turkmenchay on Tehran, which ceded vast areas in the southern Caucasus to Russia. Although this fatwa did not end well, it showed the clerics they could mobilize the masses and threaten the Shah.
Islamists wielded influence through fatwas long before the 1979 Islamic Revolution as they fought monarchists and modernizers for power. Defeats in foreign wars destroyed the power of the Qajar kings who had ruled Iran from 1789 to 1925. In their wake, modernizers advocated for Iran to westernize, while the Islamists preached a return to original Islam.
Iranians walk past a billboard displaying Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the capital Tehran, on July 31 2022. ATTA KENARE / AFP/Getty Images
The 19th century witnessed the gradual erosion of the king's power and confrontations between the king and the clergy. The most fateful one happened during the reign of Muzaffar ad-Din Shah, which led to the constitutional revolution of 1905 to 1911 and the establishment of a parliament.
During the revolution, modernizers and Islamists worked together to limit the power of the Shah. But the honeymoon between the two groups did not last; Islamists turned on their allies. Sheikh Fazl Allah Nouri issued a fatwa against constitutionalism ("Mashorooteh") and declared it "haram" or forbidden by Sharia law. In the ensuring civil war, constitutionalists defeated the Islamists, hanged Sheikh Fazl Allah, sent the Shah into exile, and put his son on the throne. A key slogan of the Sheikh's supporters: "We are followers of Quran, we do not want Mashrooteh." There is a highway named after the Sheikh in Tehran today. A martyr to Islamists, he is the spiritual grandfather of the Islamic revolution.
The fall of the Qajar dynasty and the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty temporarily unified the modernizers and the monarchy; marginalizing the clergy became one of their key goals. Reza Shah created the modern school system in Iran, breaking the clergy's monopoly over the education system. Even more significant was the establishment of the modern, secular judiciary in Iran. For centuries, the clergy had played the role of judge, which had offered them significant political and financial power. The new judiciary pushed them out. The loss continued under Reza's son Mohammad Reza Shah. His "White Revolution" transferred land ownership from the landowner class, a key backer of the clergy and the monarchy, to peasants, and gave women the right to vote.
In response, Khomeini brought his followers to the streets to force the Shah to retreat. They failed; Khomeini was arrested and sent to exile. The Shah picked a Baha'i as his personal doctor, Jews such as Habib Elghaniyan played a significant role in the country's economy, and the Shah's sister even converted to Catholicism, a sin punishable by death. The fatwa class was on the verge of losing everything, but Khomeini was adamant to get it all back.
Khomenei saw the opportunity to establish his power and to return the fatwa to its position of political and religious influence. Historically, the "Twelver Shiite" clergy believed that the right to rule only belongs to Allah, which he transferred to the prophet and twelve Imams. Khomeini advanced a minority view that ultimately prevailed: in the absence of the hidden twelfth Imam, the clergy has the right and responsibility to establish an Islamic government based on Sharia law and executed through fatwas. The clergy's objective is to prepare the world for the reappearance of the hidden Imam.
Khomenei's Islamic revolution in 1979 succeeded in reestablishing the power of the clergy and the potency of the fatwa. For decades, his successor Ali Khamenei has insisted that Khomeini's fatwa against Salman Rushdie is valid. Khamenei understands the transnational power of the fatwa. He uses it to impose his will on how millions of Muslims think, talk, and act in lands far from Iran. This week, a fatwa inspired an American to try and murder another American. The plot failed. Will the next victim be so lucky?
Mark Dubowitz is the chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington, D.C.-based nonpartisan policy institute. Saeed Ghasseminejad is a senior Iran and financial economics advisor at FDD.
The views expressed in this article are the writers' own.
Newsweek · by Jason Nichols · August 18, 2022
7. FDD | Another Iran Deal? Looking Back and Looking Ahead
Conclusion:
Renewed talks and side negotiations in Vienna present Washington with a stark choice. It can acquiesce to the regime’s demands and empower a terrorist state with nuclear ambitions. Or it can devise a joint plan with Israel and other Middle Eastern allies to push Iran to embrace a new and completely comprehensive agreement. The goal must be to permanently and verifiably block the regime’s path to a nuclear weapon. Such a deal would restore American and IAEA credibility in the region while preventing a slide toward war.
FDD | Another Iran Deal? Looking Back and Looking Ahead
Jacob Nagel
Senior Fellow
Jonathan Schanzer
Senior Vice President for Research
fdd.org · by Jacob Nagel Senior Fellow · August 18, 2022
After multiple failed rounds of nuclear diplomacy in Vienna and Doha, talks between Iran and the P5+1 (the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia, and China) are back on in Vienna. The revived talks first hit a snag earlier this year when Tehran raised several new demands, including the removal of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from the State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) list. Washington initially balked but reportedly then acquiesced to a partial solution: removing secondary sanctions on companies doing business with the IRGC.
“I am absolutely sincere… when I say that Iran got much more than it could expect,” said Russian diplomat Mikhail Ulyanov back in March. The deal now on the table is far better for Tehran than the one to which Ulyanov referred.
Admittedly, the regime has more than once pumped the brakes on nuclear diplomacy. This intransigence signaled that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader, may not have ever wanted an agreement at all. Rather, he may seek to prolong talks to advance the regime’s nuclear program while avoiding harsh decisions by the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Still, recent news out of Vienna suggests a deal may be imminent, with even more Western concessions.
This memo chronicles Tehran’s dangerous nuclear advances in recent years, the results of American-led diplomacy to curtail this activity, and the actions Israel has taken both to encourage greater American leverage and to hinder Iranian progress.
Iran’s Quest for a Nuclear Weapon
For more than three decades, Tehran has worked, with varying degrees of intensity, to develop a full-fledged military nuclear program. Its leaders deny this, citing a purported fatwa, or Islamic ruling, from Khamenei that abjures nuclear weapons. Israel ultimately proved Iran’s assertion false in 2018, when the Mossad exfiltrated from a Tehran warehouse a secret nuclear archive documenting the clerical regime’s efforts to develop a nuclear weapon.
The archive revealed that Iran’s covert nuclear weapons program, which began in the late 1990s, was far more advanced than Western intelligence had previously assessed. One of the documents included handwritten instructions by Iranian leaders to the program’s directors, ordering them to design, build, and test five 10-kiloton nuclear warheads. Attached to the document were blueprints for a warhead and descriptions of a plan to affix it to a long-range ballistic missile.
The regime in Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which theoretically should restrict its nuclear ambitions. However, this has not stopped Tehran from building uranium enrichment facilities and concealing them from the IAEA, the UN body that monitors and verifies Iran’s nuclear commitments.
For a country to become a nuclear-threshold state, it must develop three key components: fissile material (enriched uranium or plutonium); a weapon system to detonate the fissile material; and a delivery system to carry the weapon. Once a nation completes these steps, its acquisition of a nuclear weapon depends not on technology or capability, but only on political will and timing. In such a situation, military intervention or regime change may constitute the only means to prevent a larger crisis.
The Iranian regime has worked for years to master all three components. But progress has not been linear. In 2003, Tehran curtailed but did not end its nuclear weapons development, likely fearing an attack by the West in the wake of America’s invasion of Iraq. The regime may or may not have resumed those weaponization activities. If it has, it is probably keeping a low profile, mostly under the cover of academic work.
Nevertheless, the Islamic Republic has steadily added to its nuclear gains for 15 years and counting. In 2007, it initiated enrichment at the Natanz nuclear site, which had been covert until an Iranian opposition group exposed it in 2002. In 2009, the United States, the United Kingdom, and France exposed another underground enrichment site in Fordow, located in the Iranian province of Qom. Months later, in 2010, the regime began enriching uranium to 20 percent purity at Natanz, likely to gain leverage in future negotiations.
The level of 20 percent purity is significant. While a nuclear weapon requires a few dozen kilograms of uranium enriched to more than 93 percent, the time and effort to enrich natural uranium to 20 percent purity accounts for the majority of the process.
Between 2006 and 2010, the UN Security Council imposed four rounds of nuclear and economic sanctions on the regime. Between 2010 and 2013, Washington imposed additional sanctions that crippled the Iranian economy. Yet Tehran defiantly continued to expand its nuclear program, ultimately amassing large quantities of uranium enriched to 5 percent as well as a smaller amount enriched to 20 percent.
Israel, in turn, launched what it described as the “war between wars” — an asymmetric “gray zone” campaign targeting Iranian assets related to Tehran’s nuclear and conventional military capabilities. According to various sources, this campaign included cyberattacks against Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Fears mounted in both Washington and Tehran about a possible Israeli military strike. This prompted an international effort to reach an agreement that would halt Tehran’s program. Yet the more the West endeavored to meet Iran’s demands, the more the regime increased them. Tehran advanced its nuclear program and committed additional NPT violations. This was the case a decade ago. It is the case now.
Negotiations Begin
While various initiatives to engage Tehran were reported in the decade prior, the first serious effort to negotiate with the Iranian regime began in 2011. The Obama administration understood the importance of securing Israeli support for the negotiations given the threat that Iran posed to the Jewish state. The administration sought to use confidence-building measures to reassure Israel and other nervous Middle Eastern allies. Thus began a series of U.S. visits to meet with senior Israeli officials. American officials said they sought an interim deal that Iran would reject, thereby making it easier for the UN Security Council to impose additional sanctions, possibly without the objection of Russia and China.
Still, the Obama team argued that even if Iran accepted the interim plan, in full or in part, the final agreement would meet Israeli demands, based on the limitations specified by the Security Council. Jerusalem stated that the only suitable outcome would be “zero, zero, zero.” Tehran could have no enrichment facilities or centrifuge research and development (R&D); no plutonium, heavy water reactors, or separation plants; and no fissile material inside Iran.
However, while one American team was building trust with Israel, secret negotiations between the United States and Iran began in Oman in 2012. The talks were led by figures now holding key positions in the Biden administration: National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and CIA Director William Burns, then serving as the State Department’s director of policy planning and deputy secretary of state, respectively. These secret negotiation laid the foundation for both the 2013 interim agreement, formally known as the Joint Plan of Action (JPOA), and the 2015 final agreement, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
In exchange for minimal nuclear concessions, the JPOA granted Iran — for the first time — a de facto authorization to enrich uranium, contravening multiple Security Council resolutions. This concession directly reneged on the Obama administration’s pledge to Israel. The agreement, designed to last six months, lasted two years as Iran and world powers repeatedly extended talks past self-imposed deadlines. The deal effectively rewarded Tehran with cash every month simply for negotiating. Billions of dollars in sanctions relief injected new life into Iran’s sanctions-battered economy.
Israel’s Warnings
With negotiations underway, Israel formed a group of experts from the Israel Defense Forces’ Military Intelligence Directorate and Planning Directorate, the Mossad, the National Security Council, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Defense’s Political-Military Division, the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission, and the Ministry for Strategic Affairs. While Israel was not a party to the negotiations, the group of experts worked intensively with the world powers negotiating with the Iranians. Jerusalem aimed to underscore the dangers of an agreement that failed to permanently prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
The team of experts forwarded dozens of technical papers to the American and other negotiators. They called for an Iranian breakout time — the time needed to produce enough fissile material for one nuclear bomb — of at least several years rather than merely one year (as proposed in the talks). The Israeli experts wanted Tehran to dismantle all enrichment infrastructure and ship it out of Iran. They called for a full disclosure of the Iranian nuclear program’s “possible military dimensions” (PMD).
The experts also sought a complete cessation of Iranian R&D on advanced centrifuges, as well as assurances that Iran’s Arak reactor would not be a heavy water facility. They recommended the retention of sanctions on the Islamic Republic for at least 20 years, if not longer. These recommendations went largely unheeded.
A Deal Is Struck
The final round of talks lasted approximately nine consecutive weeks in 2015, concluding with the finalized JCPOA on July 14. The deal gave Iran nearly everything it wanted, primarily due to the other side’s eagerness to reach an agreement. Communication between the Israeli experts and the U.S. negotiators broke down. The Obama administration blamed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s March 2015 speech to the U.S. Congress — delivered against the wishes of the president — criticizing the emerging deal. But this was not the only reason. The discussions were simply no longer productive. The American negotiators wanted an agreement at almost any cost, and Israel’s protests were no longer welcome.
Thus, even as Tehran continued to call for the annihilation of Israel, the JCPOA provided the regime with a clear path to nuclear weapons and the ability to acquire the necessary infrastructure. The agreement effectively enabled Iran to become an internationally recognized and legitimate nuclear-threshold state. The regime also reaped a massive financial windfall, enabling an alarming increase in Iranian support for terrorist groups across the region — Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and the Houthis in Yemen, among others. No less alarming for Israel: The JCPOA provided a template for other Middle Eastern countries to pursue the status of a threshold state.
Moreover, UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which endorsed the agreement, codified the JCPOA’s sunset provisions. Per the resolution, the UN arms embargo on Iran expired in 2020 even though Tehran had repeatedly violated it by sending weapons to violent proxies and terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Bahrain. Resolution 2231 also removed the ban on Iranian tests of “ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons.” The resolution merely “call[ed] upon” Tehran to halt its missile development, and even that non-binding language will expire next year. Since 2015, Iran has tested dozens of ballistic missiles.
The Israeli Response
The Israeli cabinet issued a statement rejecting the deal on the day of the JCPOA’s finalization. Thereafter, the Israeli government launched a campaign to educate Congress and the broader U.S. public about the loopholes, gaps, and other flaws in the agreement. It was a last-ditch effort to prevent the deal from entering into force.
It was no use, however. Congress failed to muster the necessary votes to stop the agreement. By the end of 2015, the IAEA prematurely closed its investigation of the PMD of Iran’s nuclear program, paving the way for the JCPOA’s implementation in January 2016. The Iranian economy soon received billions of dollars in sanctions relief, enabling a conventional military buildup and a surge in terror sponsorship worldwide.
Apart from concealing from the IAEA the existence of a secret nuclear weapons archive, undeclared nuclear sites, and undeclared nuclear material, Iran abided by most of its other commitments under the deal. Tehran understood that patience was all that was needed to ultimately gain a legitimized nuclear program along with massive economic benefits. This calculus was upended when President Donald Trump pulled out of the agreement in 2018. Before he made his final decision, however, the administration offered the Iranians opportunities to negotiate a more comprehensive agreement. They refused.
Tehran treaded carefully at first but then substantially increased its violations following the November 2020 election of President Joe Biden, who signaled an eagerness to return to the deal and removed a credible U.S. military threat from the equation.
Russia, China, and Europe assert that Iran’s nuclear violations were the result of Washington’s unilateral withdrawal. However, the most egregious Iranian violations did not occur until 2021, after Biden’s election and the subsequent renewal of negotiations. Tehran appeared to seek leverage for these talks.
In response, Israel has increased the intensity of its war between wars. According to a wide range of Israeli and other sources, this campaign has impeded Iran’s military expansion in Syria and limited the regime’s efforts to supply its Lebanese terrorist proxy, Hezbollah, with lethal precision-guided munitions. More importantly, Israel has reportedly acted against Iran’s nuclear program, eliminating senior nuclear officials as well as some physical components.
Returning to the JCPOA
Israel’s shadow war notwithstanding, the regime’s nuclear advances have rendered a return to the old agreement futile. Iran’s nuclear progress since 2015, and particularly since Biden’s election, is beyond the point of containment. This underscores why the original deal was a mistake. The data disclosed by the nuclear archive, as well as new information obtained by IAEA inspectors since 2015, show that the JCPOA failed to account for the full range of Iranian nuclear activities, including activities that preceded the agreement.
Between the JCPOA’s finalization and America’s 2018 exit from the deal, the Iranian regime increased uranium enrichment and added advanced centrifuges, as permitted under the agreement. This enabled Iran to transition to clandestine underground enrichment. The regime already had second-generation IR-2M centrifuges operating in the Natanz underground facility, even though the JCPOA prohibited it.
Worse, the agreement did not bar the regime from stockpiling raw materials or producing advanced centrifuges. This undermined optimistic calculations of Tehran’s breakout time projected by supporters of the deal. Iran has already mastered the enrichment technology needed to amass enough fissile material for a weapon.
As Secretary of State Antony Blinken ceded in April 2022, Iran’s breakout time was “down to a matter of weeks.” Since then, the regime’s breakout time has reportedly dropped to near zero. A return to the original agreement as written is therefore futile.
The Failures of the IAEA
The decision to close the PMD investigation was among the West’s biggest mistakes. Today, the regime insists this issue is not open for discussion. Regime negotiators now demand that all IAEA investigations — new and old — be closed or written off. This is reportedly one of the remaining sticking points in Vienna.
Regardless of the terms of any deal that is reached, the regime in Iran is much closer to a bomb than previously estimated. The IAEA has only recently reached this conclusion, thanks largely to Israeli evidence. The nuclear watchdog appears incapable of fulfilling its mandate independently. This alone raises troubling questions about the feasibility of a sustainable agreement, which would require reliable monitoring and verification.
A fundamental aim of the 2015 deal was to establish airtight, unprecedented inspections of Iranian nuclear sites. The IAEA’s strict inspections were supposed to be the most effective tool in the agreement. Yet these inspections, which never extended to military sites or sites connected to Iran’s secret nuclear-military Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research, missed the nuclear archive and all the nuclear sites and activities the IAEA subsequently discovered thanks to the archive. In the meantime, the IAEA has repeatedly put JCPOA violations on the back burner for the sake of preserving the agreement.
The IAEA director general, Rafael Grossi, has repeatedly traveled to Tehran in an attempt to reach new understandings with the regime. Yet Tehran has accelerated its nuclear activities, breaching not only the JCPOA but also the NPT, Iran’s Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA, and the Additional Protocol. The IAEA’s failure to address these violations has severely damaged its credibility and could effectively end the agency’s status as an independent body.
The Iranian Strategy
The Iranian nuclear strategy appears to be based on four assumptions. The first is that the United States, under its current leadership, lacks the will to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. This view has yielded a second — and erroneous — belief that Israel lacks sufficient capabilities to strike Iran’s nuclear program and will not attack without American support. Third, the Islamic Republic believes its economy can withstand Washington’s current economic pressure, which is significantly weaker than the sanctions of past administrations. And finally, the regime believes it faces no meaningful internal threats to its survival. These four views explain why Tehran has not exhibited any flexibility at the negotiating table.
JCPOA-Minus Agreement
With negotiations now at a pivotal moment, Jerusalem’s primary concern is that Washington will agree to a “JCPOA-minus.” The White House is reportedly willing to offer sanctions relief that goes far beyond the JCPOA’s concessions. In particular, the Biden team has offered to lift sanctions on thousands of individuals and entities, including Iranian banks, the supreme leader, and his inner circle. Moreover, U.S. Special Envoy for Iran Rob Malley and his team, together with some EU high officials, have explored ways to comply with the Iranian demand to remove IRGC-related entities from the FTO list despite promises from the White House to the contrary.
Offering additional concessions to the regime is irresponsible, particularly amidst a spate of regime-inspired attacks and plots on American soil. Moreover, Iran is already enriching uranium at 60 percent, manufacturing and testing advanced centrifuges, and blocking the IAEA’s access to active nuclear sites and other locations where violations have occurred in the past. Tehran refuses to dismantle the advanced centrifuges it has produced in violation of the 2015 agreement.
And the clock is still ticking. In 2027, the JCPOA’s limitations on the regime’s industrial-scale production and installation of centrifuges, including advanced ones, will expire. In 2031, the deal’s restrictions on Iranian fissile-material stockpiles and enrichment, including to weapons-grade, will expire, too. Enrichment at Fordow and the building of new enrichment plants will be permitted. The bans on processing plutonium, storing heavy water, and constructing heavy water reactors will be lifted. Tehran will be in a position to produce dozens of bombs.
Toward A Better Agreement
Should the Biden administration wish to negotiate a deal that would truly restrain Iran from attaining a nuclear weapon, it must address the three key steps for becoming a nuclear-threshold state. The IAEA should strictly prohibit Tehran from producing fissile materials and or possessing the technology needed to develop a bomb. This cannot be subject to negotiation. Without such restrictions, the Iranians will be three to five months away from a nuclear weapon — with tacit international approval.
Additionally, while the United States and Israel have long measured Iran’s nuclear progress in terms of breakout times, this concept is no longer helpful. Tehran has no intention of “breaking out” to a weapon. Rather, it will “sneak out” in undisclosed underground facilities using advanced centrifuges that enrich at much higher speeds.
Any viable deal must force the regime to come clean about its past activities, reopen the PMD investigations closed in 2015, and answer all questions stemming from new findings. The United States cannot conclude a worthwhile deal if Iran fails to confess to its past violations and fully disclose all its previous nuclear activities.
Finally, addressing the Iranian regime’s delivery systems, primarily ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads, requires more than weakly worded UN resolutions. The missile-test ban, already rendered toothless in 2015, will expire entirely in 2023. A better agreement should put a permanent stop to the development of these missiles, even if the regime says this is non-negotiable.
Recent Iranian and American Positions
In nuclear talks over the past year, Iranian negotiators introduced several new demands. In addition to its requirement to remove the IRGC from the FTO list, Tehran called for guarantees for compensation in an event of another American withdrawal. The regime also sought to close all the IAEA’s open files and to end all investigations, past and present.
In effort to demonstrate it has not capitulated to the regime’s terms, Washington made new demands: Tehran must commit to halt aggression in the Persian Gulf, particularly by curbing the IRGC’s activities there, and to communicate directly with Washington. The viability of such an arrangement is questionable given the regime’s past behavior and stated goal of destabilizing the region. Interestingly, U.S. efforts to reach a “longer and stronger” accord, as the Biden team promised upon his election, have ended.
An immediate concern is that the JCPOA’s restrictions will soon sunset. In 2025, world powers will lose the “snapback” mechanism to reinstate all sanctions in response to an Iranian nuclear violation, as stipulated in the original agreement. Iran has already committed multiple violations to justify such a move.
The neutering of the IAEA is further undermining Washington’s ability to hold Iran to account. The IAEA has already halted its investigation of Iran’s development of uranium metal. Three other files relevant to illicit nuclear activity await Iranian explanations that will probably not materialize. If Washington and Tehran reach a new agreement, the likelihood that the IAEA will press for answers on other possible Iranian nuclear violations seems even more remote. The United States should wield its economic leverage to require the regime to come clean on its past activities.
Only one part of the 2015 agreement deals with the regime’s development of a weapon system: Section T of Annex I. However, Israeli officials believe there is a 2015 side agreement between the Russians, the Iranians, and the United States not to enforce this section. Other side agreements may have found their way into the recent talks in Vienna, further undermining the leverage needed to hold the regime to account.
Most obviously, the lifting of sanctions will erode what remains of U.S. and Western leverage to pressure the regime to end its nuclear ambitions. This was a fatal flaw of the last agreement, and complicates the deal currently being negotiated.
A Bipartisan Opportunity
Earlier this year, 165 House Republicans published a letter to President Biden vowing that a new deal would meet the same fate as the JCPOA if he fails to secure congressional support pursuant to the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act. This law, passed in May 2015, requires the president to submit any deal to the House and Senate for approval. Forty-nine out of 50 Republican senators issued a similar warning in another letter.
In light of Iran’s continued intransigence, Democrats and Republicans should be able to agree that further concessions are a bad idea. Skeptical Democrats should deliver the message to the White House that capitulating to Iran is extremely dangerous.
The Head of the Octopus
Israel, for its part, is expected to intensify its asymmetric campaign, enlisting the integrated tools and skills of multiple Israeli agencies to weaken Iran in the economic, diplomatic, military, political, cyber, and legal arenas. The message from Jerusalem to Tehran has been blunt: Gone are the days when the “head of the octopus” remained untouched while the regime’s terrorist tentacles destabilized the Middle East. Israel’s decision to strike Iran at home, as opposed to merely batting its proxies, was a shift first articulated in former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 2018 updated National Security Strategy. The essence of the strategy has since been embraced by Netanyahu’s successors, Prime Ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid.
The Israeli campaign also includes efforts to inform the international public, primarily in the United States, about the dangers posed by a nuclear Iran. That campaign has a long way to go from Israel’s perspective. The American people largely do not understand that a nuclear-armed Iran could soon pose a threat to the United States once the regime acquires intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Conclusion
Renewed talks and side negotiations in Vienna present Washington with a stark choice. It can acquiesce to the regime’s demands and empower a terrorist state with nuclear ambitions. Or it can devise a joint plan with Israel and other Middle Eastern allies to push Iran to embrace a new and completely comprehensive agreement. The goal must be to permanently and verifiably block the regime’s path to a nuclear weapon. Such a deal would restore American and IAEA credibility in the region while preventing a slide toward war.
Brigadier General (Res.) Jacob Nagel is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a visiting professor at the Technion Aerospace Faculty. He previously served as acting national security adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and as head of Israel’s National Security Council. Jonathan Schanzer is senior vice president for research at FDD and a former terrorism finance analyst at the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
fdd.org · by Jacob Nagel Senior Fellow · August 18, 2022
8. Russia’s spies misread Ukraine and misled Kremlin as war loomed
Interesting assessment here:
Six months into the war, neither side appears to have a clear upper hand.
Ukraine’s security agencies have scored notable victories. Early on, a Ukrainian nongovernmental organization published what it described as a roster of FSB operatives linked to the war effort, posting the identities and passport numbers of dozens of alleged spies in a move meant to disrupt the agency’s plans and rattle its personnel. A person connected to the NGO, which is called Myrotvorets, or Peacemaker, said the data was obtained by Ukraine’s security services. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing threats to his security.
At the same time, Ukraine’s main internal security service, the SBU, has struggled to rid its ranks of Russian moles and saboteurs. Several senior officers have been arrested and branded traitors by Zelensky, who took the extraordinary step in July of removing SBU Director Ivan Bakanov — a childhood friend — from his post.
Putin is not believed to have taken comparable action against any of his spy chiefs, despite the scale of their misjudgments.
“If your security services put such a high priority on understanding Ukraine, and your military plan is based on that understanding, how could they have gotten it so wrong?” said William B. Taylor Jr., who twice served as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, including in an acting capacity in 2019. “How could they have assumed the Ukrainians wouldn’t fight, that President Zelensky would not resist so valiantly? The disconnect has to be somewhere between the FSB and the very top.”
Russia’s spies misread Ukraine and misled Kremlin as war loomed
By Greg Miller and Catherine Belton
Aug. 19 at 2:00 a.m.
The Washington Post · by Greg Miller · August 19, 2022
KYIV, Ukraine — In the final days before the invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s security service began sending cryptic instructions to informants in Kyiv. Pack up and get out of the capital, the Kremlin collaborators were told, but leave behind the keys to your homes.
The directions came from senior officers in a unit of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) with a prosaic name — the Department of Operational Information — but an ominous assignment: ensure the decapitation of the Ukrainian government and oversee the installation of a pro-Russian regime.
The messages were a measure of the confidence in that audacious plan. So certain were FSB operatives that they would soon control the levers of power in Kyiv, according to Ukrainian and Western security officials, that they spent the waning days before the war arranging safe houses or accommodations in informants’ apartments and other locations for the planned influx of personnel.
“Have a successful trip!” one FSB officer told another who was being sent to oversee the expected occupation, according to intercepted communications. There is no indication that the recipient ever made it to the capital, as the FSB’s plans collapsed amid the retreat of Russian forces in the early months of the war.
The communications exposing these preparations are part of a larger trove of sensitive materials obtained by Ukrainian and other security services and reviewed by The Washington Post. They offer rare insight into the activities of the FSB — a sprawling service that bears enormous responsibility for the failed Russian war plan and the hubris that propelled it.
An agency whose domain includes internal security in Russia as well as espionage in the former Soviet states, the FSB has spent decades spying on Ukraine, attempting to co-opt its institutions, paying off officials and working to impede any perceived drift toward the West. No aspect of the FSB’s intelligence mission outside Russia was more important than burrowing into all levels of Ukrainian society.
And yet, the agency failed to incapacitate Ukraine’s government, foment any semblance of a pro-Russian groundswell or interrupt President Volodymyr Zelensky’s hold on power. Its analysts either did not fathom how forcefully Ukraine would respond, Ukrainian and Western officials said, or did understand but couldn’t or wouldn’t convey such sober assessments to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The humiliations of Russia’s military have largely overshadowed the failures of the FSB and other intelligence agencies. But in some ways, these have been even more incomprehensible and consequential, officials said, underpinning nearly every Kremlin war decision.
“The Russians were wrong by a mile,” said a senior U.S. official with regular access to classified intelligence on Russia and its security services. “They set up an entire war effort to seize strategic objectives that were beyond their means,” the official said. “Russia’s mistake was really fundamental and strategic.”
Ukraine’s security services have an interest in discrediting Russia’s spy agencies, but key details from the trove were corroborated by officials in Western governments.
The files show that the FSB unit responsible for Ukraine surged in size in the months leading up to the war and was counting on support from a vast network of paid agents in Ukraine’s security apparatus. Some complied and sabotaged Ukraine’s defenses, officials said, while others appear to have pocketed their FSB payments but balked at doing the Kremlin’s bidding when the fighting started.
There are records that add to the mystery of Russian miscalculations. Extensive polls conducted for the FSB show that large segments of Ukraine’s population were prepared to resist Russian encroachment, and that any expectation that Russian forces would be greeted as liberators was unfounded. Even so, officials said, the FSB continued to feed the Kremlin rosy assessments that Ukraine’s masses would welcome the arrival of Russia’s military and the restoration of Moscow-friendly rule.
“There was plenty of wishful thinking in the GRU and the military, but it started with the FSB,” said a senior Western security official, using the GRU abbreviation for Russia’s main military intelligence agency. “The sense that there would be flowers strewn in their path — that was an FSB exercise.” He and other security officials in Ukraine, the United States and Europe spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence.
Adhering to these erroneous assumptions, officials said, the FSB championed a war plan premised on the idea that a lightning assault on Kyiv would topple the government in a matter of days. Zelensky would be dead, captured or in exile, creating a political vacuum for FSB agents to fill.
Instead, FSB operatives who at one point had reached the outskirts of Kyiv had to retreat alongside Russian forces, Ukrainian security officials said. Rather than presiding over the formation of a new government in Kyiv, officials said, the FSB now faces difficult questions in Moscow about what its long history of operations against Ukraine — and the large sums that financed them — accomplished.
The FSB did not respond to requests for comment.
The FSB’s plans and the efforts of Ukraine’s security agencies to thwart them — with backing from the CIA, Britain’s MI6 and other Western intelligence services — are part of a shadow war that has played out in parallel to Russia’s military campaign. It is a conflict that was underway long before the Feb. 24 invasion, and its battle lines are blurred by the tangled, overlapping histories of Russian services and Ukrainian counterparts that began as offspring of the Soviet-era KGB.
Six months into the war, neither side appears to have a clear upper hand.
Ukraine’s security agencies have scored notable victories. Early on, a Ukrainian nongovernmental organization published what it described as a roster of FSB operatives linked to the war effort, posting the identities and passport numbers of dozens of alleged spies in a move meant to disrupt the agency’s plans and rattle its personnel. A person connected to the NGO, which is called Myrotvorets, or Peacemaker, said the data was obtained by Ukraine’s security services. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing threats to his security.
Ivan Bakanov, who headed the SBU, Ukraine's main internal security service, at the start of the war. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Efrem Lukatsky/AP; iStock)
At the same time, Ukraine’s main internal security service, the SBU, has struggled to rid its ranks of Russian moles and saboteurs. Several senior officers have been arrested and branded traitors by Zelensky, who took the extraordinary step in July of removing SBU Director Ivan Bakanov — a childhood friend — from his post.
Putin is not believed to have taken comparable action against any of his spy chiefs, despite the scale of their misjudgments.
“If your security services put such a high priority on understanding Ukraine, and your military plan is based on that understanding, how could they have gotten it so wrong?” said William B. Taylor Jr., who twice served as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, including in an acting capacity in 2019. “How could they have assumed the Ukrainians wouldn’t fight, that President Zelensky would not resist so valiantly? The disconnect has to be somewhere between the FSB and the very top.”
II
Among those making plans to arrive in Kyiv in late February was Igor Kovalenko, identified by Ukraine as a senior FSB officer who had for years been a principal handler of some of the most prominent Ukrainian politicians and government officials secretly on the Kremlin’s payroll, including members of the opposition party co-chaired by Viktor Medvedchuk, a close friend of Putin.
An exchange Kovalenko had with an FSB subordinate on Feb. 18 suggests that he had his eye on an apartment in Kyiv’s leafy Obolon neighborhood, overlooking the Dnieper River.
Intercepted communications show that Kovalenko asked for the address of the apartment and contact details for an FSB informant who occupied it. Ukrainian authorities said the resident was subsequently detained and questioned.
Igor Kovalenko, identified by Ukraine as a senior FSB officer, seemed to have his eye on an informant's apartment in a building in Kyiv's Obolon neighborhood. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Heidi Levine for The Washington Post; iStock)
Kovalenko’s subordinate sent back the address, phone numbers and code words used to communicate with the informant, who served in Zelensky’s government, Ukrainian officials said.
The officials declined to identify the informant but said he admitted that he had received FSB instructions days before the invasion to pack his belongings, leave his keys and get out of the capital to ensure his personal security during the war’s initial phase.
Other informants detained by Ukrainian authorities have provided similar accounts, one of the officials said. “They had been told, ‘When you return, it will all be different.’ ”
Details published by Peacemaker and confirmed by Ukrainian security officials describe Kovalenko as a 47-year-old veteran of the spy service who in recent years was responsible for managing the agency’s clandestine ties to Ukraine’s parliament and main pro-Russian party.
Kovalenko did not respond to requests for comment.
Ukrainian authorities believe that Kovalenko may have been just miles from the capital in March, accompanying Russian forces then outside the city. But the FSB team assigned to set up operations in Kyiv had to abandon that plan when Russia’s forces began their retreat, officials said.
The Obolon apartment was placed under surveillance by the SBU after the address surfaced in communications intercepts, officials said. Neither Kovalenko nor any other FSB officer ever turned up to claim the keys.
III
Kovalenko is a senior officer in an FSB unit — the Ninth Directorate of the Department of Operational Information — whose main purpose has for years been to ensure Ukraine’s servility to Moscow.
The department is overseen by a senior FSB officer, Sergey Beseda, who started his career with the KGB in the late 1970s, according to Ukrainian officials, and was assigned to overseas posts including Cuba before returning to Moscow to head operations in Ukraine, Georgia and other former Soviet republics.
After protests erupted in Kyiv in late 2013 against the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovych, Beseda turned up in the Ukrainian capital urging Yanukovych to use deadly force to put down an uprising that would come to be known as the Maidan Revolution, Ukrainian officials said.
When the protesters prevailed, Yanukovych fled to Russia with a group of senior advisers suspected of working with Beseda’s branch in the years that followed to bring a pro-Russian government back to power.
Anti-government protesters rally in Kyiv in December 2013 in what would become known as the Maidan Revolution. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Brendan Hoffman/Getty; iStock)
That project appeared to take on new urgency in the two years leading up to the February invasion.
In 2019, the FSB began a major expansion of its Ukraine unit, a group that grew from 30 officers to as many as 160 last summer, according to Ukrainian officials who cited intercepted communications and other intelligence.
To entice recruits from other branches, the FSB offered bonuses and free housing in buildings adjacent to the FSB training academy on Michurinsky Prospekt in Moscow, officials said. Arriving officers were assigned territories in Ukraine and tasked with developing lists of collaborators to work with, as well as adversaries to neutralize.
At first, the surge was seen as another venture aimed at “returning Russian influence in Ukraine,” said a security official in Kyiv involved in tracking FSB operations. But in retrospect, it may have been an early signal that Russia was shifting focus, the official said, from shaping events in Ukraine to plotting “its seizure.”
As Russia’s military mobilization accelerated last year, Ukraine’s security services were inundated with additional intelligence from Western spy services, officials said.
On Jan. 12, CIA Director William J. Burns arrived in Kyiv with a detailed dossier on Russia’s plans and a team of accompanying U.S. officials who sought to convince Zelensky and his inner circle that war was imminent.
Yet when the CIA team departed, Ukraine’s spy chiefs gathered with Zelensky to deliver a follow-on briefing that was far more equivocal.
“We relayed all the information that the Americans had shared without any changes,” said a participant. But at the same time, the official said, “our information said that the Russians are not planning war” on such a large scale, and that judgment was given equal weight alongside the CIA warnings.
The final weeks before the invasion were punctuated by a flurry of contradictory intelligence reports and confusing signals from European officials.
Ten days after Burns’s visit, the British government declared that it had “information that indicates the Russian government is looking to install a pro-Russian leader in Kyiv as it considers whether to invade and occupy Ukraine.”
The British file identified a pro-Russian former member of Ukraine’s parliament, Yevhen Murayev, “as a potential candidate,” a claim that Murayev dismissed as “ridiculous and funny” in a response to the Associated Press. The British statement also listed former members of Yanukovych’s cabinet, alleging that they had links to Russian intelligence and that officers they were in contact with were “involved in the planning for an attack on Ukraine.”
Russian Sergey Beseda, who oversees the FSB's Ukraine directorate. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Photo obtained by The Washington Post; iStock)
About the same time, Ukraine’s security agencies picked up indications that FSB operatives were in direct communication with Russia’s airborne forces, officials said. Such direct interaction between the FSB and military units was so unusual, officials said, that it was regarded as a worrisome sign of joint operational planning.
That concern seems to have been well-placed. Russia’s airborne forces played a pivotal role in the capture of an airport in Hostomel, on the outskirts of Kyiv, in the early hours of the invasion. It was a key node for the anticipated assault on the capital, and FSB officers were observed there before Russian forces were driven from the airstrip, officials said.
Other late-arriving intelligence, however, seemed to cast doubt on the idea that Russia was even prepared for, let alone planning, full-scale combat.
In mid-February, Ukraine’s foreign intelligence service, the SZR, sent agents into Russia to carry out surveillance operations on military units. One team encountered a Potemkin village of Russian hardware, officials said, with dozens of parked tanks accompanied by a small security detail. No tank operators or maintenance crews were anywhere in the vicinity.
Elsewhere, Ukraine’s spies came upon a scene of disciplinary mayhem: lines of stranded Russian vehicles accompanied by troops who had bartered fuel and other supplies for alcohol. “A lot of them were drunk,” said a Ukrainian official who reviewed reports on what Ukraine’s spies had witnessed.
The scenes fed doubts among security advisers to Zelensky, some of whom were understandably disinclined to believe that their country’s days might be numbered. Even now, months later, many continue to express disbelief that Russia pressed ahead so poorly prepared.
European officials also remained skeptical. In Kyiv on Feb. 8, French President Emmanuel Macron said he had received a personal assurance from Putin that Russia would not escalate the situation. Germany’s spy chief, Bruno Kahl, had said days earlier that Putin’s decision on whether to attack had “not yet been made.” (Kahl was in Kyiv on the day the invasion began and had to be evacuated by car to Poland.)
In the end, many Ukrainian security officials believed that Russia’s military buildup was largely a psychological ploy, but that Moscow might use missile strikes and incursions by airborne units and elite Spetsnaz troops to topple a government it saw as teetering. At the time, Zelensky’s approval ratings had plummeted to around 26 percent as Ukraine faced an energy crisis and pressure on its currency that officials attributed to Russian sabotage.
“We didn’t envision … some classic invasion in Second World War style with tanks, artillery and infantry,” a senior Ukrainian security official said. Ukraine was wrong about Russia’s intentions, he said, but even Moscow may not have envisioned a major land war.
“They expected somebody to open the gate,” the official said. “They didn’t expect any resistance.”
In an interview this month with The Post, Zelensky said that well before the invasion, Russia had been waging “a hybrid war against our state. There was an energy blow, there was a political blow.”
“They wanted a change of power from inside the country,” he said. “I had the feeling that [the Russians] wanted to prepare us for a soft surrender.”
IV
Ukraine’s SBU — like its Russian counterpart — is a direct descendant of the KGB. It occupies the former KGB headquarters in Kyiv, is organized around the same bureaucratic structure as its Soviet predecessor, and employs an undisclosed number of officers who trained at the KGB academy in Moscow or its FSB successor after the Soviet breakup.
The agencies’ entangled histories bring a hall-of-mirrors aspect to the conflict.
Current and former Ukrainian security officials said fear about the loyalties of even senior personnel is a source of constant anxiety. One official said he reached for his phone on the war’s second day to begin calling subordinates to relay orders. But he hesitated as he dialed, he said, worried that his calls would go unanswered or reveal that senior lieutenants had thrown their support to the Russians.
He was stunned, he said, when those he called not only answered but followed orders with a precision and determination that were rare before the conflict.
“It’s a paradox of the Ukrainian state,” the official said. “It was believed, including by Ukrainians themselves, that there was a high level of corruption, inefficiency and infiltration of Russian agents in the Ukrainian government structures.” But after Feb. 24, he said, “they not only worked but also worked more efficiently than ever.”
He and others attributed much of that resilience to the example Zelensky set with his decision to remain in the capital. His ability to do so was due in part to the existence of a massive bunker complex under Kyiv’s government quarter that was designed by Soviet engineers and built to survive nuclear conflict.
A senior adviser described being taken to meet Zelensky in the first weeks of the war and descending into a disorienting warren of tunnels and command posts. “I still can’t say to you where [Zelensky’s base of operations] is exactly,” he said, because the complex is such a labyrinth.
Ukraine has made repeated attempts to cleanse its ranks of Russian assets, at one point even enlisting a CIA officer to serve as an internal adviser on rooting out FSB penetrations, according to former U.S. officials. But with an estimated 27,000 employees — making the SBU at least five times as large as MI5, its British equivalent — the agency has struggled to surmount the problem.
SBU and police personnel during July 2021 anti-terrorism exercises in Kyiv. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Maxym Marusenko/NurPhoto/Getty; iStock)
“Is there treachery? What can I say?” Zelensky said. “With all my love for Ukraine, we are not without sin.” The number of those who are not loyal to their country “has fallen over the years,” he said. Still, when the war started, “there were people who were working for Russians for money, and some who from the inside always hated Ukraine and were waiting for the Soviet Union to return.”
Several senior SBU officers have been charged with treason. Among them is the former head of the agency’s directorate in Kherson, in southern Ukraine, who was accused of ordering subordinates to abandon their posts as Russian forces flooded the region.
Last month, Ukrainian authorities arrested another SBU officer, Oleg Kulinich, who had been installed in the service’s upper ranks by Bakanov, the SBU director and childhood friend of Zelensky. The allegations against Kulinich underscore the pervasiveness of Russian penetrations. Charges filed by Ukrainian authorities describe him as part of a cell of sleeper agents operated by Vladimir Sivkovich, a former deputy head of Ukraine’s security council who was placed under sanction by the U.S. Treasury Department in January for working “with a network of Russian intelligence actors to carry out influence operations.”
Two years before the war, Sivkovich “set a task for Kulinich” to begin stealing secret internal SBU files that would be “of operational interest” to the “special services of the Russian Federation,” according to the charging document.
Together, according to the document, they conspired to help promote another alleged Russian spy to take control of the SBU’s counterintelligence department. That figure, Andriy Naumov, was arrested in Serbia in June carrying cash and gems worth more than $700,000, according to information released by Serbian authorities.
On the night before Russia’s invasion, Kulinich “deliberately” blocked the dissemination of intelligence warning that Russian forces in Crimea were hours from launching an attack, according to the Ukrainian indictment.
Zelensky’s decision to oust Bakanov as SBU director after Kulinich’s arrest was driven by exasperation with his failure to “cleanse” the agency of Russia sympathizers, said Andriy Smirnov, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office. “Six months into the war,” he said, “we continue to uncover loads of these people.”
Bakanov did not respond to requests for comment. Kulinich, Sivkovich and Naumov could not be reached for comment, and none appears to have made any public statement about the allegations against them.
Overall, Ukraine has detained more than 800 people suspected of aiding Russia through reconnaissance or sabotage, according to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry. Authorities have also moved against suspected “agents of influence” in government, parliament and politics.
Chief among them is Medvedchuk, the opposition party chairman who has such close ties to Putin that the Russian leader is the godfather of his youngest daughter. Ukrainian officials described Medvedchuk, 68, as a savvy political operator who harbored ambitions of high office himself and probably would have served as puppet-master to any regime installed by the Kremlin.
Zelensky’s government had charged Medvedchuk with treason in May 2021 and placed him under house arrest. Medvedchuk denied any wrongdoing and said he would fight to clear his name. He then escaped during the early days of the war, but was recaptured in April and now awaits trial. Medvedchuk’s lawyer, Tetyana Zhukovska, declined to comment this month, saying she could not do so until a Ukrainian court ruled in the treason case against her client.
“When they began on Feb. 24, the task was to take Kyiv,” said a Ukrainian security official. “They expected it would lead to a domino effect” that would ripple across the country. “They would take first central power and then they would have strengthened presence in regions.”
As part of that plan, Ukrainian officials said, the FSB had lined up at least two pro-Russian governments-in-waiting — not just one as the British government had warned. Ukraine officials said it was unclear why Russia had mobilized two groups, though some speculated that Putin may have simply wanted options.
One, positioned in Belarus, centered on Yanukovych. On March 7, a plane that belonged to the former Ukrainian president landed in Minsk, its arrival treated as an indication that Russia might seek to reinstate a politician Kremlin officials still referred to after his 2014 ouster as the country’s “legitimate” leader.
Yanukovych then issued an open letter to Zelensky, broadcast by a Russian state news agency, in which he told the Ukrainian president it was his duty to “stop the bloodshed and reach a peace deal at any price.” Over the following week, Yanukovych’s security chief spoke three times with a senior officer from the FSB’s Ukraine unit, according to data intercepted by Ukrainian intelligence.
Yanukovych did not respond to requests for comment. His former prime minister, Nikolai Azarov, said in a telephone interview with The Post that any suggestion that Moscow was seeking to engineer Yanukovych’s return to power was “total nonsense.”
Oleg Tsaryov, a former leading member of Ukraine's pro-Russian Party of Regions. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Alexander Natruskin/Sputnik/AP; iStock)
A second group, which included former members of the Yanukovych government, gathered in southeastern Ukraine as territory there fell to Russian forces. Among them was Oleg Tsaryov, a former leading member of Yanukovych’s Party of Regions, who declared his presence in Ukraine on a post to the Telegram messaging app, saying that “Kyiv will be free from fascists.”
In a telephone interview with The Post last month, Tsaryov said he had even moved into areas around Kyiv during the initial weeks of the war, traveling with “friends” he declined to identify. He wouldn’t answer questions about whether he was part of any plot to seize power, saying only that when he was outside Kyiv, “I didn’t have any agreements with anyone about a new government.”
V
Nearly every intelligence service with a stake in the war made consequential misjudgments.
U.S. spy agencies were prescient on Putin’s intentions but underestimated Ukraine’s ability to withstand the onslaught — an error that contributed to the United States’ initial hesitation to send heavy and sophisticated weapons.
Ukraine’s services appear to have read too much into signs that Russian forces were ill-prepared for full-scale combat, resisting Western warnings of an invasion that came within miles of the capital.
Russia’s intelligence breakdowns in Ukraine seem more systemic, its work marred by unreliable sources, disincentives to deliver hard truths to the Kremlin, and an endemic bias that matched Putin’s contemptuous attitude toward the country.
The FSB fueled this dynamic, officials said, with assessments packaged to please the Kremlin and with sources who had their own reasons — political and financial — for encouraging a Russian takedown of the Kyiv government.
Confidential reports by a think tank with close ties to the FSB, the Moscow-based Institute of CIS Countries, prodded Moscow to reassert control over its neighbor. An early 2021 report obtained by The Post said that doing so was the only way to “rid Russia of the eternal threat … posed by the puppet state ready to carry out any order of the enemy forces of the West.”
The director of the institute, Konstantin Zatulin, insisted in a telephone interview that he had opposed the use of military force against Ukraine, and blamed the Kremlin’s “inflated expectations” about what the invasion could accomplish on exaggerations by Kremlin allies in the country.
Viktor Medvedchuk, the Ukrainian oligarch and Putin friend whom Kyiv charged with treason in May 2021. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Sputnik/AP; iStock)
Foremost among them was Medvedchuk, who had served as presidential chief of staff in the early 2000s before amassing a business fortune and becoming co-leader of Ukraine’s main pro-Russian party.
Unlike other Ukrainian figures, Medvedchuk was in direct contact with Putin, according to officials who cited monitored communications. His was the most prominent voice in a chorus of Kremlin allies assuring Moscow that Zelensky was weak, that his government would collapse and that Russian forces would be welcomed by the Ukrainian people, officials said.
In recent years, Medvedchuk appeared to use his business empire to lay the groundwork for a Russian move against Kyiv. His TV stations routinely bashed Zelensky and aired pro-Russian propaganda, including discredited claims that the United States had biolabs in the country to help Ukraine develop biological weapons. His companies, which included a stake in an oil refinery in southern Russia, served as a conduit for money that flowed to pro-Russian forces and backed plots to destabilize the Kyiv government, officials said.
As his activities became more brazen, the United States and Ukraine moved against his network.
The U.S. Treasury Department, which had previously placed Medvedchuk under sanction, went after key party lieutenants in January, accusing them of collaborating with Russian intelligence on efforts to “take over the Ukrainian government and control Ukraine’s critical infrastructure with an occupying force.”
One of those sanctioned associates, Oleh Voloshyn, denied that he or Medvedchuk had any specific prior knowledge of Russia’s invasion plan or that they were seeking to overthrow the Zelensky government. In a telephone interview with The Post last month, Voloshyn blamed the war on Zelensky, saying the repression of Medvedchuk and his supporters forced Moscow to defend its allies.
“The choice was always becoming neutral voluntarily, or made neutral through force,” he said. “I don’t say this is good or bad. It’s just the reality.”
Almost immediately, the war failed to live up to Medvedchuk’s forecasts. And it was his political network, rather than Zelensky’s, that ultimately folded, with as many as a dozen senior party officials leaving the country.
Moscow’s subsequent spurning of Medvedchuk has been one of the few visible signs of Putin’s pique.
After Medvedchuk was recaptured in mid-April, Ukrainian authorities proposed sending him to Moscow as part of a prisoner swap. But officials said the Kremlin has shown no interest in any deal that would free the oligarch.
Often pictured before the war wearing immaculately tailored suits in meetings with the Russian leader, recent images released by Ukraine show Medvedchuk in prison fatigues and handcuffs.
Images of Medvedchuk after his 2022 rearrest in Ukraine are seen at a Moscow news conference held by his wife to call for his release. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Anadolu Agency/Getty; iStock)
To the Kremlin, “he is a traitor because he took all the money and delivered no results,” said Kostyantyn Batozsky, who was an adviser to a Donetsk governor before the region was taken over by pro-Russian separatists.
Medvedchuk “is a played card; they will never use him again,” Batozsky said. “He doesn’t want to go to Russia now because he will be asked the most unpleasant question in the world: What about the money? Where did it go?”
VI
One of the more puzzling aspects of Russia’s miscalculation is that the FSB had received information suggesting that war with Ukraine would not be a walkover.
Recent polls conducted by an organization with close ties to the FSB showed that Putin was deeply unpopular in Ukraine and that the idea that Russian forces would be welcomed was fiction, according to copies obtained by Ukrainian intelligence.
An April 2021 poll by the firm Research & Branding found that 84 percent of Ukrainians would regard any further encroachment by Russian forces as an “occupation,” with just 2 percent seeing such a scenario as a “liberation.”
A second poll, conducted in late January just weeks before the war, queried Ukrainians about invasion scenarios in extraordinary detail, according to a 26-page document reviewed by The Post. It was commissioned by and presented to Sivkovich, the former Yanukovich aide who is accused of running sleeper agents, Ukrainian officials said.
Was a “great war” between the countries possible? the poll asked. Were people “feeling concerned for themselves and their loved ones” about the buildup of Russian forces? Was Ukraine’s army capable of fending off an invasion?
The most salient question appears toward the end of the poll: “Are you ready to defend Ukraine in the event of such a necessity?” Overall, 48 percent answered in the affirmative.
Pre-war polls by an organization linked to Russia’s security service found that 48 percent of Ukrainians were prepared to fight to defend the country, and that only 2% would regard the “appearance” of Russian forces as a “liberation”. (Research & Branding)
Ukrainian officials said the number should have been interpreted as a sign of resolve, showing that millions of citizens were ready to take up arms against Russia. The FSB, however, may have drawn a different conclusion from the same data, believing that only a minority of Ukrainians were committed to defending their country.
It is unclear whether the results of these surveys were accurately relayed to the Kremlin.
When contacted by telephone, Eduard Zolotukhin, Research & Branding’s director, asked The Post to send written questions, but then did not respond.
VII
The fallout for the FSB has been difficult to ascertain amid the information blackout imposed on Russian media by Putin.
Early reports that Beseda, responsible for the FSB’s Ukraine directorate, had been demoted or even imprisoned are viewed skeptically by U.S. and other intelligence officials, who say they have seen no information to suggest that any of Russia’s spy chiefs has faced such consequences.
Russia's FSB chief, Alexander Bortnikov. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty; iStock)
“We have pretty good reason to believe that he’s still in the job,” a senior U.S. official said of Beseda. Nor, the official said, is there any indication that FSB chief Alexander Bortnikov has been held to account for his agency’s failures. A senior Russian politician with close links to the Kremlin and to the FSB also said in an interview that Beseda was continuing to carry out his duties.
Other reports indicated that Putin had sidelined the FSB because of its failures and given greater responsibility for Ukraine to the military-linked GRU. Ukrainian officials say otherwise.
“I don’t share this view,” one official said. The FSB “didn’t manage the task they were given. But they are continuing to work. Not with the same enthusiasm. But they continue.”
Ukrainian officials cited recent intelligence indicating that the FSB — like the Russian military — has regrouped, turning its focus to territories in the south and east that have been obliterated by Russian artillery.
“We can see it playing out now in Mariupol, Melitopol, Kherson” and other cities that have fallen to Russian forces, a Ukrainian intelligence official said. FSB officials swoop in to implement a version of the blueprint the agency originally had for Kyiv.
“The aim is political control, economic control, control over criminal groups — all spheres of activity on seized territory,” the intelligence official said. “The final aim is to install a pro-Russian power.”
An official adjusts a Russian flag before handing out Russian passports to residents of the southern Ukrainian city of Melitopol, now under Kremlin control. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA-EFE; iStock)
Kherson, the first major city to fall to the Russian army, now offers a chilling glimpse into what life might have been like if Russia had taken Ukraine’s capital.
The city’s mayor, Ihor Kolykhaiev, was arrested in June after repeatedly refusing to cooperate with the Russian occupiers, and his whereabouts are unknown, an aide to the mayor said. He has been replaced by Oleksandr Kobets, a former KGB officer who had also once worked for the SBU.
The former mayor’s aide, Galina Lyashevskaya, said that at least 300 residents were unaccounted for when Kolykhaiev was ousted from his position in April. More recent estimates are at least double that.
Many more have been arrested, she said, and about half the city’s population of 300,000 has fled. In a recent report, Human Rights Watch documented dozens of cases of torture among Kherson’s residents.
“The FSB does not have any uniform, so you never know who is standing next to you,” Lyashevskaya said. “It is paradise for the FSB here. … They can force anyone to do what they want.”
Ukrainian officials said the FSB is involved in planning a referendum that would provide a pretext for incorporating the city and surrounding region into Russia. But Ukraine has begun staging forces for a major counteroffensive to retake Kherson.
VIII
With no end to the war in sight, FSB officials have begun operating on three-month rotations, according to Ukrainian security officials.
Kovalenko, the FSB operative who had inquired about a riverside apartment in Kyiv, retreated to Russia with a broken finger and apparent unease about Ukrainian penetrations of his directorate, according to Ukrainian security officials. In communications with relatives that were monitored by Ukrainian intelligence, he spoke about changing phones, switching addresses in Moscow and even selling family vehicles. Then, in late May, he revealed that he was being sent back to Ukraine for another assignment.
Igor Kovalenko, identified by Ukraine as a senior FSB officer. (Emily Sabens/The Washington Post; Photo obtained by The Washington Post; iStock)
One relative responded to the news with a Russian expletive.
Ukrainian officials said they have not been able to determine Kovalenko’s current whereabouts.
Shane Harris, Karen DeYoung and Souad Mekhennet in Washington and Isabelle Khurshudyan and David L. Stern in Kyiv contributed to this report.
About this story
Editing by Peter Finn. Copy editing by Martha Murdock and Tom Justice. Photo editing by Chloe Coleman. Design and development by Garland Potts and Emily Sabens. Design editing by Joe Moore. Project management by Jay Wang.
The Washington Post · by Greg Miller · August 19, 2022
9. Opinion | Why China will become ever more dangerous as its baby bust worsens
Excerpts:
When asked on Aug. 8 whether the Defense Department has changed its assessment that China will not attempt a military conquest of Taiwan in the next two years, Colin Kahl, undersecretary of defense for policy, was admirably terse: “No.”
Assessments can, of course, be mistaken — Pearl Harbor, Chinese intervention in the Korean War, the 1968 Tet offensive in Vietnam, weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, etc. The Defense Department’s assessment of the likelihood of a near-term invasion had better be right. Reports vary concerning the number of simulations there have been in recent years of U.S.-China military conflict over Taiwan. Whatever the number is, it appears to be almost the number in which China prevailed.
Opinion | Why China will become ever more dangerous as its baby bust worsens
The Washington Post · by George F. Will · August 19, 2022
On Jan. 10, 1980, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, then in the first of his four terms, delivered a Senate speech pertinent to today’s foremost U.S. foreign policy challenge: China. Casting a cold eye on the Soviet Union 17 days after its Christmas Eve invasion of Afghanistan, Moynihan criticized the preceding decade’s excessive emphasis on detente (citing Samuel Johnson: “the triumph of hope over experience”). He added that increased Soviet stridency and aggressiveness suggested the behavior of “a wounded bear.” He had recently said “the defining event” of the 1980s “might well be the breakup of the Soviet Empire.” And it also could be “the defining danger.”
Forty-two years later, China becomes more dangerous as its decline becomes more predictable. Writing in the Spectator, Rana Mitter, a British historian and political scientist, cites a U.N. report that China’s population growth has declined 94 percent, from 8 million in 2011 to 480,000 last year. The projection of China’s 15- to 64-year-old population in 2100 has been revised from 579 million to 378 million.
“Today,” Mitter writes, “every 100 working-age Chinese need to support 20 retirees. If trends continue, by the turn of the next century, every 100 workers will have to support 120 retirees.”
The 10.6 million Chinese babies born in 2021 were 1.4 million fewer than in 2020. “This,” Mitter says, “was a lower birth rate than in the great famine of the 1950s.” Four years ago, Chinese media encouraged women looking for “Mr Right” to settle for “Mr OK.” A newspaper editorial explained that “marriage is a process of tolerating each other.”
All this might mean, Mitter says, that “China’s ambition to become the world’s largest economy is slipping out of reach.” The Soviet Union in the 1980s became more truculent as it became more anxious about its waning vitality compared with that of the West and the “Asian Tigers” — e.g., Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan. As China becomes increasingly fixated on its demographic destiny, it, too, might become more dangerous. If intractable population trends indicate that China is at its geopolitical apogee, it might attempt to leap at Taiwan through a closing window of opportunity.
Follow George F. Will's opinionsFollow
If so, deterrence requires urgency in turning the island into the much-discussed “porcupine,” so well-armed and trained (for mountain and urban warfare) that it is too prickly to swallow. John R. Bolton, presidential national security adviser 2018-2019, suggests in National Review “home-porting U.S. naval vessels and stationing meaningful U.S. military forces in Taiwan. Troop deployments will be necessary in any case to train and assist Taiwanese troops to handle the new weapons systems and necessary joint military exercises.”
This will take years. Passing the Taiwan Policy Act can be done immediately.
The act would, inter alia, designate Taiwan as a “major non-NATO ally,” authorize $6.5 billion over four years in security assistance to prepare for various threats (invasion, blockade, cyberattacks), authorize a War Reserve Stockpile (prepositioned munitions and other vital supplies), prevent restrictions on bilateral relations between U.S. officials and their Taiwan counterparts, and elevate Taiwan’s status in international institutions.
The TPA also would mandate changing the U.S. government’s vocabulary pertaining to Taiwan, changes that might seem trivial to Americans, but would not seem so to Beijing: ending the practice of referring to Taiwan’s government as the “Taiwan authorities,” changing the language used to describe Taiwan’s diplomatic presence in Washington from “Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office” to “Taiwan Representative Office.”
These would be small increments in treating Taiwan — a vibrant democracy of 24 million — as what is manifestly is: a nation-state. Small increments can have a large cumulative effect, which is why, for example, Beijing, since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, has been trying to establish a new normal by increasing the intensity of its military operations in the air and sea around the island.
When asked on Aug. 8 whether the Defense Department has changed its assessment that China will not attempt a military conquest of Taiwan in the next two years, Colin Kahl, undersecretary of defense for policy, was admirably terse: “No.”
Assessments can, of course, be mistaken — Pearl Harbor, Chinese intervention in the Korean War, the 1968 Tet offensive in Vietnam, weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, etc. The Defense Department’s assessment of the likelihood of a near-term invasion had better be right. Reports vary concerning the number of simulations there have been in recent years of U.S.-China military conflict over Taiwan. Whatever the number is, it appears to be almost the number in which China prevailed.
The Washington Post · by George F. Will · August 19, 2022
10. U.S. Army Special Operations to receive nine more MH-47G Chinooks from Boeing
Best helicopter in the world.
U.S. Army Special Operations to receive nine more MH-47G Chinooks from Boeing
verticalmag.com
By Glenn Sands | August 17, 2022
Estimated reading time 6 minutes, 36 seconds.
The U.S. Department of Defense and Boeing announced on August 12 a contract award for a further nine MH-47G Block II Chinooks for a cost of around US$265 million. The helicopters will be built at Boeing’s Philadelphia plant. The specialist variant will serve exclusively with the U.S. Army’s Special Operations Aviation Command (USASOAC). A statement released by the Department of Defense (DoD) stated: “The Boeing Company, Ridley Park, Pennsylvania, was awarded a US$265,022,000 firm-fixed-price, delivery order contract modification (P00001) to contract H92241-19-F-0091 for the procurement of nine MH-47G Chinook aircraft in support of U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM).”
The helicopter manufacturer is now on contract for 24 of the next-generation Chinooks.
The MH-47G Block II Chinook features an improved structure and weight reduction initiatives such as new lighter-weight fuel tanks that increase performance and efficiency, which is critical for missions behind enemy lines.
The new MH-47Gs will give the Army significantly more capability for extremely challenging missions, according to a company news release.
U.S. Army Special Operations Aviation Command is currently upgrading all of its MH-47G Chinooks to Block II configuration. Boeing photo
“The G-Model is a critical asset for the Army, our nation, and the defense industrial base,” said Andy Builta, vice president and H-47 program manager. “We’re honored that the Army’s special operators trust us to deliver it.”
In 2019, U.S. Special Operations Command has contracted Boeing to provide six re-worked and one new build MH-47G.
The 160th Special Operations Regiment (Airborne), known as the ‘Night Stalkers’ has a requirement for 61 MH-47Gs. The MH-47G modernisation program is aimed at delivering a mix of remanufactured and new build examples to the USASOAC.
The MH-47G incorporates a monolithic, machine-framed fuselage integrating long-range fuel tanks, and an extendable refuelling probe to receive fuel mid-air from fixed-wing tankers. The helicopter also possesses advanced cargo-handling capabilities.
The airframe houses a rear ramp for loading/unloading of troops, supplies and vehicles. The port side of the fuselage features a gunner’s window/firing port. The helicopter offers seating for five crew, including two pilots and three crew-chiefs or aerial gunners.
The helicopter can be fitted with special operations equipment such as a fast rope insertion extraction system (FRIES), a special patrol insertion and extraction system (SPIES), a rope ladder, an electrically powered rescue hoist and a personnel location system (PLS).
Article Continues Below
The fuselage of the MH-47G measures 15.9m-long and 4.8m-wide. The overall length of the helicopter with unfolded rotors is 30.18m. It has a maximum gross weight of 24,494kg and can transport a useful load of 11,340kg.
The Chinook helicopter variant features a fully integrated digital cockpit management system. The cockpit seats a pilot and a co-pilot in a side-by-side arrangement. The night vision goggle-compatible glass digital cockpit features five liquid crystal multi-function displays (MFDs) and two control display units (CDUs).
An airman fast ropes from an MH-47 Chinook helicopter assigned to U.S. Army 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment on Fort Fisher in Kure Beach, N.C. USAF Photo.
The integrated digital common avionics architecture system (CAAS) of the cockpit allows for the integration of global communications and navigation systems, including a forward-looking infrared (FLIR) and a multi-mode radar. The FLIR, along with an electro-optical camera mounted below the chin, enables low-level flights in low-visibility and adverse weather conditions.
The cockpit also houses a digital moving map display, dual digital data buses, an inertial doppler navigational system, an automatic target hand-off system, a GPS receiver and a Rockwell Collins low-frequency automatic direction finder.
The onboard communication systems include a high-frequency (HF) radio, a single-channel ground and airborne radio system, four ultrahigh-frequency (UHF)/very high-frequency (VHF) radios, and a blue force tracking system, an IFF transponder and a digital inter-communication system (DICS).
The MH-47G can be armed with two M134 electrically operated, air-cooled miniguns and two M240 machine guns mounted on either side of the fuselage at the forward and rear sections.
During the War on Terror, early variants of the MH-47 saw extensive combat on deep-penetration strike raids across Iraq and Afghanistan along with a number of other countries, that have yet to be disclosed by the DoD.
verticalmag.com
11. The war that changed the world
Excerpts:
A useful exercise after six months of a war that has exemplified Westishness is to ask what it tells us about this interstitial time. To ask: what are the defining characteristics of a Westish world? In the hope of starting a discussion, and of at least providing some examples, here are ten:
1. A West too reliant on the US
2. Cutting-edge technology matters more than size
3. Disorderly interdependence
4. A new map of globalisation
5. Weaponised crises of the Anthropocene
6. An ambivalent Global South
7. Power to the pivot states
8. Authoritarian limits exposed
9. Old Western assumptions examined
10. The decisive role of domestic factors
The war that changed the world
Six months in, Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has revealed a global order in transition.
By Jeremy Cliffe
NewStatesman · by Jeremy Cliffe · August 17, 2022
It feels like an eternity ago, that grim wintry pre-dawn of Thursday 24 February. A time before the place names Bucha and Irpin, Kramatorsk and Mariupol became bywords for the bloodiest war in Europe since 1945; before the letter Z became emblematic of a new fascism; before a new Iron Curtain fell over the continent; before it became impossible to describe the Covid-19 pandemic as a “once in a decade” shock to the global system. A time when a British prime minister could, as Boris Johnson had done in November, blithely declare that “the old concepts of fighting big tank battles on the European landmass are over”.
The final act of that pre-invasion era was at one with the dark poetry of the moment. In a ten-minute video address issued in the early hours of 24 February, after months of Russian troop build-ups on the Ukrainian border and increasingly deranged rhetoric from Moscow, Volodymyr Zelensky made a last-ditch plea for peace. Ukraine’s president appealed directly to Russian citizens in their own language: “The people of Ukraine want peace,” he said, but warned that the country would defend itself: “While attacking, you will see our faces. Not our backs. Our faces.” Then, just before 5am local time, Vladimir Putin announced a “special military operation”. Within minutes, air-raid sirens and the first explosions were heard in cities across the country.
The world woke up to a new reality. In a piece for the New Statesman website that morning I argued that “precedents will be set in the next days: precedents about what is acceptable in the international system of the early-to-mid 21st century and what is not; precedents that will shape the decades to come”. It would be up to Ukraine and its Western allies, I wrote, to ensure Putin did not achieve mastery over this historical turning point. At the time reports were emerging that US officials believed Kyiv could fall within one to four days, with Putin then expected to install a Kremlin puppet government and partition Ukraine.
Set against this, however, was the obvious Ukrainian determination to resist. Half a year on, it is true that swathes of the country lie in ruins. Barbaric Russian acts in Kyiv’s northern suburbs during the first weeks of the war and in southern and eastern cities over the spring and summer recalled the genocidal worst of the Balkan wars and the Second World War. Despite many thousands of Ukrainian military and civilian casualties, and the displacement of millions of its citizens, a democratic and free Ukraine still stands tall.
[See also: Russia is still underestimating Ukraine]
Russian troops turned out to be poorly prepared and unmotivated. They were not able to seize Kyiv in the first weeks of the war and withdrew from the area at the end of March. And while Russia has made gains in the eastern Donbas and along a southern Black Sea corridor to Crimea – itself illegally occupied in Putin’s initial 2014 attack on Ukraine – Russia appears to be making slow progress towards taking the whole Donbas region. US estimates put the numbers of Russian dead or injured at up to 80,000 – more in six months than the Soviet Union incurred during its entire 1979-89 war in Afghanistan.
The war has also changed the geopolitical landscape. Ukraine’s defence has drawn not just on its own impressive resolve, but also on huge transfers of Western military and economic aid. The conflict has jolted American attention back to Europe and revitalised Nato, which is now sending substantial reinforcements to its eastern flank and admitting Sweden and Finland as new members. It has disrupted flows of staple commodities – oil and gas, grain and fertiliser – and contributed to rising inflation, a looming global recession and humanitarian crises in poor countries. It has reshaped how powers further afield, notably China, view the decades ahead.
As much as the morning of 24 February 2022 was a turning point – the Zeitenwende, or epochal shift, of German chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coinage three days later – it cannot be understood in isolation. It came against a tumultuous global backdrop: the debacles of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the rise of China and relative decline of the West, the turmoil of the Trump presidency, Europe’s waning relevance, the shift towards a more multipolar and anarchic world order and, most recently, the Covid-19 pandemic. To understand the meaning of the war, six months in but far from over, is to situate it with that wider move away from the easy optimism of the immediate post-Cold War years and towards something new and, for now, still hazy.
If the war had gone as Putin had hoped, that work of analysis would have been rather straightforward. A Ukraine successfully subjugated and sundered as punishment for its alignment with the West would have made a potent symbol of a new post-Western era, the collapse of the old order and the rise of a new, authoritarian-friendly multipolarity. Instead the events of the past six months tell a sufficiently complex story – of democratic resilience, of shifting power balances, of both authoritarian revisionism and weakness, of global systems both brittle and adaptable – to spark a genuine debate about what they mean.
Putin still clings to the narrative he had hoped the war would substantiate. At the St Petersburg economic summit on 17 June, he accused Western countries of being in denial over their own decline: “They do not realise that in recent decades, new and powerful centres have been formed on the planet, each of which is developing its own political systems and public institutions.” This chimes with the Chinese view of the conflict. Writing of a recent discussion with a Beijing academic, Mark Leonard of the European Council on Foreign Relations reports: “My Chinese interlocutor sees the situation in Ukraine not as a war of aggression between sovereign countries, but rather as a revision of post-colonial borders following the end of Western hegemony.”
Within the West itself, opinion is divided. Optimists see in Ukraine’s resilience, and in the new purpose the war has given Nato, the seeds of some sort of Western revival. By contrast, realist-pessimist types have mostly deemed it either a distraction from America’s contest with China or a demonstration of the need to do unpalatable deals with thugs like Putin to prevent international chaos – or some combination of the two. Thus the war has conformed to the wider habit of sweeping, “return of the West” or “death of the West” binary arguments. Such thinking goes back decades, but it has intensified in the recent years of international and domestic turmoil.
I noted one example of this feast-or-famine demeanour last summer. A year before, in February 2020, the Munich Security Conference had warned of an era of Trumpian “Westlessness”. Yet by June 2021, ahead of a G7 meeting in Cornwall that would be the first of Joe Biden’s presidency, the hubristic slogan of the moment seemed to be “the West is back” (as if one favourable US election result could rewind the clock to the late 1990s). I argued then that a better term for new global realities would be “Westishness”, defined as a middle-ground scenario “in which aspects of the West’s values and power endure but others fragment”. This might include a “Eurasian” Europe more bound up with events to its east, as well as more heated internal battles about the values and meaning of the West and a fragmentation of global governance.
What that term “Westishness” lacks in lexical elegance it perhaps makes up for in nuance. It captures something of the past half-year of war in Ukraine, and of an age defined not by the binary triumph of one system over another but by its own in-between-ness. We are living through neither the old post-Cold War era nor the first chapter of a fundamentally new international order, but a transitional period with its own distinct rules and realities.
A useful exercise after six months of a war that has exemplified Westishness is to ask what it tells us about this interstitial time. To ask: what are the defining characteristics of a Westish world? In the hope of starting a discussion, and of at least providing some examples, here are ten:
1. A West too reliant on the US
For all its misery, the war has been a reminder of US strength. From halfway around the world, Washington has supplied Ukraine with intelligence, military and economic resources, enabling the country to largely hold off a nuclear-armed aggressor with a military budget ten times its own. Between 24 February and 1 July this year, America allocated €23.8bn in military aid, while the largest European donors, Britain and Poland, committed €4.4bn and €1.8bn respectively. It is thanks especially to American Himars (multiple rocket launchers) that Ukraine has been able to stall the artillery-led Russian advance in the Donbas. The Biden administration has driven the reinvigoration of Nato in recent months: it has committed to establishing a new permanent military headquarters in Poland and providing the backbone of a proposed expansion of Nato’s rapid-response force to 300,000 troops.
These developments are the quintessence of Westishness. They tell a story of robust, even awe-inspiring US strength that simply does not square with the gloomy proclamations of American collapse and retreat issued at dark moments, such as the storming of the Capitol on 6 January 2021 or the debacle of the Afghanistan withdrawal eight months later. Yet they also tell a story of in-between-ness, of circumstances produced by the very fact of the West swaying between supremacy and decline. For the war has also illustrated Western over-reliance on American strength. After all, if support for Ukraine had been left to the Europeans, Kyiv might now be in Russian hands. And an overly US-centric West is emphatically vulnerable to a Trump or Trumpist victory in the 2024 US presidential election.
2. Cutting-edge technology matters more than size
In mid August, Russian forces in southern Ukraine have been blindsided by devastating strikes on their anti-aircraft missile systems, including one on a major airbase in occupied Crimea. These may have involved advanced anti-radar Harm missiles, part of a recent US arms shipment. By contrast, Russian military hardware captured by Ukrainians has turned out to contain US-made microchips – some of them reportedly extracted from dishwashers and refrigerators, in a sign of Russian technological backwardness.
The role of Western technology in helping to level the field in the David-vs-Goliath struggle points to a broader trait of the Westish world: it is at least debatable whether the reality of the West’s declining relative economic weight matters as much as its prevailing (if now contested by China) technological leadership. Washington certainly hopes it does not. As Adam Tooze wrote for the New Statesman last year (“The new age of American power”, 10 September 2021), “the ultimate goal of the Pentagon planners is to loosen that link between economic performance and military force”, by using “ultra-advanced technology”.
3. Disorderly interdependence
Another element of the in-between state is that interdependence, the watchword of the 1990s utopians, has not gone away. Borders, in many places, still matter less than they used to. Nation-state sovereignty remains, on the whole, relative rather than absolute. Yet, as the world becomes more anarchic, that interdependence is creating more and more vulnerabilities. The invasion has exposed the weaknesses of multilateral international institutions like the UN. Europe is now bracing for a chilly winter of gas cut-offs, the political effects of which could be severe. Putin’s blockage of Black Sea ports – now tentatively lifted – has threatened famine and political breakdown in states such as Ethiopia and Egypt. This is neither a world of “the West is back” nor of ubiquitously rising walls, but of highly networked international systems that no institutions or rules are capable of managing.
4. A new map of globalisation
In the Western pessimist camp, it is fashionable to proclaim globalisation over. The war in Ukraine has lent credence to this idea. By triggering severe Western sanctions on Russia, pushing Russia and China closer together, and spooking Western investors out of Chinese markets – given the parallels between Putin’s war and a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan – it has accelerated the shift to a world of closed economic blocks.
Yet the story really is more complex. Western trade with Russia has been replaced by trade with others – witness the European rush to do gas deals with Azerbaijan, Algeria and the Gulf states. Likewise, as John Springford of the Centre for European Reform noted in a recent article for the think tank, Covid-19 has caused services trade to rise and goods trade to fall but recover relatively quickly, while foreign direct investment and migration flows have continued to surge. Globalised systems can adapt, in other words. And much of what is termed “deglobalisation” is in fact politics taking primacy over economic considerations. As power becomes more contested and diffuse in a Westish world, globalisation is not dying; rather, it is being shaped more by those contests and less by purely market- and price-based factors.
5. Weaponised crises of the Anthropocene
We live in an era of crises of the “Anthropocene” – that is, crises caused directly by humankind’s impact on the planet. But those crises can also be harnessed for geopolitical goals, as Russia attempted to do in recent months by limiting grain and fertiliser flows out of Ukraine and Russia. Putin may lack the economic and technological heft to defeat a Western-backed adversary, but he does hope to sow chaos in the West’s near-abroad (through, say, the collapse of a Western security client like Egypt or massive new European migration crises). The greater the strains on environmental and commodity ecosystems, the more opportunities such actors will have to exploit them.
Illustration by Doug Chayka
6. An ambivalent Global South
On 2 March, the UN General Assembly voted on a resolution condemning the invasion. Countries representing fully 59 per cent of the world’s population either abstained or voted against this. That pattern has continued in the months since: states in the Global South have broadly erred towards neutrality. Most notable among them is India. The country about to overtake China as the world’s most populous is aligned with the West on several topics – most notably the containment of China in the Pacific and Indian Oceans – but has in the past months shown its resistance to Western pressure to condemn Russia over its war.
That resistance is rooted in decades of Indian strategic doctrine, specifically a military relationship with Russia dating back to Soviet days, but it is also a window onto the mercurial instincts of states in the Global South in a period of Westishness.
7. Power to the pivot states
Related to this is a particular role for states capable of pivoting between Western and non-Western powers. It is a useful ability in a Westish age: no economic alliance remotely competes with the West – the US remains by far the world’s greatest power – and yet the West’s relative decline also presents new openings for contrary alliances. States that can walk this tightrope have particular advantages.
One is Kazakhstan, long in Russia’s shadow but a state that has sought to keep its distance from Putin’s war in Ukraine (refusing to recognise the Kremlin’s puppet regimes in the Donbas, for example) while maintaining cordial relations with both the West and China. Another example is Saudi Arabia, as tightening oil markets have thawed a relationship with the US that had been frozen by the brutal murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Other pivot states include Algeria, Vietnam and Brazil. But perhaps the best example of all is Turkey, where President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has simultaneously supplied Ukraine with valuable Bayraktar drones while maintaining relations with Russia and negotiating a deal to free up grain shipments through the Black Sea and the Bosphorus. The symbolic capital of Westishness is surely Istanbul.
8. Authoritarian limits exposed
Ukraine’s resilience and the role of US might and technology have shown the limitations of authoritarian systems. Russia’s leadership has been exposed as overly centralised, its troops as under-motivated and its system as slow to correct mistakes. It so happens that this has taken place over the period in which the weaknesses of the Chinese system have also become clear. The emerging superpower’s inept Covid strategy has merged with twin debt and property crises to raise doubts about when – and even whether – China will overtake the US as the world’s most powerful state.
That does not change the fact of Western decline. But it does indicate a dangerous new reality: of authoritarian states strong enough to accrue more relative power within the global system but not strong enough to found new poles of stability. Much has been made in recent months of the new links between China, Russia and Iran, for example. But the notion of the three coalescing into a serious, trusting, enduring alliance comparable even to today’s fragmenting Nato is ludicrous.
9. Old Western assumptions examined
A Westish international order is inherently fluid. Therefore one of its defining traits is a constant and febrile process of debate and questioning. In the US, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has put Biden’s central foreign policy agenda in doubt. (Is an “alliance of democracies” really the priority of a president fresh back from a trip-of-necessity to Riyadh to bump fists with the man behind Khashoggi’s murder and dismemberment?)
In Washington it has intensified debates between defenders of a proactive liberal-democratic America (say, writers like Anne Applebaum or David Frum), voices of old-school realism (such as the political scientist John Mearsheimer) and the new “restrainers” (such as the historian Stephen Wertheim) arguing for a US policy of non-intervention abroad. In Berlin the war has triggered an unsettling examination of Germany’s old assumptions about “Wandel durch Handel” (change through trade). In London it has coaxed out a fascinating tension between idealist Atlanticist Brexiteers (like Liz Truss) and Brexiteers of a more realist persuasion (like Dominic Cummings).
10. The decisive role of domestic factors
To the extent that it has been tough and proactive, America’s response to the war speaks of internal robustness. It has required: Biden to have prevailed over Trump’s attempt to override the US constitution in early 2021; the country to draw on its economic and technological supremacy; and American politics to generate stable consent for the White House to do things such as revitalise Nato.
Likewise, the extent to which Europe will get through a winter of gas shortages orchestrated by Moscow will be largely determined by the state of its political and economic systems. Can the EU, its states, firms and citizens, pull together to get through the cold months with disrupted energy supplies?
In a world in which many Western strengths endure, but the challenges to them are becoming more formidable, the deciding factors may turn out to be domestic ones. America retains the ability to attract many of the world’s brightest scientists and researchers in a way China cannot. Europe’s economies can adapt to adversity and change in ways that Russia’s cannot. But all that depends on a degree of cohesion and openness that is far from certain in times of such disruption. Whether these can be sustained may well ultimately decide what sort of world-historical era follows our own period of Westishness.
Observant readers will notice just how many of these points also apply to the pandemic. Covid-19 also showed us many of the contours of a Westish world: the centrality of technology; the awkward middle-zone of an interdependent order without the structures to manage its own interdependence; an adaptive but political globalisation; a geopolitical edge to an Anthropocene crisis; authoritarian states at once too strong to be boxed in entirely by Western power but too weak to provide real stability; and a West whose fortunes depend most on its own internal cohesion. The pandemic and the war belong together as a double-headed crisis.
Truly, then, we are in a global Zeitenwende. But history tells us that such epochal shifts tend to take at least a couple of years to play out. The French Revolution was more than the Storming of the Bastille. The start of the Second World War was more than the first German tanks rumbling into Poland. The end of the Cold War was more than the Berlin Wall falling on 9 November 1989. If we are indeed entering the era of Westishness, the period of transition will surely be dated to at least as early as the start of 2020 and at least as late as 2023.
That is not to take away from the importance of the war. In a future in which, say, the world of 2060 looks back on the early 2020s as a significant turning point, 24 February 2022 will doubtless be a – or even the – date that serves as shorthand for a wider shift.
So too will the events of autumn and winter 2022. At the time of writing, Ukraine’s long-mooted offensive to retake Kherson (the only major occupied city west of Crimea) is reportedly stalling for lack of weaponry. Its success depends on further increases in Western backing. China has just conducted its biggest ever military exercise simulating an invasion of Taiwan, yet remains mired in its Covid woes at home. Donald Trump is said to be canvassing the announcement of a second-term run. These are symptoms of an age of Westishness that may well last decades. The mid 21st century is dawning.
Topics in this article: Russia, Russian sanctions
This article appears in the 17 Aug 2022 issue of the New Statesman, Six Months that Changed the World
NewStatesman · by Jeremy Cliffe · August 17, 2022
12. The United Nations Can Hold the Taliban Accountable
The United Nations Can Hold the Taliban Accountable
Foreign Policy · by Lynne O’Donnell · August 18, 2022
Banning travel, at last, will send a message that brutality and support for terrorists are not acceptable.
ODonnell-Lynne-foreign-policy-columnist
Lynne O’Donnell
By Lynne O’Donnell, a columnist at Foreign Policy and an Australian journalist and author.
Taliban fighters and supporters celebrate victory.
Taliban fighters and supporters ride in a convoy to celebrate their victory day in Kandahar, Afghanistan, on Aug. 15. JAVED TANVEER/AFP via Getty Images
The United Nations is close to seizing a rare opportunity to pressure the Taliban to behave like a proper government by refusing to extend exemptions on travel bans for the listed terrorists among the group’s leadership. Ireland has opposed the exemptions, sources with knowledge of the procedures said, and it only takes one country to object to ensure the Taliban terrorists lose their travel privileges.
At least two other countries have backed the Irish position, one source close to the U.N. Security Council said on the condition of anonymity. Although nothing is guaranteed and the influence of the United States, Russia, and China could prevail, if Ireland does not back down, the exemptions are due to lapse at 11.59 p.m. on Thursday, the source said.
“This will be a signal to the Taliban that you are risking international isolation if you continue to behave like this,” the source added, referring to the Taliban’s well-documented human rights transgressions and support for terrorist groups, including al Qaeda.
The United Nations is close to seizing a rare opportunity to pressure the Taliban to behave like a proper government by refusing to extend exemptions on travel bans for the listed terrorists among the group’s leadership. Ireland has opposed the exemptions, sources with knowledge of the procedures said, and it only takes one country to object to ensure the Taliban terrorists lose their travel privileges.
At least two other countries have backed the Irish position, one source close to the U.N. Security Council said on the condition of anonymity. Although nothing is guaranteed and the influence of the United States, Russia, and China could prevail, if Ireland does not back down, the exemptions are due to lapse at 11.59 p.m. on Thursday, the source said.
“This will be a signal to the Taliban that you are risking international isolation if you continue to behave like this,” the source added, referring to the Taliban’s well-documented human rights transgressions and support for terrorist groups, including al Qaeda.
The travel bans were imposed along with financial sanctions and weapons embargoes on Taliban members listed as terrorists by the U.N. Security Council even before their collusion in the al Qaeda terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Starting in 2019 though, top Taliban leaders got exemptions so they could travel abroad and take part in talks to end the war. The bans, and exemptions, apply to about 100 existing members of the Taliban who are sanctioned terrorists, around 30 of whom are at a minister or cabinet level.
Since the exemptions to the travel ban were granted to let the Taliban work toward peace, stability, and an end to cooperation with terrorists—which they’ve demonstrably failed to do during their year in power in Afghanistan—the ban should be reinstated, some experts said.
“The specific and legal message starts with the fact that there is a sanctions regime in place that all of the members of the Security Council actually support,” said Annie Pforzheimer, former acting U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for Afghanistan. “And if the Taliban is out of compliance with that regime, and their exception to that regime was for purposes of peace and stability discussions, and they’re not having those, then the rules should be applied.”
Even after the Taliban’s takeover and the first evidence of the regime’s continued brutality, the travel ban exemptions were extended in June for all but two Taliban figures, allowing the terrorists to travel freely, often on private jets.
China and Russia have proposed that sanctioned Taliban members be allowed to keep traveling to Beijing and Moscow; others, including the United States, have suggested they should be able to go to Doha, Qatar, where the group has an office and where many countries relocated their Afghan diplomatic missions. No country recognizes the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.
A resumption of the travel ban is one of the few levers left to hold accountable a regime that has compiled a dismal record on human and women’s rights as well as maintaining its ties to terrorist groups.
The latest internal human rights report by the U.N.’s Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, obtained by Foreign Policy, makes clear that the Taliban’s arbitrary violence, kidnappings, disappearances, detentions, torture, and killings continue. If anything, things are getting worse. The report notes 400 instances of extrajudicial killings, torture, arbitrary arrests, and disappearances of former government, military, and police in the year since the Taliban issued a “general amnesty.” The judicial system faces “challenges” to due process and fair trials. Prisoners lack food, hygiene, and medicine. Afghanistan has also sped backward on women’s rights, sacking many women from positions, and detaining those that protest; girls cannot receive a secondary education almost anywhere in the country.
The group, in contravention of its agreement with the former Trump administration, also maintained ties with al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, as documented by the U.N. Security Council and a U.S. drone strike that killed Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leader of al Qaeda, while he was a guest of the Taliban in a Kabul villa.
But travel bans aren’t the only lever. Another option could be the Magnitsky Act, passed in the United States, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere, to enable travel and financial sanctions on officials who violate human rights. Some Taliban figures use false names, hold foreign passports, and have family living abroad, making them vulnerable to some of the sanctions in the Magnitsky provisions.
“Just because the West let Afghanistan fall to the Taliban doesn’t mean that the West should turn a blind eye to their barbaric practices,” Bill Browder, the financier behind the act, told Foreign Policy. “The key perpetrators should be subject to Magnitsky sanctions and all other types of sanctions available.”
There’s also financial pressure. Europe and the United States hold more than $9 billion of Afghan central bank reserves, with around $7 billion in the United States alone. Those assets were frozen after the Taliban took over.
The United States is still negotiating with the Taliban to release about half of the frozen funds, but it still has yet to secure Taliban cooperation in allowing a full audit of their use, if released. Although Washington reportedly nixed the idea of releasing any Afghan funds after the Zawahiri incident, a U.S. National Security Council spokesperson said talks are still ongoing.
The Taliban make some money. They collect millions of dollars in border duties, taxes on businesses, and so-called religious taxes owed each month, and they make millions of dollars from drugs and the extraction of mineral resources, which are sold to Pakistan and China. Their income is not being used for poverty relief or job creation at a time of massive economic and humanitarian suffering, but—like a portion of international aid—it is siphoned off for distribution to their own supporters, sources in Afghanistan’s charity sector said.
The Taliban have resisted all calls to honor human rights or, as promised, create an inclusive government. The concern is that extending exemptions for the travel ban will just entrench their impunity and help normalize their rule.
“Those are two concepts that are not in the U.S. interest,” Pforzheimer said. “If we want to be hard-nosed about it and even not think about human rights being part of our foreign policy, let’s just say that sanctions compliance should be part of our policy.”
Lynne O’Donnell is a columnist at Foreign Policy and an Australian journalist and author. She was the Afghanistan bureau chief for Agence France-Presse and the Associated Press between 2009 and 2017.
Foreign Policy · by Lynne O’Donnell · August 18, 2022
13. The China Trap: U.S. Foreign Policy and the Perilous Logic of Zero-Sum Competition
Excerpts:
Renewing U.S. leadership will also require doing more to address criticism that a U.S.-led order means “rules for thee but not for me.” Clear and humble acknowledgment of instances where the United States has violated the UN Charter, such as the invasion of Iraq, would be an important step to overcoming that resentment. And Washington must deliver value for citizens in developing countries, whether on COVID-19, climate, hunger, or technology, rather than simply urging them not to work with China. At home, Washington must work to rebuild bipartisan support for U.S. engagement with the international system.
As the United States reimagines its domestic and international purpose, it should do so on its own terms, not for the sake of besting China. Yet fleshing out an inclusive, affirmative vision of the world it seeks would also be a first step toward clarifying the conditions under which the United States would welcome or accept Chinese initiatives rather than reflexively opposing them. The countries’ divergent interests and values would still result in the United States opposing many of Beijing’s activities, but that opposition would be accompanied by a clear willingness to negotiate the terms of China’s growing influence. The United States cannot cede so much influence to Beijing that international rules and institutions no longer reflect U.S. interests and values. But the greater risk today is that overzealous efforts to counter China’s influence will undermine the system itself through a combination of paralysis and the promotion of alternate arrangements by major powers.
Finally, the United States must do much more to invest in the power of its example and to ensure that steps taken to counter China do not undermine that example by falling into the trap of trying to out-China China. Protective or punitive actions, whether military, economic, or diplomatic, should be assessed not just on the basis of whether they counter China but also on how they affect the broader system and whether they reflect fidelity to U.S. principles.
Competition cannot become an end in itself. So long as outcompeting China defines the United States’ sense of purpose, Washington will continue to measure success on terms other than on its own. Rankings are a symbolic construct, not an objective condition. If the pursuit of human progress, peace, and prosperity is the ultimate objective, as Blinken has stated, then the United States does not need to beat China in order to win.
The China Trap
U.S. Foreign Policy and the Perilous Logic of Zero-Sum Competition
September/October 2022
Foreign Affairs · by Jessica Chen Weiss · August 18, 2022
Competition with China has begun to consume U.S. foreign policy. Seized with the challenge of a near-peer rival whose interests and values diverge sharply from those of the United States, U.S. politicians and policymakers are becoming so focused on countering China that they risk losing sight of the affirmative interests and values that should underpin U.S. strategy. The current course will not just bring indefinite deterioration of the U.S.-Chinese relationship and a growing danger of catastrophic conflict; it also threatens to undermine the sustainability of American leadership in the world and the vitality of American society and democracy at home.
There is, of course, good reason why a more powerful China has become the central concern of policymakers and strategists in Washington (and plenty of other capitals). Under President Xi Jinping especially, Beijing has grown more authoritarian at home and more coercive abroad. It has brutally repressed Uyghurs in Xinjiang, crushed democratic freedoms in Hong Kong, rapidly expanded its conventional and nuclear arsenals, aggressively intercepted foreign military aircraft in the East and South China Seas, condoned Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and amplified Russian disinformation, exported censorship and surveillance technology, denigrated democracies, worked to reshape international norms—the list could go on and will likely only get longer, especially if Xi secures a third five-year term and further solidifies his control later this year.
Yet well-warranted alarm risks morphing into a reflexive fear that could reshape American policy and society in counterproductive and ultimately harmful ways. In attempting to craft a national strategy suited to a more assertive and more powerful China, Washington has struggled to define success, or even a steady state, short of total victory or total defeat, that both governments could eventually accept and at a cost that citizens, businesses, and other stakeholders would be willing to bear. Without a clear sense of what it seeks or any semblance of a domestic consensus on how the United States should relate to the world, U.S. foreign policy has become reactive, spinning in circles rather than steering toward a desired destination.
To its credit, the Biden administration has acknowledged that the United States and its partners must provide an attractive alternative to what China is offering, and it has taken some steps in the right direction, such as multilateral initiatives on climate and hunger. Yet the instinct to counter every Chinese initiative, project, and provocation remains predominant, crowding out efforts to revitalize an inclusive international system that would protect U.S. interests and values even as global power shifts and evolves. Even with the war in Ukraine claiming considerable U.S. attention and resources, the conflict’s broader effect has been to intensify focus on geopolitical competition, reinforced by Chinese-Russian convergence.
Leaders in both Washington and Beijing claim to want to avoid a new Cold War. The fact is that their countries are already engaged in a global struggle. The United States seeks to perpetuate its preeminence and an international system that privileges its interests and values; China sees U.S. leadership as weakened by hypocrisy and neglect, providing an opening to force others to accept its influence and legitimacy. On both sides, there is growing fatalism that a crisis is unavoidable and perhaps even necessary: that mutually accepted rules of fair play and coexistence will come only after the kind of eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation that characterized the early years of the Cold War—survival of which was not guaranteed then and would be even less assured now.
In Washington and Beijing, there is growing fatalism that a crisis is perhaps necessary.
Even in the absence of a crisis, a reactive posture has begun to drive a range of U.S. policies. Washington frequently falls into the trap of trying to counter Chinese efforts around the world without appreciating what local governments and populations want. Lacking a forward-looking vision aligned with a realistic assessment of the resources at its disposal, it struggles to prioritize across domains and regions. It too often compromises its own broader interests as fractious geopolitics make necessary progress on global challenges all but impossible. The long-term risk is that the United States will be unable to manage a decades-long competition without falling into habits of intolerance at home and overextension abroad. In attempting to out-China China, the United States could undermine the strengths and obscure the vision that should be the basis for sustained American leadership.
The lodestar for a better approach must be the world that the United States seeks: what it wants, rather than what it fears. Whether sanctions or tariffs or military moves, policies should be judged on the basis of whether they further progress toward that world rather than whether they undermine some Chinese interest or provide some advantage over Beijing. They should represent U.S. power at its best rather than mirroring the behavior it aims to avert. And rather than looking back nostalgically at its past preeminence, Washington must commit, with actions as well as words, to a positive-sum vision of a reformed international system that includes China and meets the existential need to tackle shared challenges.
That does not mean giving up well-calibrated efforts to deter Chinese aggression, enhance resilience against Chinese coercion, and reinforce U.S. alliances. But these must be paired with meaningful discussions with Beijing, not only about crisis communications and risk reduction but also about plausible terms of coexistence and the future of the international system—a future that Beijing will necessarily have some role in shaping. An inclusive and affirmative global vision would both discipline competition and make clear what Beijing has to lose. Otherwise, as the relationship deteriorates and the sense of threat grows, the logic of zero-sum competition will become even more overwhelming, and the resulting escalatory spiral will undermine both American interests and American values. That logic will warp global priorities and erode the international system. It will fuel pervasive insecurity and reinforce a tendency toward groupthink, damaging the pluralism and civic inclusion that are the bedrock of liberal democracy. And if not altered, it will perpetuate a vicious cycle that will eventually bring catastrophe.
THE INEVITABLE RIVALRY?
In Washington, the standard account for why the relationship has gotten so bad is that China changed: in the past decade or two, Beijing has stopped “biding its time,” becoming more repressive at home and assertive abroad even while continuing to take advantage of the relationships and institutions that have enabled China’s economic growth.
That change is certainly part of the story, and it is as much a product of China’s growing clout as of Xi’s way of using that clout. But a complete account must also acknowledge corresponding changes in U.S. politics and policy as the United States has reacted to developments in China. Washington has met Beijing’s actions with an array of punitive actions and protective policies, from tariffs and sanctions to restrictions on commercial and scientific exchanges. In the process, the United States has drifted further from the principles of openness and nondiscrimination that have long been a comparative advantage while reinforcing Beijing’s conviction that the United States will never tolerate a more powerful China. Meanwhile, the United States has wavered in its support for the international institutions and agreements that have long structured global interdependence, driven in part by consternation over China’s growing influence within the international system.
The more combative approach, on both sides, has produced a mirroring dynamic. While Beijing believes that only through protracted struggle will Americans be persuaded to coexist with a strong China, Washington believes that it must check Chinese power and influence to defend U.S. primacy. The result is a downward spiral, with each side’s efforts to enhance its security prompting the other to take further steps to enhance its own.
In explaining growing U.S.-Chinese tensions, some scholars point to structural shifts in the balance of power. Graham Allison has written of “the Thucydides trap”: the notion that when a rising state challenges an established power, a war for hegemony frequently results. Yet a focus on capabilities alone has trouble accounting for the twists and turns in U.S.-Chinese relations, which are also driven by shifting perceptions of threat, opportunity, and purpose. Following President Richard Nixon’s 1972 visit to Beijing, Washington came to view China as a strategic partner in containing the Soviet Union. And as the post–Cold War era dawned, U.S. policymakers began hedging against growing Chinese military power even while seeking to encourage the country’s economic and political liberalization through greater integration.
U.S. foreign policy has become reactive.
Throughout this period, Chinese leaders saw a strategic opportunity to prioritize China’s development in a stable international environment. They opened the country’s doors to foreign investment and capitalist practices, seeking to learn from foreign expertise while periodically campaigning against “spiritual pollution” and “bourgeois liberalization.” Despite occasional attempts to signal resolve, including during the 1995–96 Taiwan Strait crisis and after the 1999 NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Yugoslavia, Chinese leaders largely adhered to the former leader Deng Xiaoping’s lying-low strategy to avoid triggering the sense of threat that could precipitate efforts to strangle China’s rise.
If there is a year that marked an inflection point in China’s approach to the world, it is not 2012, when Xi came to power, but 2008. The global financial crisis prompted Beijing to discard any notion that China was the student and the United States the teacher when it came to economic governance. And the Beijing Olympics that year were meant to mark China’s arrival on the world stage, but much of the world was focused instead on riots in Tibet, which Chinese officials chalked up to outside meddling, and on China’s subsequent crackdown. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) became increasingly fixated on the idea that foreign forces were intent on thwarting China’s rise.
In the years that followed, the halting movement toward liberalization went into reverse: the party cracked down on the teaching of liberal ideas and the activities of foreign nongovernmental organizations, crushed pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, and built a sprawling surveillance state and system of internment camps in Xinjiang—all manifestations of a broader conception of “national security,” animated by fears of unrest. Internationally, China gave up any semblance of strategic humility. It became more assertive in defending its territorial and maritime claims (along the Indian border, in the East and South China Seas, and with regard to Taiwan). Having surpassed Japan as the world’s second-largest economy in 2010, it began wielding its economic power to compel deference to CCP interests. It ramped up development of military capabilities that could counter U.S. intervention in the region, including expanding its once limited nuclear arsenal. The decision to develop many of these capabilities predated Xi, but it was under his leadership that Beijing embraced a more coercive and intolerant approach.
As it registered China’s growing capabilities and willingness to use them, Washington increased its hedging. The Obama administration announced that it would “pivot” to Asia, and even as Washington sought a constructive role for China in the international system, the pace of China’s rise quickly outstripped U.S. willingness to grant it a correspondingly significant voice. With Donald Trump’s election as president, Washington’s assessment became especially extreme: a Marxist-Leninist regime was, in Trump’s telling, out to “rape” the United States, dominate the world, and subvert democracy. In response, the Trump administration started a trade war, began to talk of “decoupling” the U.S. and Chinese economies, and launched a series of initiatives aimed at countering Chinese influence and undermining the CCP. In speeches, senior U.S. officials hinted at regime change, calling for steps to “empower the Chinese people” to seek a different form of government and stressing that “Chinese history contains another path for China’s people.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan concluding talks with Chinese counterparts in Anchorage, United States, March 2021
Pool / Reuters
The Biden administration has stopped any talk of regime change in China and coordinated its approach closely with allies and partners, a contrast with Trump’s unilateralism. But it has at the same time continued many of its predecessor’s policies and endorsed the assessment that China’s growing influence must be checked. Some lines of effort, such as the Justice Department’s China Initiative, which sought to prosecute intellectual property theft and economic espionage, have been modified. But others have been sustained, including tariffs, export controls, and visa restrictions, or expanded, such as sanctions against Chinese officials and companies. In Congress, meanwhile, ever more vehement opposition to China may be the sole thing that Democrats and Republicans can agree on, though even this shared concern has produced only limited agreement (such as recent legislation on domestic semiconductor investments) on how the United States should compete.
Over five decades, the United States tried a combination of engagement and deterrence to bring China into an international system that broadly sustains U.S. interests and values. American policymakers knew well that their Chinese counterparts were committed to defending CCP rule, but Washington calculated that the world would be less dangerous with China inside rather than outside the system. That bet largely succeeded—and is still better than the alternative. Yet many in Washington always hoped for, and to varying degrees sought to promote, China’s liberal evolution as well. China’s growing authoritarianism has thus fed the narrative of a comprehensive U.S. policy failure, and the focus on correcting that failure has entrenched Beijing’s insecurity and belief that the United States and its allies will not accept China as a superpower.
Now, both countries are intent on doing whatever is necessary to demonstrate that any move by the other will not go unmet. Both U.S. and Chinese decision-makers believe that the other side respects only strength and interprets restraint as weakness. At this year’s Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore in June, China’s defense minister, General Wei Fenghe, pledged to “fight to the very end” over Taiwan a day after meeting with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
TELL ME HOW THIS ENDS
Where the current trajectory leads is clear: a more dangerous and less habitable world defined by an ever-present risk of confrontation and crisis, with preparation for conflict taking precedence over tackling common challenges.
Most policymakers, at least those in Washington, are not seeking a crisis between the United States and China. But there is growing acceptance that a crisis is more or less inevitable. Its consequences would be enormous. Even if both sides want to avoid war, crises by definition offer little time for response amid intense public scrutiny, making it difficult to find pathways to deescalation. Even the limited application of force or coercion could set in motion an unpredictable set of responses across multiple domains—military, economic, diplomatic, informational. As leaders maneuver to show resolve and protect their domestic reputations, a crisis could prove very difficult to contain.
Taiwan is the most likely flash point, as changes in both Taipei and Beijing have increasingly put the island at the center of U.S.-Chinese tensions. Demographic and generational shifts in Taiwan, combined with China’s crackdown in Hong Kong, have heightened Taiwan’s resistance to the idea of Beijing’s control and made peaceful unification seem increasingly fanciful. After Taiwan’s traditionally pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won the presidency in 2016, Beijing took a hard line against the new president, Tsai Ing-wen, despite her careful efforts to avoid moves toward formal independence. Cross strait channels of communication shut down, and Beijing relied on increasingly coercive measures to punish and deter what it perceived as incremental moves toward Taiwan’s permanent separation.
Preparation for conflict is taking precedence over tackling common challenges.
In response, the United States increased military patrols in and around the Taiwan Strait, loosened guidelines for interacting with Taiwanese officials, broadened U.S. declaratory policy to emphasize support for Taiwan, and continued to advocate for Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations, including the United Nations. Yet many well-intentioned U.S. efforts to support the island and deter China have instead fueled Beijing’s sense of urgency about the need to send a shot across the bow to deter steadily growing U.S.-Taiwanese ties.
Even with an official U.S. policy of “strategic ambiguity” on whether the United States would intervene in the event of an attack on Taiwan, Chinese military planners expect U.S. involvement. Indeed, the anticipated difficulty of seizing Taiwan while also holding the United States at bay has long underpinned deterrence across the Taiwan Strait. But many U.S. actions intended to bolster the island’s ability to resist coercion have been symbolic rather than substantive, doing more to provoke than deter Beijing. For example, the Trump administration’s efforts to upend norms around U.S. engagement with Taiwan—in August 2020, Secretary for Health and Human Services Alex Azar became the highest-ranking cabinet member to visit Taiwan since full normalization of U.S.-Chinese relations in 1979—prompted China to send combat aircraft across the center line of the Taiwan Strait, ignoring an unofficial guardrail that had long served to facilitate safe operations in the waterway. Intrusions into Taiwan’s Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) have become a frequent means for Beijing to register displeasure with growing U.S. support. In October 2021, Chinese intrusions into Taiwan’s ADIZ hit a new high—93 aircraft over three days—in response to nearby U.S.-led military exercises.
This action-reaction cycle, driven by mutually reinforcing developments in Beijing, Taipei, and Washington, is accelerating the deterioration of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait. In recent months, Chinese official rhetoric has become increasingly threatening, using phrases that have historically signaled China’s intent to escalate. “Whoever plays with fire will get burnt,” Xi has repeatedly told U.S. President Joe Biden. In May, after Biden implied an unconditional commitment to defend Taiwan, rather than simply expressing the longstanding U.S. obligation to provide the island with the military means to defend itself and to maintain the U.S. capacity to resist any use of force, the Chinese Foreign Ministry stressed that Beijing “will take firm actions to safeguard its sovereignty and security interests.”
Beijing is beginning to believe that coercion may be necessary to halt Taiwan’s permanent separation.
Although Beijing continues to prefer peaceful unification, it is coming to believe that coercive measures may be necessary to halt moves toward Taiwan’s permanent separation and compel steps toward unification, particularly given the Chinese perception that Washington’s support for Taiwan is a means to contain China. Even if confidence in China’s military and economic trajectory leads Beijing to believe that “time and momentum” remain on its side, political trends in Taiwan and in the United States make officials increasingly pessimistic about prospects for peaceful unification. Beijing has not set a timetable for seizing Taiwan and does not appear to be looking for an excuse to do so. Still, as the political scientist Taylor Fravel has shown, China has used force when it thinks its claims of sovereignty are being challenged. High-profile symbolic gestures of U.S. support for Taiwan are especially likely to be construed as an affront that must be answered. (As of this writing, Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, the first trip by a U.S. speaker of the house since 1997, has prompted Chinese warnings that “the Chinese military will never sit idly by,” followed by unprecedently threatening military exercises and missile tests around Taiwan.)
As both the United States and Taiwan head into presidential elections in 2024, party politics could prompt more efforts to push the envelope on Taiwan’s political status and de jure independence. It is far from clear whether Tsai’s successor as president will be as steadfast as she has been in resisting pressure from strident advocates of independence. Even under Tsai, there have been troubling signs that DPP leaders are not content with the status quo despite its popularity with voters. DPP leaders have lobbied Washington to refrain from making statements that the United States does not support Taiwan independence. In March, Taipei’s representative office in Washington gave former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo a hefty honorarium to visit Taiwan, where he called on the United States to offer the island “diplomatic recognition as a free and sovereign country.”
The risk of a fatal collision in the air or at sea is also rising outside the Taiwan Strait. With the Chinese and U.S. militaries operating in proximity in the East and South China Seas, both intent on demonstrating their willingness to fight, pilots and operators are employing dangerous tactics that raise the risk of an inadvertent clash. In 2001, a Chinese fighter jet collided with a U.S. reconnaissance plane over the South China Sea, killing the Chinese pilot and leading to the 11-day detention of the U.S. crew. After initial grandstanding, the Chinese worked to head off a full-blown crisis, even cracking down on displays of anti-Americanism in the streets. It is much harder to imagine such a resolution today: the desire to display resolve and avoid showing weakness would make it exceedingly difficult to defuse a standoff.
THE CENTER CANNOT HOLD
Even if the two sides can avoid a crisis, continuation of the current course will reinforce geopolitical divisions while inhibiting cooperation on global problems. The United States is increasingly focused on rallying countries around the world to stand against China. But to the extent that a coalition to counter China forms, especially given the ideological framing that both the Trump and Biden administrations have adopted, that coalition is unlikely to include the range of partners that might stand to defend universal laws and institutions. “Asian countries do not want to be forced to choose between the two,” Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong wrote of China and the United States in these pages in 2020. “And if either attempts to force such a choice—if Washington tries to contain China’s rise or Beijing seeks to build an exclusive sphere of influence in Asia—they will begin a course of confrontation that will last decades and put the long-heralded Asian century in jeopardy.”
The current approach to competition is also likely to strengthen the alignment between China and Russia. The Biden administration has managed to deter Chinese military assistance to Russia in Ukraine, and China has mostly complied with sanctions, demonstrating that there are in fact limits to Beijing and Moscow’s “no limits” partnership. But so long as the two governments share a belief that they cannot be secure in a U.S.-led system, they will continue to deepen their cooperation. In the months since the invasion of Ukraine, they have carried out joint military patrols in the Pacific Ocean and worked to develop alternatives to the U.S.-controlled financial system.
Ultimately, Chinese-Russian relations will be shaped by how Beijing weighs its need to resist the United States against its need to preserve ties to international capital and technology that foster growth. China’s alignment with Russia is not historically determined: there is an ongoing high-level debate within Beijing over how close to get to Moscow, with the costs of full-fledged alignment producing consternation among some Chinese analysts. Yet unless Washington can credibly suggest that Beijing will see strategic benefits, not only strategic risks, from distancing itself from Moscow, advocates of closer Chinese-Russian cooperation will continue to win the argument.
Insecurity and fear have pernicious effects on democracy.
Growing geopolitical tension also crowds out progress on common challenges, regardless of the Biden administration’s desire to compartmentalize certain issues. Although U.S. climate envoy John Kerry has made some headway on climate cooperation with China, including a joint declaration at last year’s climate summit in Glasgow, progress has been outweighed by acrimony in areas where previous joint efforts had borne fruit, including counternarcotics, nonproliferation, and North Korea. On both sides, too many policymakers fear that willingness to cooperate will be interpreted as a lack of resolve.
Such tensions are further eroding the already weak foundations of global governance. It is not clear how much longer the center of the international rules-based order can hold without a broad-based effort at its renewal. But as Beijing has grown more concerned that the United States seeks to contain or roll back its influence—by, for example, denying it a greater say in international economic governance—the more it has invested in alternative institutions, such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. Meanwhile, China’s engagement with the multilateral system is increasingly aimed at discrediting U.S. leadership within it. Even though Beijing has not exactly demonstrated fealty to many of the principles it claims to support, the divide between the haves and have-nots has allowed it to cast the United States as protecting the privileges of a minority of powerful states. At the United Nations, Beijing and Washington too often strive to undercut each other’s initiatives, launching symbolic battles that require third countries to choose between the two.
Last but far from least, a fixation on competition brings costs and dangers in the United States. Aggressive U.S. efforts to protect research security, combined with increased attacks against Asian Americans, are having a chilling effect on scientific research and international collaboration and are jeopardizing the appeal of the United States as a magnet for international talent. A 2021 survey by the American Physical Society found that 43 percent of international physics graduate students and early career scientists in the United States considered the country unwelcoming; around half of international early career scientists in the United States thought the government’s approach to research security made them less likely to stay there over the long term. These effects are particularly pronounced among scientists of Chinese descent. A recent study by the Asian American Scholar Forum found that 67 percent of faculty of Chinese origin (including naturalized citizens and permanent residents) reported having considered leaving the United States.
As the United States has sought to shield itself from Chinese espionage, theft, and unfair trading practices, it has often insisted on reciprocity as a precondition for commercial, educational, and diplomatic exchanges with Beijing. But strict reciprocity with an increasingly closed system like China’s comes at a cost to the United States’ comparative advantage: the traditional openness, transparency, and equal opportunity of its society and economy, which drive innovation, productivity, and scientific progress.
Watching a CCTV news broadcast about naval operations near Taiwan by the Chinese military, Beijing, August 2022
Thomas Peter / Reuters
The climate of insecurity and fear is also having pernicious effects on democracy and the quality of public debate about China and U.S. policy. The desire to avoid appearing “soft” on China permeates private and public policy discussions. The result is an echo chamber that encourages analysts, bureaucrats, and officials to be politically rather than analytically correct. When individuals feel the need to out-hawk one another to protect themselves and advance professionally, the result is groupthink. A policy environment that incentivizes self-censorship and reflexive positioning forecloses pluralistic debate and a vibrant marketplace for ideas, ingredients critical to the United States’ national competitiveness.
From the World War II internment of Japanese Americans to the McCarthyism of the 1950s to hate crimes against Muslim and Sikh Americans after September 11, U.S. history is replete with examples of innocent Americans caught in the crossfire of exaggerated fears of the “enemy within.” In each case, overreaction did as much as or more than the adversary to undermine U.S. democracy and unity. Although the Biden administration has condemned anti-Asian hate and stressed that policy must target behavior rather than ethnicity, some government agencies and U.S. politicians have continued to imply that an individual’s ethnicity and ties to family abroad are grounds for heightened scrutiny.
BEFORE CATASTROPHE
If the United States and Soviet Union could arrive at détente, there is no reason that Washington and Beijing cannot do so as well. Early in the Cold War, President John F. Kennedy, hailing the need to “make the world safe for diversity,” stressed that “our attitude is as essential as theirs.” He warned Americans “not to see conflict as inevitable, accommodation as impossible, and communication as nothing more than an exchange of threats.”
Even while making clear that Beijing will pay a high price if it resorts to force or other forms of coercion, Washington must present China with a real choice. Deterrence requires that threats be paired with assurances. To that end, U.S. policymakers should not be afraid of engaging directly with their Chinese counterparts to discuss terms on which the United States and China could coexist, including mutual bounds on competition. It was relatively easy for Americans to imagine coexistence with a China thought to be on a one-way path of liberalization. The United States and its partners now have the harder task of imagining coexistence with an authoritarian superpower, finding a new basis for bilateral interaction that focuses on shaping outward behavior rather than changing China’s domestic system.
The most pressing need relates to Taiwan, where the United States must bolster deterrence while also clarifying that its “one China” policy has not changed. This means ensuring that Beijing knows how costly a crisis over Taiwan would be, putting at risk its broader development and modernization objectives—but also that if it refrains from coercive action, neither Washington nor Taipei will exploit the opportunity to push the envelope further. While Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other senior officials have affirmed that the United States does not support Taiwan’s independence, other actions by the administration (especially Biden’s repeated statements suggesting an end to “strategic ambiguity”) have sown doubt.
The United States must do much more to invest in the power of its example.
While helping bolster Taiwan’s resilience to Chinese coercion, Washington should avoid characterizing Taiwan as a vital asset for U.S. interests. Such statements feed Beijing’s belief that the United States seeks to “use Taiwan to contain China,” as China’s ambassador to Washington put it in May. The United States should instead make clear its abiding interest in a peaceful process for resolving cross-strait differences rather than in a particular outcome. And as they highlight the costs Beijing can expect if it escalates its coercive campaign against Taiwan, U.S. policymakers should also stress to Taipei that unilateral efforts to change Taiwan’s political status, including calls for de jure independence, U.S. diplomatic recognition, or other symbolic steps to signal Taiwan’s permanent separation from China, are counterproductive.
These steps will be necessary but not sufficient to pierce the growing fatalism regarding a crisis, given Beijing’s hardening belief that the United States seeks to contain China and will use Taiwan to that end. To put a floor beneath the collapsing U.S.-China relationship will require a stronger effort to establish bounds of fair competition and a willingness to discuss terms of coexistence. Despite recent meetings and calls, senior U.S. officials do not yet have regular engagements with their counterparts that would facilitate such discussions. These discussions should be coordinated with U.S. allies and partners to prevent Beijing from trying to drive a wedge between the United States and others in Europe and Asia. But Washington should also forge a common understanding with its allies and partners around potential forms of coexistence with China.
Skeptics may say that there is no reason for the leadership in Beijing to play along, given its triumphalism and distrust. These are significant obstacles, but it is worth testing the proposition that Washington can take steps to stabilize escalating tensions without first experiencing multiple crises with a nuclear-armed competitor. There is reason to believe that Beijing cares enough about stabilizing relations to reciprocate. Despite its claim that the “East is rising and the West is declining,” China remains the weaker party, especially given its uncertain economic trajectory. Domestic challenges have typically tended to restrain China’s behavior rather than, as some Western commentators have speculated, prompting risky gambles. The political scientist Andrew Chubb has shown that when Chinese leaders have faced challenges to their legitimacy, they have acted less assertively in areas such as the South China Sea.
The U.S. and China will have to take coordinated but unilateral steps to head off a militarized crisis.
Because Beijing and Washington are loath to make unilateral concessions, fearing that they will be interpreted as a sign of weakness at home and by the other side, détente will require reciprocity. Both sides will have to take coordinated but unilateral steps to head off a militarized crisis. For example, a tacit understanding could produce a reduction in Chinese and U.S. operations in and around the Taiwan Strait, lowering the temperature without signaling weakness. Military operations are necessary to demonstrate that the United States will continue to fly and sail wherever international law allows, including the Taiwan Strait. But ultimately, the United States’ ability to deter and Taiwan’s ability to defend against an attempt at armed unification by Beijing have little to do with whether the U.S. military transits the Taiwan Strait four, eight, 12, or 24 times a year.
In the current atmosphere of distrust, words must be matched by actions. In his November 2021 virtual meeting with Biden, Xi said, “We have patience and will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts.” But Beijing’s actions since have undercut its credibility in Taipei and in Washington. Biden likewise told Xi that the United States does not seek a new Cold War or want to change Beijing’s system. Yet subsequent U.S. actions (including efforts to diversify supply chains away from China and new visa restrictions on CCP officials) have undermined Washington’s credibility among not just leaders in Beijing but also others in the region. It does not help that some administration officials continue to invoke Cold War parallels.
To bolster its own credibility, the Biden administration should also do more to preempt charges of hypocrisy and double standards. Consider U.S. policy to combat digital authoritarianism: Washington has targeted Chinese surveillance technology firms more harshly than similar companies based in the United States, Israel, and other Western democracies.
THE WORLD THAT OUGHT TO BE
So far, the Biden administration’s order-building efforts have centered on arrangements that exclude China, such as the Quad (Quadrilateral Security Dialogue) and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. Although officials have been careful to insist that these initiatives are not targeted at any one country, there is little sign of any corresponding effort to negotiate Beijing’s role in the international or regional order. At the margins, there have been some signs that inclusive groupings can still deliver. (The World Trade Organization has struck agreements on fishing subsidies and COVID-19 vaccines.) But if investments in narrower, fit-for-purpose coalitions continue to take priority over broader, inclusive agreements and institutions, including those in which China and the United States both have major roles to play, geopolitical tensions will break rather than reinvigorate the international system.
Renewing U.S. leadership will also require doing more to address criticism that a U.S.-led order means “rules for thee but not for me.” Clear and humble acknowledgment of instances where the United States has violated the UN Charter, such as the invasion of Iraq, would be an important step to overcoming that resentment. And Washington must deliver value for citizens in developing countries, whether on COVID-19, climate, hunger, or technology, rather than simply urging them not to work with China. At home, Washington must work to rebuild bipartisan support for U.S. engagement with the international system.
As the United States reimagines its domestic and international purpose, it should do so on its own terms, not for the sake of besting China. Yet fleshing out an inclusive, affirmative vision of the world it seeks would also be a first step toward clarifying the conditions under which the United States would welcome or accept Chinese initiatives rather than reflexively opposing them. The countries’ divergent interests and values would still result in the United States opposing many of Beijing’s activities, but that opposition would be accompanied by a clear willingness to negotiate the terms of China’s growing influence. The United States cannot cede so much influence to Beijing that international rules and institutions no longer reflect U.S. interests and values. But the greater risk today is that overzealous efforts to counter China’s influence will undermine the system itself through a combination of paralysis and the promotion of alternate arrangements by major powers.
Finally, the United States must do much more to invest in the power of its example and to ensure that steps taken to counter China do not undermine that example by falling into the trap of trying to out-China China. Protective or punitive actions, whether military, economic, or diplomatic, should be assessed not just on the basis of whether they counter China but also on how they affect the broader system and whether they reflect fidelity to U.S. principles.
Competition cannot become an end in itself. So long as outcompeting China defines the United States’ sense of purpose, Washington will continue to measure success on terms other than on its own. Rankings are a symbolic construct, not an objective condition. If the pursuit of human progress, peace, and prosperity is the ultimate objective, as Blinken has stated, then the United States does not need to beat China in order to win.
- JESSICA CHEN WEISS is the Michael J. Zak Professor of China and Asia-Pacific Studies at Cornell University. She served as a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow on the Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State from August 2021 to July 2022. The views expressed here are her own.
Foreign Affairs · by Jessica Chen Weiss · August 18, 2022
14. How Pelosi’s Visit to Taiwan Drove Chinese Public Opinion Toward Reunification by Force
Uh Oh.
Excerpts:
With that in mind, public opinion might well think a potential armed conflict between the PLA Navy and U.S. Navy is acceptable. It is questionable whether the Chinese public perceives the U.S. deterrence strategy as effective.
Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan has changed history. At the very least, the PLA fired missiles over Taiwan Island for the first time in history. At the very most, the path of history might turn toward a future of reunification by force, one that is welcomed and supported by the Chinese public. The probability of armed conflict over Taiwan is rising. When the first day of the PLA’s drills unfolded, the PLA News Media Center posted a short story named “Notice! Military Drills Not Only Train the Soldiers But Also Train the People.” Sadly, it seems public opinion has been trained successfully as well.
How Pelosi’s Visit to Taiwan Drove Chinese Public Opinion Toward Reunification by Force
Since Pelosi’s visit, the future of the cross-strait issue has surged toward military conflict, as the Chinese public started to dismiss the possibility of peaceful reunification.
thediplomat.com · by Leo Chu · August 19, 2022
Advertisement
On the night of August 2, many Chinese people were tracking U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s travels online. They either joined the millions of people looking at Flightradar24, or watched live streaming and discussed online. People believed that they were witnessing history – a possible shoot-down of the House speaker’s plane or a sudden military operation to reunify Taiwan.
That, obviously, did not happen. However, the direction of history has changed. Since Pelosi’s visit, the future of the cross-strait issue has surged toward military conflict, in the minds of Chinese netizens. Mainland public opinion now prioritizes reunification by force. When Pelosi planned her trip, the strategic logic was to ensure U.S. deterrence. But it may have done the opposite: increasing the likelihood of war by raising public demands for it within China.
The Chinese public was already paying close attention to Pelosi even before the House speaker started her trip. The Chinese government and media talked tough and used every chance to condemn Pelosi. Official voices did not make it clear in advance how China would react to Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, yet both China’s Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Defense warned that there would be harsh countermeasures. Meanwhile, a narrative of China-U.S. rivalry and strong nationalist sentiments went viral among China’s internet users. When Hu Xijin, a prominent Chinese commentator and former editor-in-chief of China’s state-affiliated media Global Times, tweeted his support of tough military deterrence and posited a possible shoot-down of Pelosi’s plane, many Chinese people read that as a governmental statement. They expected a tough and fierce reaction from the government, and they expected that to come on the night of August 2.
As a result, on August 3 and 4 disappointment was the mainstream emotion on the Chinese internet. A mix of shame, fear of being viewed as weak, and even anger toward the perceived inaction of the government accounted for the bulk of online discussions. Deng Bojun, a Chinese internet influencer with 6 million followers on Weibo, recalled that his friends had “relatively big negative emotions” after learning that Pelosi’s plane had landed at the Taoyuan International Airport in Taiwan. Deng explained that people were agitated because self-media and influencers had set expectations too high for China’s reaction to the trip.
The “negative emotions,” be it disappointment or anger, resulted from a belief that China lost to the U.S. in this “game of chicken” by simply allowing Pelosi to land. That was interpreted as a loss of face plus a loss of sovereignty – as Beijing has always seen Taiwan as part of its territory. Deng compared this incident with what many Chinese people call “the three disgraces” – three incidents around the turn of the 21st century that saw the United States shame China. They were the Hainan incident, the Yinhe ship incident, and the U.S. bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. Some nationalist Chinese users started to add Pelosi’s visit to Taipei to the list and call them collectively “the four disgraces.”
Enjoying this article? Click here to subscribe for full access. Just $5 a month.
However, the negative public emotion was never likely to backfire against the Chinese government. These four disgraces – if Pelosi’s trip is counted – share one emotion in common: They revealed a perceived U.S. threat to Chinese sovereignty and a fear that the West would infringe on China’s sovereignty and threaten the existence of the Chinese nation. The Hainan incident was a U.S. surveillance plane colliding with a Chinese fighter jet in the South China Sea; the Yinhe ship incident was the U.S. Navy detaining and searching a Chinese ship in international waters. The bombing of the embassy was alleged to be accidental but the Chinese people hardly bought it. Viewed alongside these incidents, Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, another sovereignty issue, would incite nationalist and anti-U.S. sentiments much more than disappointment toward Beijing.
Yet even what disappointment there was diminished within a few days when the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) announced and started military drills around the island of Taiwan. The early disappointment reflected a fear of inaction, which was dispelled when the Chinese government began to implement its countermeasures. Meanwhile, there was a change of focus quietly underway in the public opinion field: The narrative was switching from China-U.S. rivalry to Mainland-Taiwan reunification.
As shown by Hu’s tweet and Deng’s observation, much of the early Chinese narrative on Pelosi’s visit was about the China-U.S. standoff. Chinese people worried that the U.S. infringed on the sovereignty of China, and that Beijing was weak in responding to Washington. However, starting from the morning of August 3, the focus shifted to a discussion around the Taiwan issue. An op-ed from a state-backed media account, titled “History Will Not Be Condensed into One Night,” began trending on Weibo and was reposted by many state newspapers. The article urged people to think about the best means to “solve the Taiwan issue.” And in the eye of public opinion, reunification by force is the future solution.
Advertisement
Against that backdrop, reports of the PLA’s military drills quickly went viral. Chang Kaishen, another Chinese internet influencer who is famous for his political analysis, told me that Chinese netizens came to believe that China did not lose face after the military drills broke several tacit rules between Beijing and Taipei, including repeated crossings of the median line of the strait. “This is a gradual process,” said Chang, “it is hard to find a specific point in time [on when netizens turned their opinion].” Some people looked at the map of the drills that were encircling the island and became more confident; others felt satisfied only after the PLA sent missiles flying over Taipei. One thing is for certain: The military drills were seen as a big step toward reunification by force, and that was welcomed by Chinese public opinion.
For a long time, reunification by force has been seen as only a “last resort” if peaceful reunification fails. Yet the definition of the “last resort” remains unclear. When might Beijing and the Chinese people decide that they need to use this last resort? When might peaceful reunification be doomed to failure? If one had posed these two questions to the Chinese public before August, then the answers probably would have been “undecided” and “definitely not yet.” It is not easy to support a military conflict, especially when the Chinese people have enjoyed decades of peace and development.
Li Jianqiu, a Chinese businessman and online commentator, told me that he felt the cross-strait relationship was “quite good” back in the age of Ma Ying-jeou. “It would be best if we can peacefully solve the (Taiwan) issue,” Li answered when asked about how much he supports reunification by force. If the cross-strait conflict is not brought openly and dramatically before almost everyone, the old age of peaceful hope might just be preserved.
Unfortunately, when Pelosi’s visit ignited the discussion on Taiwan, the Chinese public started to think about the possibility of peaceful reunification and question their willingness to maintain the status quo. Their conclusions were predictably negative. Chang Kaishen said that what he observed in Chinese was a positive correlation between knowledge about Taiwan and hostility toward the authorities on Taiwan. The more a netizen is exposed to news and information about Taiwan, Chang said, the more likely they will dislike Taiwan, and thus the more likely they will be to support reunification by force. It is no coincidence that in China’s closed media environment, most news that does appear about Taiwan is negative.
The first week of August certainly saw a substantial increase in Taiwan news and information appearing on China’s internet. The public sees clearly that the government on Taiwan does not believe it is part of China, and that few Taiwanese people – especially the younger generations – see themselves as Chinese. That is the hard truth, one that undermines the very possibility of peaceful reunification.
Chang, Deng, and Li all agreed that after Pelosi’s visit, reunification by force has become more welcome among the public.
Furthermore, the Chinese public now believes that the PLA will face relatively little resistance if they reunify Taiwan by force. The military drills, and the lack of pushback, have given most people an unprecedented level of confidence. As concluded by the Chinese Central Television’s influencer account Yuyuantantian, the PLA has made 10 breakthroughs around Taiwan, including approaching the coastline by air and by water. Many Chinese military fans compared this year’s drills with the ones during last Taiwan crisis in 1996. The transformation in China’s military power was rapid and astonishing.
Enjoying this article? Click here to subscribe for full access. Just $5 a month.
Those who know weapons and equipment now claim that China’s armed forces have enough ability to implement area denial against the U.S. military. Meng Xiangqing, a professor of strategy at the National Defense University in Beijing, said on television that “we can fight in whatever way we want, and on whatever date we choose.” Those who don’t read military data nevertheless also judged the U.S. capacity to respond as low. After all, no U.S. warships were around this time, compared to the presence of two aircraft carriers in 1996. Deng pointed out that people think the “costs of reunification by force might not be that high.”
With that in mind, public opinion might well think a potential armed conflict between the PLA Navy and U.S. Navy is acceptable. It is questionable whether the Chinese public perceives the U.S. deterrence strategy as effective.
Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan has changed history. At the very least, the PLA fired missiles over Taiwan Island for the first time in history. At the very most, the path of history might turn toward a future of reunification by force, one that is welcomed and supported by the Chinese public. The probability of armed conflict over Taiwan is rising. When the first day of the PLA’s drills unfolded, the PLA News Media Center posted a short story named “Notice! Military Drills Not Only Train the Soldiers But Also Train the People.” Sadly, it seems public opinion has been trained successfully as well.
Leo Chu
Leo Chu is a research assistant at the University of Southern California Center for Active Learning in International Studies.
thediplomat.com · by Leo Chu · August 19, 2022
15. What the Taliban Really Fear: A Resistance Movement Is Growing in Afghanistan—and It Needs International Support
Will anyone support the resistance?
(Unconventional Warfare consists of activities to enable a resistance or insurgency to coerce, disrupt, or overthrow a government or occupying power, through and with an underground, auxiliary or guerrilla force in a denied area.)
Excerpts:
The NRF knows full well that Afghanistan has seen much bloodshed in recent decades. It has always sought a peaceful political solution to end the conflict in the country. The Taliban, however, have no desire for such a peace process. Thanks to the Taliban’s implacable extremism, the NRF believes that armed resistance is the only reasonable approach and strategy to liberate Afghanistan and to counter international terrorism.
Afghanistan is at a critical juncture, and the situation will deteriorate if ignored by the international community, with damaging security and political consequences for all. Afghanistan’s people, under the banner of the NRF, have a chance to fight for and form a democratic and just government that truly represents their will and interests. Through its inaction, the international community only rewards and provides legitimacy to the Taliban—a terrible choice when a real alternative is taking shape.
What the Taliban Really Fear
A Resistance Movement Is Growing in Afghanistan—and It Needs International Support
August 19, 2022
Foreign Affairs · by Ali Maisam Nazary · August 19, 2022
A year has passed since the fall of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the return of the Taliban to power in Kabul. Despite its troubles, Afghanistan before August 2021 was a free, democratic country; now it is in a state of turmoil and anarchy. It is on the brink of the worst humanitarian crisis in modern times, with its economy in tatters and its people facing acute food insecurity. Human trafficking and drug trafficking are on the rise. The killing of the al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul points to the persisting ties between the Taliban and transnational terrorist groups. Disarray in the country will only fuel further terrorism and violence, but the international community has merely looked on as Afghanistan has unraveled. Regional and global powers seem willing to accept the de facto rule of the Taliban, even though they lack legitimacy and the support of the population.
The world should not consign Afghans to this bleak future. At least one force remains in the country that seeks to beat back the Taliban, fight terrorist groups such as al Qaeda and the so-called Islamic State (also known as ISIS), and restore democracy. The National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF) is the most capable organized and armed opposition in the country. It is led by Ahmad Massoud, the son of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud, the veteran leader from the struggle against the Soviets and fierce opponent of the Taliban who was assassinated by al Qaeda in 2001, two days before the 9/11 attacks. As his father resisted the Taliban and foreign terrorists decades ago, so, too, has Massoud in the past year. When Ashraf Ghani, the president of the fallen Afghan republic, and many other officials fled Afghanistan last August, Massoud decided to stay and fight. In his home province of Panjshir, he was able to rally thousands of soldiers from the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) who opted to join the NRF. Key officials from the republican government also came to Panjshir to band together with Massoud in the resistance to the Taliban.
The NRF fought pitched battles against the Taliban until mid-September last year when Massoud commanded his forces to withdraw into the side valleys of Panjshir and Andarab and to adopt a strategy of guerrilla warfare. Since then, the military wing of the organization has been operating in northern Afghanistan while the political wing is based outside Afghanistan.
NRF forces remain active across the north of the country. In recent weeks, the NRF has attacked Taliban positions, liberated villages from Taliban control, and launched strikes on international terrorist groups in northern Afghanistan that the Taliban have once again allowed into the country. The NRF’s resistance offers a sliver of hope, but so far the international community has not extended the group any support. To rescue Afghanistan from the brutal, oppressive grip of the Taliban and its terrorist allies, outside powers must help give the NRF a fighting chance.
THE DAWN OF THE RESISTANCE
The republic that the Taliban toppled in 2021 was not without its blemishes. The governments that ruled Afghanistan during the past 20 years were highly centralized and built around the figure of a king-like president, a configuration that created the conditions for pervasive corruption, the empowering of cronies and political allies, and the marginalization of the interests of the majority of Afghans. Disaffection with the distant and haughty government in Kabul led many people from all over the country to join the Taliban.
The NRF believes that Afghanistan should be governed as a decentralized democratic republic, a political system that would better represent all ethnic groups and ensure equal rights for all citizens regardless of their race, religion, and gender. In a country such as Afghanistan, where no single ethnic group makes up a majority of the population, only a decentralized political system can equitably distribute power, ensure political stability, and guarantee justice and unity. Power and authority must be devolved from the capital to the provinces and districts, and local and provincial officials must be elected by the people instead of being appointed by the central government. A decentralized Afghanistan will allow people to be closer to the decisions that shape their lives and hold to account their representatives and officials. Before any such process can be established, however, democracy and the institution of elections must be revived to pave the way for a more just and credible government. The NRF is adamant that free and fair elections are the only source for political legitimacy in the country, and without them, no group can lay claim to represent the people of Afghanistan.
To achieve that goal, the NRF has taken up armed struggle against the Taliban and its partners. The military wing of the NRF is made up of the remnants of Afghanistan’s former armed forces, who were trained, advised, and funded by the United States and NATO over the past two decades. The collapse of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was not their fault. The U.S. withdrawal pulled away necessary resources, contractors, and advisers, limiting the ability of ANSF forces to effectively resist the advance of the Taliban. More important, the Afghan army was let down by weak political leadership. Ghani and his advisers lacked military training and experience, but they made major military decisions and appointments from the presidential palace and ignored the advice of security officials.
Fortunately, more effective leaders remain in Afghanistan. Thousands of Afghan soldiers came to Panjshir in August 2021 to rally to Massoud and continue the struggle against the Taliban and its terrorist allies. Even though it lacks sufficient resources, the NRF has the will to fight, embraces a legitimate cause, and benefits from strong leadership. NRF soldiers believe that Massoud, an honest, young, and educated leader, is capable of liberating the country from the Taliban and setting up a new political and social order that will benefit all Afghans.
THE SPRING OFFENSIVE
In the past year, the NRF has continued its fight even as every single outside power abandoned Afghanistan. The stakes of the ongoing conflict are great, exceeding those of a mere civil war. The Taliban have allowed regional and international terrorist groups to set up base in Afghanistan. Thousands of foreign fighters from the Middle East, South Asia, and Central Asia, speaking languages unknown to Afghans, are living throughout the country under Taliban protection. These militants are armed with the weapons and equipment left behind by NATO, worth more than $7 billion, in the chaos of the U.S. withdrawal.
They threaten not just the stability of Afghanistan but that of the broader region. The Taliban have handed over the security of the Afghan-Tajik border to the militant groups Jamaat Ansarullah and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. Recently, with the assistance of the Taliban, terrorists from Tajikistan formed a group called the Taliban Movement of Tajikistan that aims to establish its own Islamic emirate in Central Asia. The recent U.S. drone attack that killed Zawahiri in the heart of Kabul shows the deep and intertwined relationship between the Taliban and terrorist groups such as al Qaeda. Despite all these distressing developments, the NRF stands alone. Not a single country provides material support to the NRF, even though it is part of a broader fight for global security and universal values.
The anti-Taliban resistance has fought on even as every single outside power abandoned Afghanistan.
The NRF has nevertheless persevered and grown. It had to rely on its own resources to sustain thousands of troops in the north during the harsh winter in the Hindu Kush mountains, a laborious feat that required establishing logistical supply lines to provide NRF soldiers with shelter, clothing, communications, weapons, and munitions. Fortunately, the NRF not only successfully sustained its forces but in March expanded its operations from two provinces to 12 provinces. Today, the NRF is actively fighting in six provinces against the Taliban. It has been able to build permanent bases in districts throughout northern Afghanistan, and it has even successfully launched attacks against Taliban positions in Nangarhar Province in eastern Afghanistan.
A testament to the strength of the NRF was the successful launch of a spring offensive this year. Starting in early May, the offensive exceeded all expectations. The NRF is using the tactics of guerrilla warfare to strike at the Taliban, as opposed to the tactics of more conventional warfare that would be required to liberate entire provinces. Nevertheless, the NRF has been able to exhaust the enemy forces, win resources such as caches of weapons and munitions, open new fronts, and demonstrate the competence of its military personnel—all without a drop of help from any country.
Many Western observers have suggested that their governments should back the Taliban to contain the threat of ISIS in the country. Better to choose the lesser of two evils, they reason, than to hand Afghanistan to ISIS. But ISIS is not the force that most threatens the Taliban today; the Taliban’s most formidable adversaries are the pro-democracy forces of the NRF. In recent weeks, the Taliban have scrambled to launch a counteroffensive against NRF positions, but they have suffered heavy casualties. Several senior officials who led the attack, including Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, returned to Kabul and Kandahar after their assaults failed. In Panjshir this week, NRF troops killed dozens of Taliban fighters and took dozens more captive. The Taliban are clearly frustrated and unable to defeat the NRF in northern Afghanistan.
THE ROAD TO VICTORY
These developments are no doubt promising, but they represent only fragile success. For the NRF to translate its achievements into more meaningful victories—to turn from waging an unconventional war to prosecuting a conventional war that will liberate whole provinces—it will need the backing of the international community. The Taliban have benefited from the windfall of securing billions of dollars’ worth of arms left by withdrawing U.S. and NATO troops; the NRF needs help to contend with such a well-equipped foe. But foreign powers should not just back the NRF in its fight against the Taliban. The NRF remains a crucial part of any serious campaign seeking to limit the terrorist threats that can spread out from Afghanistan. The international community ignored the country through much of the 1990s as the Taliban rode roughshod over Afghanistan and played host to international terrorists such as Osama bin Laden. The world cannot make that same costly mistake again.
Unfortunately, the international community has adopted a policy of appeasement toward the Taliban. International media outlets have provided the Taliban numerous platforms to promote their false narratives and to make empty promises about guaranteeing women’s rights, severing ties with terrorist groups, and forming an inclusive and representative government—pledges they will never fulfill. Contrary to its messaging for an international audience, the group has not softened and still remains bent on confining Afghan women, committing atrocities against Afghan people, and abetting terrorist groups.
Massoud in Bazarak, Afghanistan, September 2019
Mohammad Ismail / Reuters
The NRF knows full well that Afghanistan has seen much bloodshed in recent decades. It has always sought a peaceful political solution to end the conflict in the country. The Taliban, however, have no desire for such a peace process. Thanks to the Taliban’s implacable extremism, the NRF believes that armed resistance is the only reasonable approach and strategy to liberate Afghanistan and to counter international terrorism.
Afghanistan is at a critical juncture, and the situation will deteriorate if ignored by the international community, with damaging security and political consequences for all. Afghanistan’s people, under the banner of the NRF, have a chance to fight for and form a democratic and just government that truly represents their will and interests. Through its inaction, the international community only rewards and provides legitimacy to the Taliban—a terrible choice when a real alternative is taking shape.
- ALI MAISAM NAZARY is head of foreign relations for the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan.
Foreign Affairs · by Ali Maisam Nazary · August 19, 2022
16. Marine Corps will not stand down MV-22 fleet despite Air Force move
Marine Corps will not stand down MV-22 fleet despite Air Force move - Breaking Defense
The service has known about the clutch failure phenomenon since 2010 and feels "that we have the appropriate procedures in place to handle this emergency procedure in the event that it occurs again," a Marine Corps official said.
breakingdefense.com · by Justin Katz · August 18, 2022
A U.S. Marine V-22 Osprey ascends the USS Bataan in Aqaba, Jordan, to begin a demo flight in support of Eager Lion 2017. (U.S. Army/Sgt. Mickey A. Miller)
WASHINGTON — In the wake of the Air Force grounding its CV-22 Osprey fleet over a safety concern, the Marine Corps’ top aviator said the Corps will not be following suit for its MV-22s, saying the Corps has been well aware of the issue for more than a decade. He is instead issuing guidance on how to reduce the likelihood of the problem occurring.
“The hard clutch issue has been known to the Marine Corps since 2010, and as such, we have trained our pilots to react with the appropriate emergency control measures should the issue arise during flight,” according to a statement the service published today. “We also remain engaged with the joint program office, NAVAIR engineering, and our industry partners to resolve the issue at the root cause.”
Breaking Defense first reported on Wednesday that Air Force Special Operations Command had grounded all 52 of its CV-22 Ospreys due to an “increased number of safety incidents” involving an issue with the aircraft’s clutch, including two incidents in within the past six weeks.
A Marine Corps official told reporters the service has been training its pilots on how to deal with the clutch issue since first discovering it in 2010. The official said since that time, the V-22 program — meaning the Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force variants — have only recorded 15 incidents, and 10 of those incidents involved the Marines. None of the 15 incidents occurred on the Navy’s CMV-22 variant.
The military characterizes aviation mishaps by “classes,” with each class representing specific injuries to the pilots and a dollar amount tied to the damage inflicted to the aircraft. The Marine Corps official could not immediately provide a breakdown of the 15 incidents based on class, but did say none were “Class A” — the most severe rating associated with the loss of life. They added that none of the mishaps included a pilot being seriously harmed. (An AFSOC official previously told Breaking Defense that by their estimation, in many cases, both gearboxes and engines require replacements after the incident — making them Class A mishaps with damage in excess of $2.5 million.)
Today AFSOC said there had been no change in their decision to ground their V-22 fleet, which began Tuesday. When pressed about why the Marines Corps is not standing down its fleet despite the Air Force’s decision, the Marine Corps official stressed that the service’s pilots have been instructed — and new guidance being issued today will reinforce — on how to reduce the chances the issue will occur.
“We feel that we have the appropriate procedures in place to handle this emergency procedure in the event that it occurs again,” the Marine Corps official said. “Whether that’s tomorrow or a year from now, our crews will be trained to properly respond to this emergency and safely land the aircraft.”
That mitigation, which is emphasized in the deputy commandant’s guidance, includes the importance of doing a “hover check,” a maneuver where the pilot brings the aircraft just a few feet off the ground and “hovers” for a moment while checking their instruments.
“Over two-thirds of these occurrences have happened within seconds after takeoff. So by coming up into a hover-in-ground effect and monitoring your instruments prior to committing to forward flight, we’re reducing the exposure to this to this phenomenon of the clutch failure,” the official said.
The Marine Corps official declined to answer any questions related to materiel solutions for the aircraft and deferred those questions to the V-22 Joint Program Office.
Breaking Defense’s Valerie Insinna contributed to this report.
17. China’s drills to change US military assumptions
Excerpts:
The US should be worried about the conclusion that the Taiwan Strait war will be prolonged although the US has certain advantages over China.
In this case, the US’ “preferred ammunition” (mainly various advanced and long-range missiles) will soon be exhausted. The domestic production capacity will be insufficient, and the replenishment of supply will be difficult.
If Russia, Iran or other forces challenge the US at this time, the US will run out of ammunition and food. In other words, the US will seriously suffer for supporting Taiwan. This may be the end of US hegemony. And this may change the view of US politicians and people.
The CSIS exercise has not yet calculated the economic impact and casualties of the war.
The two aircraft carriers have at least 10,000 officers and soldiers while there are 10,000 on other ships. Several thousand infantry soldiers and pilots will die. This is an intense burst of casualties not seen since World War II.
The Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the War on Terror had more casualties, but those accumulated over many years. The war in the CSIS scenarios only lasted for three to four weeks.
It remains to be seen how the PLA’s drills will change the settings of the scenario planning done by the CSIS or other institutions.
China’s drills to change US military assumptions
China will send small units to infiltrate Taiwan and use its naval and air superiority to block the US military
asiatimes.com · by Chen Feng · August 18, 2022
Chinese and foreign media have recently reported that the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a heavyweight think tank in the United States, has conducted scenario planning looking toward war in the Taiwan Strait.
Participants included former senior military officers, senior government military and political experts and fellows from think tanks such as the RAND Corporation and the Center for New American Security (CNAS).
The scenario planning had been scheduled for a long time. It caught a lot of attention as it happened after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan.
The CSIS assumed a war will break out in the Taiwan Strait in 2026. Such an estimation could be based on the prediction of the former commander of the US Pacific Command, Admiral Philip Davidson, who said in his testimony before Congress that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) would be ready to attack Taiwan in 2027.
It assumed that the attack would consist of six to eight rounds, each of them lasting three to four days. In total, it would last for three to four weeks.
The scenario planning indicated that in most (but not all) scenarios, the Taiwan military would not fall completely, but Taiwan’s economy and infrastructure would be basically destroyed.
It said the US military in the Western Pacific would pay a heavy price while the PLA would control one-third to half of Taiwan Island. Then the PLA would not be able to maintain its supply but the US military’s supply would continue.
The scenario planning will run until September, with a final report scheduled for December. So far, 18 of the 22 rounds of possible attacks have been carried out.
After the PLA’s drills, the CSIS may change the settings of its scenarios and even add more scenarios, in order to have a new understanding of the war in the Taiwan Strait.
In the scenarios, the US lost 500 to 900 US aircraft and more than 20 warships, including two aircraft carriers. However, the PLA lost 150 amphibious and surface vessels. Taiwan’s navy and half of its air force were eliminated in the first round.
Most news reports were vague about the scenario planning settings, but an article published by the US Breaking Defense website on August 11 provided more information.
Assumptions:
- The main attack of the PLA comes from amphibious landings.
- It is difficult for the PLA troops to achieve landings.
- The US military can use Japanese bases.
- Neither China nor the US will use nuclear weapons.
- The number of weapons and forces in 2026 is estimated based on publicly available information.
Basic conclusions:
- No matter how the war begins, it ends up being a protracted war between China and the US.
- The PLA must deploy all its troops. If it only deploys those in the Eastern Theater Command, it will be defeated in the first round.
- Both sides have less to worry about when no nuclear weapons will be used.
- Whether the Marine Littoral Regiment (MLR) will participate has a great impact on the result of the war. It cannot stop the PLA from landing on Taiwan but can prevent the Chinese troops from occupying the entire island.
Main conclusions:
- The PLA will not be ready for a war by 2027, but maybe in 2030-2035.
- America can only hope for a pyrrhic victory, but will be unable to overcome some other crisis after the war.
It is not difficult to see that the United States’ thinking on the Taiwan Strait war is still at the level of the Battle of Kinmen in 1949 or the Battle of Normandy in 1944.
They believe that the biggest threat of the PLA to Taiwan Island still comes from direct landing and that the landing must be quick to get ahead of the US and Japan’s intervention.
So they think the key mission of the US and Taiwan is anti-landing, which refers to interception at sea and containment at landing places.
PLA’s landings
Taiwan Island is not far away from mainland China but it is not close either.
Even if the Taiwanese army is weak, the PLA has to deploy one or two large army groups. There are technically only a few ways for a large army group to land in Taiwan directly.
- Hovercraft beach landing
- It requires a large area of flat beaches but there are only a few in Taiwan, which is not a secret. These beaches have long been the focus of Taiwan’s defense.
- Helicopter landing
- The distance across the strait is long while the PLA does not have enough helicopters. It’s an option for small troops but not large army groups.
- Parachute landing
- Soldiers cannot carry heavy equipment and it’s hard for them to gather. It’s not suitable for large army groups.
Taipei is the focus of Taiwan’s defense, and the towns are dense, so it is not easy to go straight to attack Taipei.
In the scenario planning, those who went straight to Taipei were easily repelled.
So most of the red teams (representing the PLA) chose to land at southwest Taiwan’s Tainan or Kaohsiung. But they faced a supply problem due to a longer distance from the mainland. They also faced attack from Penghu during their journeys.
Landing at Tainan at that early point in the war is not the best option for the PLA.
China’s different concepts
The PLA demonstrated a completely different operational concept in its drills in the Taiwan Strait. It dispatched a large number of naval, air and rocket forces, but did not focus too much on amphibious attacks.
It is not because amphibious attack is not important, but because it is not the only option. In fact, the PLA has practiced amphibious attacks many times.
The PLA does not have to stick to specific tactics but can flexibly switch its forces at the north and south ends of the Taiwan island.
The US has repeatedly encouraged the Taiwan military to avoid fighting against the PLA in naval and air battles but adopt an asymmetric “hedgehog defense” strategy (using handheld missiles). The US seems to agree that PLA has naval and air superiority.
The scenario planning has shown that the US and Taiwan combat aircraft and surface ships had little effect but shore-to-ship missiles had a more important role. Under such circumstances, it is not wise for the PLA to land in Taiwan directly without using its sea and air superiority.
The only reason for a quick landing is that the PLA wants to avoid the United States’ military intervention. But it does not seem to be a reason anymore.
US military intervention would definitely complicate mainland China’s military reunification of Taiwan.
In the latest exercise, all the preparations of the PLA were aimed at blocking the US military’s intervention. The PLA has improved its area-denial capability and is more and more confident of its ability to withstand the US intervention.
In the scenario planning, almost all scenarios ended in a stalemate.
If the PLA can stop the US intervention, there is no urgency for it to land on Taiwan.
Quick landing is important but not by a large army group, which moves slowly and requires strong supply, especially in urban areas.
The US wanted to prevent China’s large army group from landing, so it focused a lot on how to fight against amphibious and supply ships.
In fact, by deploying a large number of small military units to infiltrate Taiwan, the PLA will not only increase the means of landing and supply, but also greatly increase its flexibility.
It can also create a psychological shock in the minds of the Taiwanese military and people that “the communist army is everywhere.”
PLA infantry soldiers with guns are more useful than missiles, guided bombs and long-range rockets fires.
PLA soldiers under training. Photo: Eastern Theater Command
The PLA’s powerful naval and air and missile strikes, plus small troops on the island, will greatly shake the confidence of the Taiwanese military and people, and strategically slowing the operations of Taiwan’s troops can create a huge threat to Taiwan’s anti-ship missile and radar systems.
Such a strategy will be very effective. Of course, reconnaissance and attack planes, strategic bombers and satellites should also be used.
Small military units are only auxiliary forces that help the mainland’s large army group land. If Taiwan’s troops do not surrender, the PLA will launch more attacks.
US military bases in Japan
It’s an interesting issue whether the US military can use Japanese bases. If US planes take off from Japan and attack the PLA at sea and on land, there is no reason for the PLA not to attack the US bases in Japan.
In CSIS scenario planning, one scenario is that the PLA preemptively attacked the US military bases in Japan and Guam before landing on Taiwan Island. Then Japan joined the war. And the US and Japan won the war.
This is a strange assumption. Even if the PLA attacks US military bases in Japan, it is unclear whether Japan will join the war. Or in the first place, it’s not necessary that Japan will allow American planes to take off from the bases in its territory.
With Dongfeng 16, Donghai 10 and Xian H-6, China has prepared in case Japan joins the war. But there is no reason for China to take the initiative to attack Japan.
In many scenarios, the US lost two aircraft carriers. They were the most powerful forces that could arrive in the Taiwan Strait within a short time but they were not able to stop the PLA from landing Taiwan. They could not even protect themselves.
Neither combat aircraft nor surface fleet proved useful. The scenarios showed the insufficient supply to US naval and air forces. The locations of bases, the numbers of flights and the flight ranges of aircraft were limiting factors.
It is also a strange assumption that the PLA would only deploy troops in the Eastern Theater Command. The Eastern Theater Command is strong but the PLA has never fought unprepared battles.
It is wishful thinking that all of China’s neighbors will stand together with the US and wait for an opportunity to invade China. Such a situation will not be seen in the foreseeable future.
Nuclear war
Both China and the US are nuclear states. China has a policy of not being the first to use nuclear weapons. But the US has a policy, a tradition and an impulse to use them first.
The CNAS has done scenario planning before. The red team (representing Russia) threatened to use nuclear weapons while the blue team (the US) constrained its operations to avoid the scenario. In the end, the red team launched a nuclear bomb in Hawaii.
In the Taiwan Strait, neither China nor the US should rule out the possibility of nuclear escalation.
Marine Littoral Regiment
The MLR was a main research topic in the CSIS scenario planning. In the Taiwan Strait, its main weapons included naval strike missiles and HIMARS rockets, instead of F-35Bs, tanks or howitzers.
Whether the MLR can enter Taiwan in advance will have a great impact on the result of the war. However, there are several problems:
- Given that China reacted strongly to Pelosi’s visit, the MLR’s entry to Taiwan will definitely trigger a war.
- Once the MLR runs out of ammunition, it is impossible to replenish the supply. A C-17 military transport aircraft was shot down by the PLA in a scenario.
- The MLR can stop the PLA from occupying the whole of Taiwan but cannot prevent it from landing on the island.
Even if all 6,000 to 7,000 MLR soldiers are deployed to Taiwan by 2026, it is still insufficient in strength, not to mention that there is no time for deployment.
Without ammunition supply, the MLR will become a light infantry to support the Taiwan Army. It won’t be able to resist the PLA’s large army group, which at that later stage of the war may find that the time is ripe to land in Tainan.
In most scenarios, the MLR tried to land in Taiwan after a war broke out but failed. Without the MLR, the US and Taiwan defense was very difficult.
The US should be worried about the conclusion that the Taiwan Strait war will be prolonged although the US has certain advantages over China.
In this case, the US’ “preferred ammunition” (mainly various advanced and long-range missiles) will soon be exhausted. The domestic production capacity will be insufficient, and the replenishment of supply will be difficult.
If Russia, Iran or other forces challenge the US at this time, the US will run out of ammunition and food. In other words, the US will seriously suffer for supporting Taiwan. This may be the end of US hegemony. And this may change the view of US politicians and people.
The CSIS exercise has not yet calculated the economic impact and casualties of the war.
The two aircraft carriers have at least 10,000 officers and soldiers while there are 10,000 on other ships. Several thousand infantry soldiers and pilots will die. This is an intense burst of casualties not seen since World War II.
The Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the War on Terror had more casualties, but those accumulated over many years. The war in the CSIS scenarios only lasted for three to four weeks.
It remains to be seen how the PLA’s drills will change the settings of the scenario planning done by the CSIS or other institutions.
Chen Feng is a columnist of Guancha.cn, which originally published this article in Chinese as an exclusive manuscript. It is republished in English translation here with permission and has been edited slightly for length. This article is the author’s personal opinion and does not represent the Guancha platform’s or Asia Times’s opinion. It may not be reprinted without authorization.
Read: China’s Taiwan Strait drills: the new normal
asiatimes.com · by Chen Feng · August 18, 2022
18. Russia’s New Naval Doctrine: A ‘Pivot to Asia’?
Conclusion:
The 2022 Naval Doctrine is the first national security document that Russia has published since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, and reflects the Kremlin’s strategic thinking at the present time. The document focuses on Russia’s overall confrontation with the United States and NATO, and emphasizes a more central place for the use of force in defending Russian global interests and seeking economic and strategic alternatives for the West in the developing world. This document reinforces Russia’s tendency to turn international waters into a space for strategic competition and confrontation between the great powers. The militarization of maritime space found its expression in the document “Fundamentals of state policy of the Russian Federation in the military-naval sphere until 2030” (2017), derived from the doctrine from 2015, which detailed its military dimensions.
The pathos in which the naval doctrine was written provokes in many scholars a tendency to focus on the disconnect between Putin and his admirals and the grim reality of the Russian Navy. Indeed, it is very likely that Russia will find it difficult to meet its full ambitions, especially with regard to the “blue waters.” That said, the changes between 2015 and 2022 reflect a re-orientation of Russian foreign policy toward the Global South, following the war in Ukraine, and the perception of the Arctic as a new “milking cow” for the Russian economy.
Russia’s New Naval Doctrine: A ‘Pivot to Asia’?
Russia’s new maritime doctrine gives increasing importance to the Pacific and the Arctic.
thediplomat.com · by Daniel Rakov · August 19, 2022
Advertisement
On July 31, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed an updated version of the Naval Doctrine of the Russian Federation. This is a top-tier strategic-planning document, elaborating Moscow’s official approach to the maritime domain. The new edition reflects significant changes compared to the previous one from 2015.
It is tilted toward global confrontation with the West, pre-eminence of the security prism in defining national goals, and reorientation of Russia’s foreign policy toward the Global South following its invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin intends to strengthen its naval combat capabilities worldwide and announces its higher readiness to employ military means to further its interests in international waters, including an intention to increase its naval presence on the high seas. In order to do so, the new doctrine calls for a complete restructuring of the shipbuilding industry, with a qualitative scale-up in its technological and production capabilities, both in the military and civilian domains.
In the energy field, the doctrine stipulates reinvigoration of seabed exploration and production of fossil fuels. The 2015 text required Russia to establish a “strategic reserve” of geologically explored areas for future exploration; the lack of a similar passage in 2022 implies that Russia is going for maximal exploitation of hydrocarbons in the next years, probably fearful that the climate change agenda will diminish the future possibilities for exports.
Similar to the 2015 text, the new doctrine divides the world into six geographical “directions,” though their order has changed. The Arctic and the Pacific directions, previously mentioned in the second and third places, have been upgraded to the first two spots, at the expanse of the Atlantic direction, now numbered third. One of Russia’s main goals in each of these three directions is to “ensure strategic stability” (a euphemism for mutual nuclear deterrence), stated in more assertive and urgent language, compared to 2015.
The Doctrine explains that the Arctic has turned into a region of global military and economic competition and lists as major goals sustaining Russia’s leading position in this region and “wide exploitation” of its mineral reserves. Russia intends to utilize the “Northern Sea Route” (NSR) as its internal waters. Thus, the resource-intensive NSR, initially promoted by the Russians as an alternative to the Suez Canal, has been redirected eastwards since the war began to expedite the export of Russian commodities to Asia.
Enjoying this article? Click here to subscribe for full access. Just $5 a month.
It seems that Russia seeks to avoid an image of being increasingly dependent on China following its disastrous invasion of Ukraine. Whereas the 2015 version of the Naval Doctrine stated that the “development of friendly ties with China is a key component of national maritime policy in the Pacific direction,” China is completely absent from the current document. Instead, there are new “key components”: lowering the threats to Russia’s national security, assuring strategic stability in the region, and developing friendly relations with the countries in Asia-Pacific. It is clear from the document that both the Arctic and the Pacific are conceived as areas of strategic confrontation between Russia and the U.S. and its allies.
The downgrade of the Atlantic direction (which also includes the Baltic, the Black, the Mediterranean and the Red Seas) to the third priority indicates the Kremlin’s loss of hope for any positive engagement with the West. Accordingly, the main Russian goal in the Atlantic direction is to “ensure strategic stability.”
Similar to the 2015 edition, the Caspian Sea is listed fourth, the Indian Ocean direction is fifth and Antarctica is sixth.
Advertisement
The reference to the Mediterranean basin (as mentioned above, a subregion of the Atlantic region) is updated and more detailed in relation compared to the 2015 iteration. It was determined, among other things, that Russia would like to strengthen its partnership with Syria; will ensure its military presence in the Mediterranean on the basis of the Russian military outpost in Tartus (Syria); will seek to establish additional techno-logistical outposts in the region; will work vigorously to ensure military-political stability in the Middle East; and will seek to deepen cooperation with Middle Eastern countries.
Another detailed reference to the Middle East also appears in the context of the Indian Ocean expanse: The Russians are interested in expanding cooperation with Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq; and seek to develop diverse ties, including security and maritime cooperation, with all countries of the Indian Ocean basin.
Another goal set is the maintenance of a military-naval presence in the Persian Gulf, “based on techno-logistical outposts in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and the use of the infrastructure of the countries of the region for the purpose of conducting Russian naval military activity.” This is a somewhat strange statement since Russian ships rarely visit the Persian Gulf, and Russia lacks permanent bases in this space. For the past three years, Russia has failed to force the Sudanese government to implement the long-term lease agreement for part of Port Sudan, signed with former dictator Omar al-Bashir.
A major innovation in the doctrine is the assertion that Russia is a “great maritime power” and has interests in all seas and oceans. The preservation and development of this status was placed first in the chapter “The Strategic Objectives of National Maritime Policy.” Another important change is in the classification of all maritime spaces in the world according to their vitality and Russia’s willingness to use armed force in these waterways. There are three ranks:
- “Areas of existential importance,” in which Russia can use all components in the defense of its interests, including armed force. Under this category are the territorial waters and Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of Russia, the Russian part of the Caspian Sea, the Okhotsk Sea (near Japan), and large parts of the Arctic Ocean.
- “Important areas,” in which the use of force will be available as a last resort after the other options have been exhausted. These areas include the eastern Mediterranean basin, the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, the Baltic Sea, the Turkish, Danish, and Kuril straits, and even international shipping routes off the coast of Asia and Africa.
- “The other regions”: the rest of the international waters, where Russia’s interests will be promoted by non-forceful methods.
Moreover, the new doctrine establishes the supremacy of Russian law over international law. It gives a stronger emphasis than in the past to the production and export of energy resources from offshore reservoirs and the protection of underwater gas pipelines; strengthens the ability to mobilize all maritime capabilities, including civilian ones, in emergencies; calls for strengthening the Russian military and commercial fleet and developing the necessary technological and industrial capacity, including in the field of aircraft carrier construction; and calls for the acceleration of Russian diplomatic activity in the maritime context – in international organizations dealing with maritime issues, as well as the presence of Russian battleships and research ships “in the world ocean.”
When Doctrine Meets Reality
Enjoying this article? Click here to subscribe for full access. Just $5 a month.
Since Putin’s rise to power, he has invested considerable resources in restoring Russia’s military (including naval) potential, which was severely damaged by the dissolution of the Soviet Union. At the same time, Russian commercial companies have increased their activities in offshore drilling, laying underwater gas pipelines, and developing the Arctic.
Despite ambitious national preparations and considerable financial investment, many problems that limit Russia’s development as a “maritime power” remain. The Russian industries, both military and civilian, lack technological knowledge, production infrastructure, and advanced manpower in many areas.
For example, since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia has had one outdated aircraft carrier that it has difficulty maintaining. After the sinking of the cruiser Moscow in the war in Ukraine, it has only four cruiser/battlecruiser-sized ships and about ten destroyers. All of these ships were launched or began to be built during the Soviet period. In the civilian sphere, Russia lacks a robust capacity for laying underwater gas pipelines or conducting deep-water drilling and building an infrastructure for production of liquefied natural gas; it relied on Western companies that stopped working in Russia following the onset of the Ukraine War.
Advertisement
Nuclear weapons submarines are the main power base of the Russian Navy, allowing Russia to pose a serious threat to other powers. In the coming years, Russia promises a unique array of submarines carrying supersonic torpedoes and armed with a powerful nuclear warhead (Poseidon). In the conventional field, the Russians manufacture corvettes, frigates, and diesel submarines and arm them with modern and precise cruise missiles (Kaliber up to a range of about 2,500 km, which was widely used against Ukraine, and soon Zircon, a missile with an approximate range of 1,500-1,000 km). Russia is also a world leader in the production of nuclear-powered icebreakers necessary for the development of the Arctic.
All Russian projects suffer from a multiplicity of models (which makes maintenance difficult); poor quality level and negligence (which leads to frequent serious accidents); and postponements in the schedule of development and production. The Western sanctions regime, which made it difficult for Russian industries even before the current war in Ukraine, is expected to pose significant challenges to the development of Russian naval power, which is embodied in the new doctrine.
Since the Russian Navy consists mainly of small ships (a “green water navy,” as opposed to a “blue water navy,” vessels intended for the open ocean), most of its activity is concentrated in the water basins near Russia’s borders (the North Sea, the Black Sea, the Baltic Sea, the Caspian Sea, the Okhotsk Sea, and the Sea of Japan). The eastern part of the Mediterranean is an unusual and unique area where the Russian navy managed to establish a permanent presence in the post-Soviet era, on the basis of the two Russian bases in Syria, Hmeymim and Tartus, which were leased to Moscow for decades. The military importance of the eastern Mediterranean is now apparent – Russia has concentrated the lion’s share of its warships in it and the Black Sea, in order to deter NATO from deepening its involvement in the war against Ukraine.
Conclusion and Significance
The 2022 Naval Doctrine is the first national security document that Russia has published since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, and reflects the Kremlin’s strategic thinking at the present time. The document focuses on Russia’s overall confrontation with the United States and NATO, and emphasizes a more central place for the use of force in defending Russian global interests and seeking economic and strategic alternatives for the West in the developing world. This document reinforces Russia’s tendency to turn international waters into a space for strategic competition and confrontation between the great powers. The militarization of maritime space found its expression in the document “Fundamentals of state policy of the Russian Federation in the military-naval sphere until 2030” (2017), derived from the doctrine from 2015, which detailed its military dimensions.
The pathos in which the naval doctrine was written provokes in many scholars a tendency to focus on the disconnect between Putin and his admirals and the grim reality of the Russian Navy. Indeed, it is very likely that Russia will find it difficult to meet its full ambitions, especially with regard to the “blue waters.” That said, the changes between 2015 and 2022 reflect a re-orientation of Russian foreign policy toward the Global South, following the war in Ukraine, and the perception of the Arctic as a new “milking cow” for the Russian economy.
Daniel Rakov
Daniel Rakov, Lt. Col. (ret.) is a senior fellow at Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security. He is an expert on Russian policy in the Middle East and great-power competition in the region. He served in the IDF for more than 20 years, mainly in the Israeli Defense Intelligence (Aman).
thediplomat.com · by Daniel Rakov · August 19, 2022
19. How the new Special Warfare Branch at AFRS is making a difference
How the new Special Warfare Branch at AFRS is making a difference
aetc.af.mil · August 16, 2022
- Published
- By Air Force Recruiting Service Public Affairs
- Air Force Recruiting Service
JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-RANDOLPH, Texas --
Historically, recruiting Airmen for Special Warfare career fields has been as tough as the Airmen who fill its ranks. So when Air Force Recruiting Service entered fiscal 2022, it organized a team in its Operations division here to inspire, engage and recruit future SW Airmen.
That team, called the SW branch, is reporting some progress despite headwinds that have characterized one of the toughest recruiting years in Air Force history for all career fields.
The selection process and relatively small size of the Air Force Special Warfare community compared to other career fields make members an elite class of warriors. So AFSPECWAR is lesser known compared to its counterparts in the Army, Navy and Marine Corps.
“We needed to share the story of our community, its feats of heroism and no longer be ‘quiet professionals’,” said Lt. Col. Joe Lopez, SW branch chief. The former Army Ranger and current Air Force combat rescue officer by trade, designed the 2022 plan to recruit aspiring Airmen for AFSPECWAR from within the Air Force as well as non-prior service future Airmen.
Unlike most branches at the AFRS headquarters, SW branch members visited universities and military installations where they met with all demographics while local Air Force recruiters focused on traditional recruiting methods. Overall, SW branch is searching for people with grit and determination who have the aptitude, mentality and physicality to endure the requirements of entering the SW career fields.
Those career opportunities include Combat Rescue, Special Tactics, and Tactical Air Control Party officer career fields as well as Pararescue, Combat Control, Special Reconnaissance, and Tactical Air Control Party enlisted career fields. In addition, the branch also supports recruitment for enabler Air Force Specialty Codes such as Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape, along with Explosive Ordnance Disposal enlisted career fields.
Specific to enlisted career fields, qualified applicants will enter the Special Warfare Operator Enlistment vectoring program designed in 2020 to streamline the enlistment process. This begins in the pre-accession phase where recruiting development teams identify potential SW candidates and begin the process to prepare them for the rigors of the Special Warfare training pipeline and later, their designated career field.
AFRS and the AFSPECWAR community aim to create a competitive model in the SWOE “Development Pool” where interested civilians strive to be sufficiently mentally and physically fit so they can be the next AFSPECWAR operators.
Part of the need and desire to move out more aggressively than before is because the Air Force has struggled to meet its goal for enlisted and officer ranks in AFSPECWAR.
“The intent of these outreach efforts is to establish rapport with interested applicants, give them insight on how to train smartly, and expose them with introductions to some of the physical challenges that they may experience while being screened and assessed so they’re better prepared mentally to overcome adversity during those trying times,” Lopez said. “All too often, we hear ‘I didn’t know the Air Force had this capability,’ so we are working to inspire, connect, develop and recruit future candidates into AFSPECWAR before they ship to Basic Military Training.”
Lopez’s team includes veteran recruiters who are familiar with the challenges of recruiting SW Airmen. “Recruiting special warfare Airmen for the Air Force is very difficult, because most civilians have only heard about Navy SEALs and Green Berets,” said Master Sgt. Kenneth Babb, SW branch superintendent and former SW recruiting flight chief. “Few have ever heard about this very small community of elite warriors inside the Air Force. We know that there are people out there who want to serve in the military as a ground combatant and we need them to know that there are opportunities for them in the Air Force.”
Circumstances dictated the need for a new, innovative approach and plan that synchronized the worldwide effort to recruit SW Airmen.
“This is the very reason AFRS stood SW branch up and we hit the ground running,” Lopez said. “In our first year alone, we engaged with almost 1,300 cadets in 42 different Air Force ROTC detachments to recruit potential special warfare officers,”
The SW branch also visited 10 different Air Force bases and met with more than 200 Airmen to conduct in-service recruiting for enlisted Airmen and officers.
Simultaneously, Lopez and his team supported initiatives to elevate public awareness and engage new enlistees. The SW branch helped AFSPECWAR obtain trademark approval for a new logo and was involved in the Air Force’s decision-making process to increase SW initial enlistment bonuses from $15,000 to $50,000.
“Our main goal is to streamline the process from recruiting America’s highly talented applicants to enter the Air Force and begin their journey, in the hopes of becoming an AFSPECWAR Airman,” Lopez said. “We truly believe that if we can improve AFSPECWAR’s brand awareness and promote the opportunities special warfare careers offer, then recruiting will be much easier.”
SW branch members said that, overall, AFSPECWAR’s most difficult challenge is recruiting SW Open Enlistment candidates. SW recruiters are spread throughout the U.S. where they need to bring in roughly 1,000 non-prior service recruits each year.
“I was blown away by the effort a recruiter puts into shipping a SWOE candidate,” said Master Sgt. Matthew Voss, a SERE specialist assigned to the SW branch. Before Voss was assigned to AFRS, he served as a flight chief for the SERE Specialist Orientation Course at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland’s Chapman Annex. He is the first SERE specialist assigned to AFRS.
“The Airmen of AFSPECWAR are absolutely critical when a conflict kicks off and we need to ensure that we have sufficient Airmen ready for the next conflict,” Voss said. “That all starts with recruiting.”
aetc.af.mil · August 16, 2022
20. 'Those treatments saved my life': The veterans who turn to psychedelic treatments for PTSD healing
'Those treatments saved my life': The veterans who turn to psychedelic treatments for PTSD healing
Can psychedelic therapies help win the war on PTSD? More and more veterans — and doctors — are saying yes.
BY ETHAN E. ROCKE | PUBLISHED AUG 18, 2022 8:23 AM
taskandpurpose.com · by Ethan E. Rocke · August 18, 2022
The first time Cory Poolman did an Iboga ceremony last year, the Navy SEAL veteran believed the powerful psychedelic medicine he took as part of the ritual had sent him to hell, literally.
The integration coaches on hand to help guide Poolman through his Iboga journey at the treatment center in Mexico had all become demons in his mind; they couldn’t be trusted.
Navy SEAL veteran Cory Poolman contributes to a fire-talk during a Bwiti Iboga ceremony in Gabon. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
In a tiny village in the Central African nation of Gabon, the blond, hazel-eyed SEAL recently recalled that early episode in his long healing journey with a smile and a laugh. When Poolman left the SEAL teams in 2018, he was suffering from depression and anxiety. Though the nightmarish visions he experienced in his first Iboga journey were terrifying at the time, he’s come a long way since venturing through some of the darkest parts of his psyche. On the other side of his temporary descent into hell was the beginning of what he and many other U.S. military veterans have described as a sort of spiritual awakening — a cognitive reset that brings a new outlook and lease on life.
“I was just constantly trapped in my mind,” Poolman told me in Gabon. “I had so much negative dialogue about myself going on, and the medicine showed me how to quiet that dialogue and take control of my mind so that my thoughts could no longer control me and work against me.”
Cory Poolman stares toward the jungle canopy at the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
In 2017, Poolman helped take back the Iraqi city of Mosul from ISIS while serving as a military working dog handler in SEAL Team 7. Eddie Gallagher, the now-retired Navy Chief charged with and acquitted of war crimes on that deployment, was Poolman’s platoon chief.
Poolman and “Hal,” a former Army Ranger — his real name is being withheld by Task & Purpose at his request — made the pilgrimage to Gabon in June to train under a 10th-generation Bwiti Shaman and learn how to heal others with traditional Bwiti Iboga ceremonies.
For thousands of years, the Tabernanthe Iboga shrub has been central to the Bwiti spiritual tradition practiced in Central West African nations such as Gabon, Cameroon, and the Congo Republic. Followers of Bwiti incorporate animism, ancestor worship, and Christianity into a syncretistic belief system in which the psychedelic, mind-altering root bark of the Iboga plant is used ritualistically to promote health and happiness.
As a member of the elite 75th Ranger Regiment, Hal completed five combat deployments — four to Iraq and one to Afghanistan — before spending time as a personal-security contractor and then getting a bachelor’s and master’s degree from Columbia University in New York.
Poolman and Hal met each other along the same healing path that thousands of veterans are now following as more and more people in search of healing turn to psychedelic-assisted therapies and centuries-old indigenous, psychospiritual, plant-medicine ceremonies.
SEAL veteran Cory Poolman and former Army Ranger Hal wait for a welcome ceremony to begin in the Bwiti temple at the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
“We are in a psychedelic renaissance, and not just in the United States, but around the world,” says Dr. Rick Doblin, founder and executive director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). After President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs and signed the Controlled Substances Act in 1971, Doblin — a self-proclaimed “old hippie from the ’60s” — dedicated his life to the goal of bringing psychedelic research and therapies back to the forefront of Western psychiatry.
Psychedelic research in the U.S. began its rise in the 1950s, slowly gaining speed before peaking in the late ’60s and early ’70s, when funding began to dry up in the wake of the politicization and cultural stigmatization of psychedelics. Doblin says that in the last few years, research on psychedelic therapies has reached a level about four times the amount back in those peak years, and Doblin says veterans in search of healing are helping to fuel the resurgence.
Rick Perry, the former Republican Governor of Texas and U.S. Energy Secretary for the Trump Administration, has become a vocal supporter of psychedelic research and therapies for veterans. Perry, who served as a C-130 Hercules pilot in the Air Force in the ’70s, says he learned about the power of psychedelic therapies through his friendship with Marcus Luttrell, the Navy SEAL who became the “Lone Survivor” of his four-man SEAL team in the infamous Operation Red Wings mission that claimed the lives of 19 Americans in a single day. Luttrell is one of the many US veterans who turned to psychedelic therapies after years of searching for effective treatments and healing for post-traumatic stress, traumatic brain injury, depression, anxiety, substance abuse and other ailments common among veterans.
Republican Congressman Dan Crenshaw, a retired Navy SEAL who represents Texas’ 2nd District, is one of several members of Congress who have recently come out in favor of legislation promoting psychedelic therapies and research.
“We need new ideas because it seems we’re losing the battle with veteran suicide,” Crenshaw said on the U.S. House floor last month while testifying in favor of amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act that would promote psychedelic therapy research for active-duty military members. “Active-duty service members … are precluded from even trying treatments such as psychedelics that could save their lives and bring hope to their families.”
SEAL veteran Cory Poolman waits for a welcome ceremony to begin in the Bwiti temple at the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
SEAL veteran Cory Poolman watches Bwiti dancers during a welcome ceremony at the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
Cory Poolman, Bwiti Shaman Moughenda Mikala, Iboga provider Flynn Helper, and Hal at the Iboga Retreat Center July 12. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
Crenshaw also cited the example of Marcus Capone, a medically-retired SEAL Team SIX operator who credits psychedelic therapy with saving his life and bringing his family back together. In 2019, Marcus and his wife Amber Capone founded Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions (VETS), a nonprofit that provides resources, research, and advocacy for U.S. veterans seeking treatment with psychedelic-assisted therapies.
Like more than 300 other special operations veterans, Cory Poolman and Hal found their way to psychedelic therapies through the Capones’ charity, which provided them grants to undergo psychedelic therapies at retreat centers in Mexico.
“I honestly couldn’t tell you how many different psychologists I went to,” Marcus Capone said, describing how he suffered for years with intense anxiety and depression connected to the traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress caused by his service as a breacher in the SEAL teams. “It was the traditional Western medicine approach of antidepressants and talk therapy, and I wasn’t getting any better.”
Marcus and Amber tried every treatment approach they could find, including hyperbaric oxygen therapy, transcranial magnetic stimulation, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, and others.
“I just got more frustrated, more angry, and more isolated,” Marcus said.
Marcus said he was morbidly depressed and on the verge of suicide when he tried psychedelic treatments as a last resort. During a five-day retreat in Mexico in November 2017, Marcus completed an ibogaine treatment followed by treatment with 5-MeO-DMT, another powerful psychedelic used medicinally by indigenous peoples in parts of northern Mexico and the southwestern U.S.
The fruit of the Tabernanthe iboga shrub grows near the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon, Africa. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
Ibogaine is a single alkaloid extracted from the Iboga root, and its effects and treatment benefits are similar. Because the pure form of the root bark contains all of its naturally-occurring alkaloids, it is more potent than ibogaine, and its effects last longer. Ibogaine and Iboga can cause cardiac arrest in people with certain heart conditions, and health providers who administer the compounds usually screen out patients with high-risk factors.
“Those treatments saved my life,” Marcus says. “My life had been so dark for so long, and after those treatments, my whole perspective flipped — a complete 180.”
Sometimes called “the God particle,” 5-MeO-DMT is a powerful psychedelic found in the venom of the Sonoran Desert Toad and in a variety of plant species. It can also be produced synthetically.
In 2019, European researchers observed that a single inhalation of 5-MeO-DMT was associated with sustained improvements in satisfaction with life, mindfulness, and a reduction of psychopathological symptoms, including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety. According to Johns Hopkins Medicine, out of 362 5-MeO-DMT users surveyed in another study, approximately 80 percent of respondents reported improvements in anxiety and depression. Improvements were also related to stronger beliefs that the experience contributed to enduring well-being and life satisfaction.
Hal says 5-MeO-DMT treatments ended his depression and the persistent migraines he used to experience regularly.
“It also helped me out physically by releasing a lot of the physical trauma from old injuries I suffered while I was a Ranger,” he says.
SEAL veteran Cory Poolman (white tank top) helps administer a “spiritual sauna” at the Iboga Retreat Center in Gabon. Participants are wrapped in sheets, under which a mix of herbs and other vegetation are burned. The smoke bath is said to ward off evil or negative spirits in preparation for an Iboga ceremony. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
Marcus Capone and other special operations veterans who have found healing with ibogaine have affectionately dubbed it “the nuclear option” of psychedelic therapies, mostly because the 14- to 24-hour journey can be very unpleasant, especially for anyone who has to visit and confront dark, painful experiences and traumas.
Dr. Martín Polanco is a medical doctor and researcher who specializes in treating addiction, mild-traumatic brain injuries, and post-traumatic stress with psychedelics. In 2017, Polanco founded The Mission Within (TMW), an organization that provides psychedelic treatments to veterans and their spouses. Polanco says TMW has treated more than 600 special operations veterans and their spouses, and the majority of the veterans he treats suffer from “operator syndrome.” A 2020 research paper in the International Journal of Psychiatry in Medicine defines operator syndrome as “the accumulation of physiological, neural, and neuroendocrine responses resulting from the prolonged chronic stress; and physical demands of a career with the military special [operations] forces.”
“Operator syndrome really refers to a combination of issues,” Polanco says. “It’s related to blast exposure and toxicity, chronic pain, hormone dysregulation, sleep apnea, traumatic brain injury, depression, anxiety, insomnia, rage, marital issues and substance abuse.”
Polanco says mild traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress are the two most common issues TMW focuses on treating, and ibogaine and 5-MeO-DMT provide a highly effective treatment modality.
After experiencing profound, positive effects from ibogaine, Iboga and 5-MeO-DMT treatments, Poolman and Hal were inspired to study the Bwiti tradition and become Iboga providers. They just completed two months of intensive training under Missoko Bwiti Shaman Moughenda Mikala at Mikala’s Iboga Retreat Center on the edge of the Gabonese jungle.
Moughenda Mikala is a 10th-generation Bwiti Shaman from the Missoko tribe in Gabon. Mikala says his people are healers and warriors, and Iboga is central to their way of life. (Photo by Ethan E. Rocke)
As a 10th-generation shaman, Mikala passes on the Bwiti traditions and healing practices to his people and those who enroll in his Iboga Provider Training, where students initiate in the Bwiti tradition, participate in numerous ceremonies and complete rites of passage.
“I think Iboga and the Bwiti teachings are what veterans need,” Poolman says. “We need to help these guys reprogram their minds after they get back from war, and that’s what Iboga and other plant medicines will do. Iboga will show you your mind, and the Bwiti teachings will show you how to reprogram it.”
Polanco says the benefits of the experience are about 30% the psychedelic journey itself, and the other 70% is what is known in the world of psychedelic therapies as “integration.”
“It’s not just what you experience and what you see; it’s what you do with it,” Polanco says. “What kind of habits and practices are you developing in your integration phase after the treatments? Some of the main benefits you can derive from session experiences are being better able to focus, and being more calm and present. We see these compounds as a means to an end.”
According to Veterans Health Administration data, at least 17 American veterans die of suicide each day. Rates of mental illness and suicide in the U.S. have risen substantially since 2000, and one in five adults now experience mental illness each year. The overall suicide rate in the U.S. has increased by 35% since 1999, and suicide is the second leading cause of death among people aged 10-34.
Retired Army Brig. Gen. Stephen N. Xenakis is a psychiatrist who has advised the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other senior Department of Defense officials on psychological health and the effects of blast concussion. He is a co-founder and clinical practice advisor for Reason for Hope, a nonprofit focused on preventing deaths of despair by helping to develop and advocate for the policy and legal reforms needed to facilitate safe and affordable access to psychedelic medicine and assisted therapies.
“We are at a time when mental health needs are just exploding for a number of reasons, and the current treatments probably help less than half of the people,” Xenakis says. “There’s just too many people finding that they’re not getting the help that they need and suffering seriously. And it’s really impacting their lives and their livelihood, and probably impacting the safety and security of our communities. So we’ve clearly got a huge need here, but we also have this huge capability of psychedelics. But it’s not just the drug — the compounds. It’s the therapy; it’s the setting. That’s huge. So we’ve got to figure out the right way to do this.”
Hal says he is learning everything he can about Iboga and other psychedelic therapies because he wants to help connect his fellow veterans and anyone in need to the treatments.
“I’ve seen the benefits firsthand, several times over,” he says. “I think we’re on the verge of a major inflection point where everything’s going to change. We’re going to see veterans elected to Congress who have benefited from these medicines, and they’re going to be pushing for access for other veterans and really opening it up to not only the military, but also civilians. I think psychedelic therapies are going to spread like wildfire throughout the U.S. And if you look at the rates of mental illness and suicide in our country, that massive expansion of access to these therapies can’t come soon enough.”
+++
Ethan E. Rocke is a New York Times bestselling author and an award-winning photographer and filmmaker based in San Antonio. After serving as an infantryman with the Army’s 101st Airborne Division from 1998 to 2001, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps as a “storyteller of Marines,” working as a writer, photojournalist, editor and film consultant.
This report was made possible thanks to funding from Military Veterans in Journalism.
taskandpurpose.com · by Ethan E. Rocke · August 18, 2022
De Oppresso Liber,
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation
Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy
Editor, Small Wars Journal
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
VIDEO "WHEREBY" Link: https://whereby.com/david-maxwell
Phone: 202-573-8647
email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com
| 
