News and Commentary by Dave Maxwell. Edited and Published by Daniel Riggs
1. Statement From Pentagon Press Secretary John F. Kirby on 4-Star Reviewer Appointment on Manda Bay Investigation
2. After War Zone Scandals, Special Operators Are Curbing Deployments and Investing in Ethics Training
3. Special Ops and CIA sabotage missions may shape future wars
4. Exploring Chinese Military Thinking on Social Media Manipulation Against Taiwan
5. A 35-year CIA veteran explains what China's up to around Taiwan and what the US should do about it
6. In a dramatic turnaround, China has started to lose the Covid Cold War
7. No Release for Ex-Officer Guilty in 'Fatal Vision' Murders
8. Georgetown Law Professor Decries ‘Maoist Takeover’ of Academia
9. China’s Message to America: We’re an Equal Now
10. DoD’s New Pushback Against Chinese Money In US Defense Industry
11. Options to Ensure the Best Indo-Pacific Policy in the U.S. Department of Defense
12. What Maps Can Tell Us About U.S. Strategy for Europe and Asia
13. The Quad (finally) delivers: Can it be sustained?
14. The Military, Police, and the Rise of Terrorism in the United States
15. What America’s Vaccination Campaign Proves to the World
16. Fulfilling Our Duty to Afghan and Iraqi Interpreters Is a Matter of Honor—and of National Security
17. US Needs to Show Its Willingness to Defend Taiwan
18. How Biden Will—and Won’t—Battle the Pentagon
19. US spy chiefs to warn of threats from SolarWinds to North Korea
20. Seventh Fleet move a reminder that Quad must remain a group of equals, not a US-led posse
21. FDD | Turkey’s Courtship with China Spells Trouble for Uyghurs
22. Striking the Right Balance: How Russian Information Operations in the Baltic States Should Inform US Strategy in Great Power Competition
1. Statement From Pentagon Press Secretary John F. Kirby on 4-Star Reviewer Appointment on Manda Bay Investigation
defense.gov April 12, 2021
2. After War Zone Scandals, Special Operators Are Curbing Deployments and Investing in Ethics Training
military.com · by Stephen Losey · April 12, 2021
3. Special Ops and CIA sabotage missions may shape future wars
audacy.com · by Jack Murphy · April 9, 2021
Subversion and sabotage are key pillars of unconventional warfare.
Sometimes it is useful to remember the older definitions of unconventional warfare:
A broad spectrum of military and paramilitary operations conducted in enemy-held, enemy-controlled, or politically sensitive territory. Unconventional warfare includes, but is not limited to, the interrelated fields of guerrilla warfare, evasion and escape, subversion, sabotage,
and other operations of a low visibility, covert or clandestine nature. These interrelated aspects of unconventional warfare may be prosecuted singly or collectively by predominantly indigenous personnel, usually supported and directed in varying degrees by (an) external sources(s) during all conditions of war
or peace.
(FM 31-20, 1990)
4. Exploring Chinese Military Thinking on Social Media Manipulation Against Taiwan
jamestown.org · by Nathan Beauchamp-Mustafaga · April 12, 2021
Conclusion: “In retrospect, it is clear the PLA, and especially PLASSF Base 311, prepared for and may have executed a campaign to covertly manipulate Taiwanese social media and interfere in Taiwan’s 2018 elections. This article shed light on how long the PLA—as the CCP’s “barrel of the gun”—has been interested in Taiwanese social media and focused on exploiting it for political interference against Taiwan. Social media is simply the latest and greatest way for the PLA to artificially manipulate Taiwanese public opinion.
There needs to be greater emphasis—in Taiwan specifically, but also more generally—on the stated intentions and tactical considerations of entities within the PLA and the Chinese government charged with carrying out social media interference. The hope is that this article has provided an example of the range and depth of publicly available, primary source material on official Chinese thinking on social media manipulation against Taiwan and encouraged further exploration of these materials.
A shift from an overreliance on outputs to a more balanced view that incorporates inputs can promote more substantial debates and establish a firmer foundation to inform policy discussions. Such an approach would place less weight on outcomes, which inherently assume that one party has benefited and are contentious against the backdrop of elections, instead placing more emphasis on better understanding the actual threats and how to best combat them.”
5. A 35-year CIA veteran explains what China's up to around Taiwan and what the US should do about it
Business Insider · by John Culver and Ryan Hass
Excerpt: “US policy for Taiwan should follow the Tsai administration's example of basing its legitimacy on the vibrant quality of its democracy and economic freedom. There are an array of steps the United States can take with regard to Taiwan on trade, multinational democratic forums, health policy, and even security affairs that neither stretch Washington's standard invocation of the Three Communiques, the Taiwan Relations Act, and other assurances nor risk abandonment.
And especially with regard to US security policy toward Taiwan, cooperation with Taipei should focus on steps that make a use-of-force decision by Beijing a difficult one, fraught with risk, that relies less on big-ticket, budget-busting weapons purchases and more on public determination and capacity to resist military force.
This should include US advice and assistance to enhance the credibility of Taiwan's military as a Taiwanese institution, not a legacy of the Chinese civil war that enforced martial law on the island until the late 1980s. Building public trust in the Taiwan military is essential to overco
6. In a dramatic turnaround, China has started to lose the Covid Cold War
The Telegraph · by Georgina Hayes
Excerpts: “To solve these massive long-term problems, the CCP needs to liberalise and open up. Instead, Xi Jinping has doubled down on building an isolationist totalitarian superstate. By contrast, European and American firms are set to power unexpectedly buoyant recoveries; a more dynamic capitalist environment has forced them to adapt to the new post-Covid world, shedding costs and changing their business models as required. Centre-Left politicians who have convinced themselves that recovery can only be engineered by generous handouts and aggressive state projects should take note.
There is much we can learn from China's values – its hunger and energy and innate investment in the future, rather than just the present (which share the same tense in Mandarin). But if it fails to learn, in turn, from the West that freedom is crucial to progress, the resurgent Middle Kingdom may yet turn out to be a stillborn superpower.”
7. No Release for Ex-Officer Guilty in 'Fatal Vision' Murders
military.com · by Gary D. Robertson · April 11, 2021
Will we ever know for sure what happened that night at Fort Bragg?
8. Georgetown Law Professor Decries ‘Maoist Takeover’ of Academia
National Review Online · by Ed Whelan · April 12, 2021
Here's the link to a most provocative essay that is the subject of the article.
9. China’s Message to America: We’re an Equal Now
WSJ · by Lingling Wei and Bob Davis
Excerpts: “America’s chaotic pandemic response, followed by a summer of racial upheaval and the Jan. 6 Capitol storming, solidified his faith in the Chinese system’s superiority, Chinese officials say. In internal meetings, they say, he compares American democracy to “a sheet of loose sand” and declares that the one-party system allows him to get things done.
With Mr. Biden in the White House, China has continued a hard-line approach, signaling that companies not following Beijing’s rules will lose access to the Chinese market. Swedish clothing brand Hennes & Mauritz AB recently met with a strong social-media rage and consumer boycott in China over its stance against sourcing cotton from Xinjiang. Chinese authorities have restricted military personnel and employees of certain state-owned companies from using electric vehicles made by America’s Tesla Inc., citing national-security risks including concerns about the cars’ cameras. H&M declined to comment. Tesla, which didn’t respond to requests for comment, said last week that its cameras aren’t activated outside North America.
“Nobody has forced them to stay in China,” Mr. Yang said in Anchorage, regarding U.S. companies doing business in China.
10. DoD’s New Pushback Against Chinese Money In US Defense Industry
breakingdefense.com · by Paul McLeary
Excerpts: “There currently is no centralized mandate or guidance for what needs to be done across the DoD to get their arms around the problem, and there is no dedicated funding in the budget to re-shore some manufacturing capabilities. But Slotkin and Gallagher’s urgent push to remedy that in the 2022 budget could change that, if they manage to cut through the cacophony of voices during this year’s defense spending debate.
For Dougherty, “it’s pretty clear” what DoD needs to begin to work its way out of the problem. “They just need leadership, a centralized approach…and things like centralized data and centralized reporting,” to grapple with the depth of the problem.
If some sort of conflict does arise and supply chains are put at risk, Dougherty said, “the proactive, nefarious work coming from China and Russia in particular [will make US policymakers] “realize that we don’t have control over everything that we think we have control over.”
DoD’s New Pushback Against Chinese Money In US Defense Industry
"The proactive, nefarious work coming from China and Russia in particular [will make US policymakers] “realize that we don't have control over everything that we think we have control over,” Tara Murphy Dougherty, CEO of Govini said
11. Options to Ensure the Best Indo-Pacific Policy in the U.S. Department of Defense
divergentoptions.org · by Chandler Myers · April 12, 2021
12. What Maps Can Tell Us About U.S. Strategy for Europe and Asia
19fortyfive.com · by James Holmes · April 12, 2021
Despite the norm of digital maps there is still no substitute for paper maps and globes.
Interesting analysis from Professor Holmes.
13. The Quad (finally) delivers: Can it be sustained?
lowyinstitute.org · by Susan Thornton
Excerpts: “Two key factors, though, are likely to determine the Quad’s staying power above others. The first is the degree to which the Quad can forge a reputation for producing positive-sum outcomes. Without an alternate rationale for what this particular four-country grouping can do, its salient identity will be as a nakedly anti-China bloc. India in particular will be uncomfortable with this, as was demonstrated by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s insistence that that group “stand for something and not just against something”, and by the non-mention of China in the summit’s joint statement.
But if the Quad’s raison d’être is provision of public goods and mobilising synergies on global issues, not only do member countries stand to benefit, but Chinese objections will fall flat. The initial “deliverable” of a pooled investment in Indian vaccine production capacity is right on target, but following this with further outcomes on climate change and technology cooperation will likely be more difficult. If, however, the Quad can push in the laudable direction of raising India’s global engagement while expanding its marketplace and support network, the Quad brand will remain resilient in the face of future potential pressures.
Which brings us to the final point: if China continues to show its teeth and bully others, the Quad is more likely to be sustained. If, on the other hand, China demonstrates restraint, it will be harder to keep it going.
14. The Military, Police, and the Rise of Terrorism in the United States
csis.org · by Seth G. Jones, Catrina Doxsee, and Grace Hwang · April 13, 2021
A somewhat optimistic conclusion: "Despite these challenges, one reason for hope is the low number of deaths from domestic terrorism. Terrorism from violent far-right and far-left extremists has not killed many Americans—at least not recently. This could change, of course, as Timothy McVeigh illustrated in 1995. Terrorism expert Brian Jenkins once wrote that “terrorism is theater” and “terrorists want a lot of people watching, not a lot of people dead.”73 These aphorisms may not have been true of al-Qaeda and Islamic State adherents, as Jenkins recognized.74 But the data certainly raise questions about how far most domestic terrorists are willing to go today."
The PDF can be downloaded here.
The methodology can be downloaded here.
15. What America’s Vaccination Campaign Proves to the World
defenseone.com · by Anne Applebaum
Excerpts: “But an opportunity for the U.S. might lie precisely here, in the authoritarian drive to politicize the vaccines. The best answer to Russian and Chinese strongmen who offer thousands of vaccines to countries that say nice things about them is to flood the market with millions of American doses, helping everyone regardless of what they say about the U.S. or anyone else. After Trump, the American political system won’t win much admiration again anytime soon. But if American democracy is no longer a trusted product, American efficiency could be once again. Within a matter of weeks, a majority of American adults will have had their first dose of a vaccine. What if the U.S. then begins to pivot from mass-vaccinating its own citizens to mass-vaccinating the rest of the world? Americans can’t do social trust, but we can do vaccines, plus the military logistics needed to distribute them: planes, trucks, cold-storage chains. The best cure for propaganda and disinformation is real-life experience: If people see that the vaccines work, they will eventually get one. We can end the global pandemic, improve the economy for everybody, protect ourselves and everyone else, and create the relationships that can help us deal with crises to come.
The U.S. might even have an opportunity to turn a mass-delivery effort into something more permanent. If the World Health Organization has become too bureaucratic and too reliant on China to enjoy the complete confidence of the rest of the world, then let’s use this moment to build COVAX into something new, something more trustworthy: an institution that provides smarter delivery systems, more efficient biomedical cooperation, and links among production centers in Europe, India, Africa, and elsewhere in the world. Vaccine nationalism is small-minded, self-centered, and ultimately self-defeating, because COVID-19 will not cease to be a problem until no one has it. This is the moment to think big, the moment for generosity and big ideas. As our massive logistical investment in refrigerated transport begins to pay off, the question for Americans is not just how we can enter the game, but how we can change it.
16. Fulfilling Our Duty to Afghan and Iraqi Interpreters Is a Matter of Honor—and of National Security
mwi.usma.edu · by Douglas Livermore · April 13, 2021
Excerpts: “The past management of SIV program is a national embarrassment. Afghan and Iraqi interpreters have served bravely right alongside American men and women in intense combat throughout these wars, and the SIV program was supposed to honor and repay them for their sacrifices. Yet execution of the SIV program proved to be very far from the original vision, as under-resourcing, apathy, and immorally long delays further endangered these allies and their families.
After years of ineffectual attempts to reform the program there now is a chance to finally satisfy our responsibilities to our Afghan and Iraqi comrades. The Biden administration’s order to review and recommend changes to the SIV program provides the highest-level emphasis necessary for executive and legislative action. There is every expectation that these recommendations, if enacted, will ensure proper resourcing, oversight, and execution of the SIV program. Most fundamentally, implementing such recommended reforms and improving the SIV program will both fulfill our moral obligations and support our long-term national security interests.
17. US Needs to Show Its Willingness to Defend Taiwan
spectator.org · by Francis P. Sempa · April 13, 2021
The "Asiatic Mediterranean?"
Excerpts: “In 1972, the U.S. and communist China issued the Shanghai Communiqué, which weakened U.S. ties to Taiwan for strategic reasons. Then, President Nixon wisely exploited the growing Sino–Soviet rift, and China became a de facto ally in containing the Soviet Union. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Once the Soviet empire collapsed, the strategic logic of the Communiqué ended, but successive U.S. administrations acted as if it didn’t. As China’s rise accelerated in the 21st century, the U.S. slowly strengthened its ties to Taiwan without abandoning the substance of the Communiqué.
But even when China was our de facto ally against the Soviet Union, Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act (1979), which provides that “It is the policy of the United States … to consider any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means … a threat to the security of the Western Pacific area and of grave concern to the United States.” That act also allowed the U.S. to provide “defensive” arms to Taiwan and “to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people of Taiwan.”
We are in a Cold War with Communist China. It is high time to once and for all abandon the Shanghai Communiqué and make it unmistakably clear to China that we will defend Taiwan if China attacks.
18. How Biden Will—and Won’t—Battle the Pentagon
Foreign Policy · by Mark Perry · April 12, 2021
Excerpts: “Biden retains the fears that he expressed during the Obama years—that, in the end, a president can be rolled by those in uniform.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt that we’re in the midst of a civilian-military crisis,” said retired U.S. Army Col. Andrew Bacevich, a West Point graduate and president of the Washington-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft (where I also work). “It undermines, it erodes the single most important pillar of democracy that we have as a nation. That crisis has to be the first thing on the new president’s agenda.”
Eaton, the retired Army major general, remains confident that Biden’s fundamental decency, his experience as a contentious skeptic during the Obama years, his appointment of Austin as defense secretary, his focus on diplomacy over intervention, and his intellect will help resolve the problem. “Smart soldiers will always follow smart commanders,” Eaton said. “And the view in the military is that, no matter what they might think about his policies, Biden is smart.”
Then, too, Biden retains the fears that he expressed during the Obama years—that an inexperienced president might be unduly influenced by the military’s ever confident, can-do mentality. That, in the end, a president can be rolled by those in uniform. Biden’s constant doubts, relentless questioning, and privately expressed niggling at the military’s claims during that era left an indelible impression. “The military doesn’t [screw] around with me,” he reportedly told aides as vice president. “I’ve been around too long.” Put simply, the military and its officers were able to defy Trump because he was in awe of them.
19. US spy chiefs to warn of threats from SolarWinds to North Korea
theedgemarkets.com · April 13, 2021
Excerpts: “Now, Biden’s intelligence team -- including Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and CIA Director William Burns -- is under increasing pressure to respond to a widening series of national security threats while defending the administration’s continuing reviews and policy approaches even as it nears the 100-day mark in office.
“This hearing is particular timely because those threats are rapidly evolving, with a rising great power competition with China, an increased threat from domestic violent extremism, nuclear dangers arising from nations like Iran and North Korea, and destabilizing impacts of cross-border threats like climate change and pandemic disease,” House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, said in a statement.
Biden has vowed that his intelligence officials won’t face pressure to abandon their independent assessments of America’s threats. He has pledged that Haines will be a “fierce advocate for telling the truth and leveling with the decision-makers.” In her confirmation hearing, Haines said that someone in her post “must never shy away from speaking truth to power -- even, especially, when doing so may be inconvenient or difficult.”
20. Seventh Fleet move a reminder that Quad must remain a group of equals, not a US-led posse
theprint.in · by Prakash Menon · April 13, 2021
A view from India.
21. FDD | Turkey’s Courtship with China Spells Trouble for Uyghurs
fdd.org · by Aykan Erdemir and Umut Can Fidan· April 12, 2021
22. Striking the Right Balance: How Russian Information Operations in the Baltic States Should Inform US Strategy in Great Power Competition
mwi.usma.edu · by Sandor Fabian and Janis Berzins · April 12, 2021
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Just a reminder:
George F. Kennan defined political warfare as “the logical application of Clausewitz’s doctrine in time of peace.” While stopping short of the direct kinetic confrontation between two countries’ armed forces, “political warfare is the employment of all the means at a nation's command… to achieve its national objectives.” A country embracing Political Warfare conducts “both overt and covert” operations in the absence of declared war or overt force-on-force hostilities. Efforts “range from such overt actions as political alliances, economic measures…, and ‘white’ propaganda to such covert operations as clandestine support of ‘friendly’ foreign elements, ‘black’ psychological warfare and even encouragement of underground resistance in hostile states.” See George Kennan, "Policy Planning Memorandum." May 4, 1948.
http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/history/johnson/65ciafounding3.htm
Political warfare is the use of political means to compel an opponent to do one's will, based on hostile intent. The term political describes the calculated interaction between a government and a target audience to include another state's government, military, and/or general population. Governments use a variety of techniques to coerce certain actions, thereby gaining relative advantage over an opponent. The techniques include propaganda and psychological operations (PSYOP), which service national and military objectives respectively. Propaganda has many aspects and a hostile and coercive political purpose. Psychological operations are for strategic and tactical military objectives and may be intended for hostile military and civilian populations. Smith, Paul A., On Political War (Washington: National Defense University Press, 1989)
https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a233501.pdf
"No one understood better than Stalin that the true object of propaganda is neither to convince nor even to persuade, but to produce a uniform pattern of public utterance in which the first trace of unorthodox thought immediately reveals itself as a jarring dissonance."
- Alan Bullock, British historian