6/13/2020 News & Commentary – National Security
News & commentary by Dave Maxwell. Edited and published by Duncan Moore.
1. Coronavirus 2nd wave? Nope, the U.S. is still stuck in the 1st one
2. Chinese military officer arrested after trying to leave US
3. A brief history of Antifa: part I
4. Military spy agencies did not monitor protesters, Pentagon official says
5. Mass grave of US-made tanks uncovered in Iraq: photo
6. The trouble with loose ‘war’ talk
7. China’s trillion-dollar campaign fuels a tech race with the U.S.
8. U.S.-Polish Fort Trump project crumbles
9. China-US military confrontation in the South China Sea: fact and fiction
10. The Pentagon’s proposal to fill the swamp
11. Man accused in deputy ambush scrawled extremist ‘Boogaloo’ phrases in blood
12. A letter to Maggie… post COVID-19
13. Beijing goes into ‘wartime mode’ as virus emerges at market in Chinese capital
14. China claims to be victim, wants Twitter to delete attackers
15. The military can’t save Washington from itself
16. How America’s adversaries are using hybrid warfare to capitalize on civil unrest
17. China is censoring its critics on Zoom. Will the tech company continue to comply?
1. Coronavirus 2nd wave? Nope, the U.S. is still stuck in the 1st one
NPR · by Nurith Aizenman · June 12, 2020
I think we should be very worried and we have to remain vigilant. We should be implementing the best practices of public health processes.
2. Chinese military officer arrested after trying to leave US
Washington Examiner · by Caitlin Yilek · June 12, 2020
The Chinese use our open society against us. It is pretty bold to send actual PLA officers to do a post-doctoral fellowship. I wonder about the university vetting procedures.
3. A brief history of Antifa: part I
Gatestone Institute · by Soeren Kern · June 12, 2020
Another look at ANTIFA.
4. Military spy agencies did not monitor protesters, Pentagon official says
The Washington Post · by Ellen Nakashima · June 12, 2020
I am happy to read this. If we had done this, it would surely cause a significant loss of trust and legitimacy with the American people.
5. Mass grave of US-made tanks uncovered in Iraq: photo
The Arab Source · by News Desk · June 12, 2020
I have seen no further information about this. There is not much in this article. The information comes from social media. Is this disinformation? Someone appears to be trying to undermine the reputation of the greatest tank in the world. I wonder who would seek to do that.
6. The trouble with loose ‘war’ talk
The Bulwark · by Adam Garfinkle · June 12, 2020
The author takes us all to task for using war to describe everything, especially a “new” Cold War. However, I will not stop using political warfare. We should not forget that while Clausewitz said war is politics by other means, our adversaries – the revisionist and rogue powers – believe politics is war by other means. They are practicing their unique forms of political warfare, and, in the terms Great Power Competition and conflict in the “Gray Zone,” we need to conduct our superior form of political warfare.
7. China’s trillion-dollar campaign fuels a tech race with the U.S.
The Wall Street Journal · by Liza Lin · June 11, 2020
It is going to be hard to compete with this. Perhaps we need to start using Chinese best practices (that include economic espionage) and adopt the Chinese R&D strategy: “steal to leap ahead” (note: tongue in cheek). But given the state of our economy and how we are trying to overcome the economic devastation caused by the coronavirus, it will be difficult for us to compete with the $1.4 trillion from China. We cannot do this at the government level. The question is: can and will our corporations and businesses compete on this economic and technological battlefield?
8. U.S.-Polish Fort Trump project crumbles
Reuters · by Joanna Plucinska & Idrees Ali · June 10, 2020
SOFA and burden sharing negotiations will create Polish-US friction.
9. China-US military confrontation in the South China Sea: fact and fiction
The Diplomat · by Hu Bo · June 12, 2020
A view from a Chinese author from Peking University. War is still “some way off.” Really? I hope he is right on that point.
10. The Pentagon’s proposal to fill the swamp
Lawfare · by Rep. Katie Porter & Rep. Jackie Speier · June 10, 2020
This is getting some push back within the national security community but not within the public or mainstream media.
11. Man accused in deputy ambush scrawled extremist ‘Boogaloo’ phrases in blood
NBC News · by Brandy Zadrozny, Ben Collins, & Andrew Blankstein · June 11, 2020
While we focus on ANTIFA, we miss these threats that are even within the ranks of the military. If I were advising the boogaloo bois and other similar radical organizations, I would recommend conducting an information campaign to make sure ANTIFA is blamed for all the unrest so no one focuses on these other organizations.
12. A letter to Maggie… post COVID-19
Institute for Defense & Business · by Mike Dana · May 26, 2020
An interesting look at what the world might be like.
13. Beijing goes into ‘wartime mode’ as virus emerges at market in Chinese capital
The Washington Post · by Anna Fifield & Lyric Li · June 13, 2020
There just has not been a lot of reporting from Beijing on the coronavirus outbreak there. It is those damn markets. What is China going to do about them?
14. China claims to be victim, wants Twitter to delete attackers
Variety · by Patrick Frater · June 13, 2020
I do not usually go to Variety for national security news, but this came to one of my news feeds. China is playing the victim card here. I think this is a case of the pot and kettle. I do not think China is being attacked on anywhere near the scale that China is using social media to control messaging and attack others.
15. The military can’t save Washington from itself
AEI · by Kori Schake · June 11, 2020
Dr. Schake is one of the foremost thinkers on civil-military relations. She argues that Americans have to stop thinking about the military and veterans as saviors of comic book heroes and instead think of them as fellow American citizens. Otherwise, she argues, the politicization of the military will continue.
16. How America’s adversaries are using hybrid warfare to capitalize on civil unrest
Coffee Or Die · by Nolan Peterson · June 8, 2020
From the web site “Coffee of Die.”
This bears deep study and reflection as well as assessing all the indicators. I have no doubt adversaries will try to take advantage of civil unrest in America.
When I wrote these three paragraphs some years ago I was not anticipating our adversaries would exploit these conditions in America.
“Revolutions, resistance, insurgency, terrorism, and civil war (RRIT &CW) are being conducted around the world and will continue to be the norm in the space between peace and war. Our adversaries are exploiting political resistance and political violence and ambiguous and complex international conditions to achieve their ends.”
“From the Gray Zone to Great Power, struggle is a spectrum of cooperation, competition, and conflict in that space between peace and war. We seek and desire cooperation, we have to be able to compete, and, while we want to avoid conflict, we must prepare for it. One of the important forms of conflict can be described by revolution, resistance, insurgency, terrorism, and civil war (RRIT & CW) with our adversaries – from AQ to ISIS to the Russian Little Green Men to the Iran Action Network or China’s PLA – all executing strategies of modern unconventional warfare, with their own unique characteristics to include application of conventional force, to exploit the conditions of revolution, resistance, insurgency, terrorism and civil war (RRIT &CW) to achieve their strategic political objectives.”
“Modern unconventional warfare, and the concepts of counter-UW, special warfare, and political warfare can provide a strategic capability to operate in this gap. To be effective, elements of the US military and Intelligence Community must continuously assess potential, nascent, and existing resistance organizations around the world on a day-to-day basis. Assessments will contribute to understanding when USG interests and resistance objectives can be aligned and provide the intellectual foundation to determine if a UW campaign is warranted or if opponents’ UW campaigns should be countered.”
I was not (and I am not) recommending that we need to do this in the US. But Americans need to understand the strategies of our adversaries, and we should not play into their hands. I do not want the US military or the intelligence community taking these actions in the US – though, again, the American people do need to counter our adversaries’ unconventional warfare campaigns that may be being executed in the US as they exploit the actions of radical extremists on the left and right.
17. China is censoring its critics on Zoom. Will the tech company continue to comply?
The Washington Post · by Editorial Board · June 13, 2020
A good question.
“The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty.”
– James Madison
“So long as we remain amateurs in the critical field of political warfare, the billions of dollars we annually spend on defense and foreign aid will provide us with a diminishing measure of protection.”
– Senator Mundt, 1961
“We finally did bring President Aristide back to power with full American force, which proves how effective we can be when we decide to. The team assigned to keep my sector secure is a small squad of U.S. Special Forces. There are only eleven of them, but they are the most effective eleven humans I’ve ever encountered. They have Humvees that travel to the next town in fifteen minutes over a bad road that takes a regular Land Cruiser an hour. When the rains wash everything out, they have Zodiacs to cut across the bay and skip the road altogether. They’re older than regular army soldiers; they have kids and go to PTA meetings, so they know how to talk to a local mayor with respect and patience and negotiate without screaming or immediately flashing a weapon. Alleviate, not create, tension. But the most important thing they have is autonomy. They don’t have to report to echelons above reality for daily operations. They just think it up and do it. They’re mobile, highly trained, fully armed American adults with autonomy. That’s a hell of a combination. I’d like to travel from mission to mission with a squad of these men and see what we could accomplish”
– From the book Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures: A True Story From Hell On Earth by Kenneth Cain, Heidi Postlewait, and Andrew Thomson
