How Prime Minister Modi Can Sustain India’s Pakistan Dialogue

http://carnegieendowment.org/2016/02/10/how-prime-minister-modi-can-sustain-india-s-pakistan-dialogue/itp1

C. Raja Mohan, Policy Outlook February 12, 2016
Prime Minister Narendra Modi can break out of the vicious circle in Indian-Pakistani relations by changing the way New Delhi frames and conducts dialogue with Islamabad.
India’s renewed political engagement with Pakistan in late 2015 has been followed by an agreement to resume a structured dialogue between the two countries after three tense years. Yet, a terrorist attack in January 2016 on an Indian air base in the border state of Punjab underlined the enduring fragility of the relationship. Skeptics believe the pattern of dialogue-disruption-dialogue might simply persist. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, however, can break out of that vicious circle by changing the way India frames and conducts dialogue with Pakistan. A number of steps could lend stability to India’s engagement with Pakistan and make it more sustainable and oriented toward outcomes.

Recommendations for the Modi Government
Break the Mold
Continue to put politics, not bureaucratic conservatism, in command to drive the peace process with Pakistan.
Resist pressure from the media to suspend the peace process at the first setback.
Explore opening up a channel of communication with the Pakistan Army.
Broaden the Base
Draw the opposition parties, especially the Indian National Congress, into the peace process by encouraging their leaders to travel across the troubled frontier between the two countries.
Invite the chief ministers of the states bordering Pakistan—Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Rajasthan, and Gujarat—to initiate contact with the neighboring regions across the frontier.
Liberalize the visa regime to promote exchanges between religious communities, business groups, and civil societies.

Address Hard Issues
Build on the Bangkok Mechanism—the newly established dialogue on terrorism between the two countries’ national security advisers—to strengthen engagement with Pakistani security agencies.

Revive the negotiations on Kashmir conducted by the special envoys of then Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh and then Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf between 2005 and 2007.
Revisit the many negotiations that came close to fruition during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government’s decadelong engagement with Pakistan, ranging from trade liberalization to energy exchanges to the Siachen dispute in Kashmir. 

After much trial and error, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is preparing for a formal and structured engagement with Pakistan in early 2016. Modi had previously pulled back, barely three months after his outreach to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 2014 following his election. But he embarked on a sustained effort to engage Sharif in the second half of 2015. Following meetings between the national security advisers and foreign ministers in early December 2015, the two sides announced the resumption of dialogue. Now named the Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue, it covers ten themes, including Kashmir, terrorism, trade, and humanitarian issues. Modi topped that rapid diplomatic maneuver with the surprising decision to land in Lahore, on very short notice, on Christmas Day, receiving a warm welcome from Sharif. Although the visit did not involve formal talks, it demonstrated Modi’s commitment to the peace process and his willingness to take big political risks in the pursuit of a normal relationship with Pakistan.

** "Five Truths about Terrorism"

Op-Ed, Today's Zaman, February 5, 2016
Author: Joseph S. Nye, Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor
Belfer Center Programs or Projects: International Security

ABSTRACT
American politics has been captured by terrorists.
In December 2015, polls showed that one in six Americans, some 16% of the population, now identify terrorism as the most important national problem, up from just 3% in the previous month. This is the highest percentage of Americans to mention terrorism in a decade, although it is still lower than the 46% measured after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
The effect of this change in public opinion has been particularly strong in the Republican presidential primary. It certainly boosted the candidacy of Donald Trump, whose anti-Muslim rhetoric has been particularly tough (if not incendiary). Some politicians are starting to call the battle against terrorism "World War III."
Terrorism is a problem for the United States, as the attack in San Bernardino, California in December showed. But it has been blown out of proportion, both by the presidential candidates and by a news media that adheres to the old adage, "If it bleeds, it leads." To put terrorism in proper perspective, Americans — and others — should bear in mind the following considerations.
Terrorism is a form of theatre. Terrorists are more interested in capturing attention and putting their issue at the forefront of the agenda than in the number of deaths they cause per se. The Islamic State (ISIS) pays careful attention to stagecraft. The barbaric beheadings that are broadcast and disseminated through social media are designed to shock and outrage — and thereby capture attention. By exaggerating their effect and making every terrorist act a lead story, we play into their hands.
Terrorism is not the biggest threat facing people in advanced countries. Terrorism kills far fewer people than auto accidents or cigarettes. Indeed, terrorism is not even a big threat — or a small one, for that matter. One is likelier to be struck by lightning than to be killed by a terrorist.
Experts estimate that an American's annual risk of being killed by a terrorist is one in 3.5 million. Americans are more likely to die in an accident involving a bathtub (one in 950,000), a home appliance (one in 1.5 million), a deer (one in two million), or on a commercial airliner (one in 2.9 million). Six thousand Americans die annually from texting or talking on the phone while driving. That is several hundred times more than die from terrorism. Radical Islamic terrorism kills fewer Americans than attacks by disgruntled workplace and school shooters. Terrorism is not World War III.
Global terrorism is not new. It often takes a generation for a wave of terrorism to burn out. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the anarchist movement killed a number of heads of state for utopian ideals. In the 1960s and 1970s, the "new left" Red Brigades and Red Army Faction hijacked planes across national borders and kidnapped and killed business and political leaders (as well as ordinary citizens).

Dissent and freedom in India: Full text of Amartya Sen’s lecture

We have a tradition of tolerance and plurality. But we — and the courts — have to work hard to preserve it
Written by Amartya Sen, Updated: Feb 13, 2016,
Amartya SenThe writer, a Nobel laureate in economics, is Thomas W. Lamont University Professor and professor of read more...)
I begin on a self-indulgent note. “How is Amartya?” asked my uncle Shidhu (Jyotirmoy Sengupta) — cousin of my father — in a letter written from Burdwan Jail, on August 22 of 1934, before I was one. He complained about the name “Amartya”, given to me by Rabindranath Tagore, and argued that the great Tagore had “completely lost his mind in his old age” to choose such a “tooth-breaking name” for a tiny child. Jyotirmoy was in jail for his efforts to end the British Raj. He was moved from prison to prison — Dhaka Jail, Alipur Central Jail, Burdwan Jail, Midnapur Central Jail. There were other uncles and cousins of mine who were going through similar experiences in other British Indian prisons.
Jyotirmoy himself came to a sad end, dying of tuberculosis, related to undernourishment in the prisons. As a young boy I was lucky to have a few conversations with him, and felt very inspired by what he said and wrote. He was committed to help remove “the unfreedoms heaped on us by our rulers.”

How happy would Jyotirmoy have been to be in today’s India, with the Raj dead and gone, and with no unfreedoms imposed on us by the colonial masters? But — and here is the rub — have these unfreedoms really ended? The penal codes legislated by the imperial rulers still govern important parts of our life. Of these, Section 377 of the code, which criminalises gay sex, is perhaps the most talked about, but happily a Constitution bench of the Supreme Court is re-examining it. It is, however, often overlooked that the putting on a pedestal of the sentiments of any religious group — often very loosely defined — is another remnant of British law, primarily Section 295(A) of the penal code introduced in 1927. A person can be threatened with jail sentence for hurting the religious sentiments of another, however personal — and however bizarrely delicate — that portrayed sentiment might be.
The Indian Constitution, despite claims to the contrary, does not have any such imposition. In a judgment on March 3, 2014, the Supreme Court in fact gave priority to the fundamental right of the people to express themselves, as enshrined in the Constitution. The Constitution’s insistence on “public order, decency or morality” is a far cry from what the organised political activists try to impose by hard-hitting kick-boxing, allegedly guided by delicate sentiments. The Constitution does not have anything against anyone eating beef, or storing it in a refrigerator, even if some cow-venerators are offended by other people’s food habits.

*** Storm Surge? The Tides of War Roll Back In

http://www.modernwarinstitute.org/storm-surge-the-tides-of-war-roll-back-in/
Posted by Frank Hoffman on Feb 8, 2016 | 

This blog entry is an adaptation of Dr. Hoffman’s essay, “No Wake for Ares,” Naval Institute Proceedings, December 2015. It is posted here with the permission of and gratitude towards the U.S. Naval Institute.
The tides of war are not receding. The Harvard psychiatrist Steven Pinker, in his bestselling book The Better Angels of our Nature offers a detailed explanation of mankind’s evolution from a Hobbesian world of brutish, short and violent lives to today’s benign environment. Pinker offers a multidisciplinary approach with a swirl of statistics.
It’s a popular book despite some counter-arguments on causation and Euro-centrism. Several authors have embraced Pinker’s research to extol policy implications about strategy and security resources, without absorbing his caveats against predicting the future. For example, one author quipped that “war as we know it, long thought to be an inevitable part of the human condition, has disappeared.” According to others, “we live in a remarkably safe and secure place, a world with fewer violent conflicts and greater political freedom than at virtually any other point in human history.”
There are grains of truth in the upbeat assessments of some of these analysts. Human violence was in significant decline for many years, and especially so in the developed world. The end of the Cold War ushered in a remarkably rare period of peace, with a sharp drop in the number of wars and reductions in the duration and costs of wars. That said, the last 25 years are quite a unique era, and U.S. security and the risks we have to manage are not measured by aggregated global statistics. Moreover, as this posting argues, the prognostications above fail to account for possible changes in the emerging security environment. Pinker was clear on this point, the substantial progress to date is not irreversible.
In fact, the recent decline in major conflict frequency and overall reduction in battle deaths, is a positive reflection of what we and our Allies have been doing for a generation in terms of working to sustain a rules-based international order. If true, the use of Pinker’s argument as evidence to embrace retrenchment and reduce U.S. defense spending is perversely counter-productive. A less robust military component of U.S. strategy would be less engaged, increasingly less forward deployed, and offer less deterrence to would be aggressors.
We need to develop a prudent sense of awareness of the geopolitical context that could evolve from a plausible projection of drivers in the near future, and the potentially grave consequences that may emerge. Contrary to untested assumptions about linearity in past patterns, trends are not immutable and they do not proceed in only one direction.
Contrary to untested assumptions about linearity in past patterns, trends are not immutable and they do not proceed in only one direction.

Conflict Trends: Looking Backwards
The chart below captures major conflict data from the last half century. The period 1991 to 2003 illustrates a decline in armed conflicts. But this data from the Uppsala conflict data center clearly shows a plateauing of “armed conflicts” (blue line) and the emergence of an increase in “wars” (red line) in the last decade reflecting events in Ukraine, Syria and Iraq. Lethality of conflict, measured in combatant and civilian deaths is also up appreciably.



Figure 1: Armed Conflicts and Wars 1946 to 2014

Who will succeed Raheel Sharif as the next chief of Pak Army?

http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/oped/who-will-succeed-raheel-sharif-as-the-next-chief-of-pak-army.html
13 February 2016 | Arun Vishwanathan |
For an exceptional nation known for “most countries have armies, but the Pakistan Army has a country,” the jockeying for the position of the next Army chief has been going on behind-the-scenes for some time now. As seniority and ability is not the fixed criteria, we can never be sure of how the dice will roll until the final orders are signed. Nevertheless the new chief will take charge at a time the most powerful body in Pakistan faces two challenges: a no-nonsense Prime Minister and religious extremism
The Pakistan Army has overarching influence on politics, economy, foreign and defence policy of the country. This has resulted in the coinage of the often-repeated aphorism, “most countries have armies, but the Pakistan Army has a country.” The chief of the Pakistan Army is the most powerful person in the country. Thus, the question of who will succeed General Raheel Sharif as the sixteenth chief of the Pakistan Army is a weighty one with repercussions for the region’s future.
Till recently, it was expected that General Raheel Sharif, like his predecessors General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and General Pervez Musharraf, would receive an extension. This sentiment had been strengthened by General Musharraf’s statement in September 2015 calling for extension of General Sharif’s tenure. On January 25, 2016 General Sharif put the speculation regarding his tenure to rest and revealed his plan to retire when his three-year term ends in November 2016. With the possibility of an extension out of the way, it is opportune to look at who could become the next chief of the Pakistan Army.
There are 29 three-star officers in the rank of Lieutenant-General in the Pakistan Army. Though all of them would no doubt aspire to become the next chief, the choice will zero in on to three or four officers. At the time of picking a successor to General Kayani, it was widely assumed that the race was among then Lt General Raheel Sharif, Lt General Tariq Khan, Lt General Rashad Mehmood (who was appointed as Chairman of Joint Chief of Staff Committee), Lt General Haroon Aslam and Lt General Zaheerul Islam.

8 Emerging Threats The Defense Department Will Face In 2016

http://taskandpurpose.com/8-emerging-threats-the-defense-department-will-face-in-2016-2/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tp-today
By Sarah Sicard, on January 19, 2016
As the world advances and new threats emerge, the DoD faces new threats each year.
The United States entered 2016 amid a number of complex and growing threats. Though some risks are greater than others, these threats are increasing in danger as they become more and more interconnected.
Despite the fact that all threats pose significant risks, the underlying causes are seemingly intertwined.
“It’s so often the case the state fragility is the threat the runs through a lot of things,” said Rebecca Zimmerman, an associate policy analyst with RAND Corporation, in an interview with Task & Purpose.
As nations continue to globalize, what one state does can have a profound international impact. Seemingly localized issues now have worldwide implications.
“We have this sort of notion that the world was on fire in 2015 … that’s what it felt like to a lot of us,” Zimmerman said. “When we have the impression that we are under threat … the temptation is to try to come up with a silver bullet [solution].”
For the Defense Department, which is facing global threats, shrinking budgets, and personnel cuts, the idea of a silver-bullet solution is becoming more desirable, but also less attainable.
Retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, believes “in some form or fashion, every single one of these [issues] is a priority.”
In fact, for certain units under the department, one of these risks serves the number one concern. However, the Pentagon must look at these threats altogether and plan for a multitude of scenarios.

Here are eight threats that we will see in 2016 and in coming years.
Cyber Attacks
The use of technology in deterrence, disruption, and destruction has grown exponentially over the last few years, and shows no signs of slowing down. In response, the Defense Department plans to have more than 133 cyber teams by 2018.
Playing into this rising threat are not only state actors, but also non-state actors. As evidenced by the attacks on the Office of Personnel and Management, cyber attacks can impact millions of people.
“New dominant technologies end up creating new vulnerabilities,” Zimmerman said. “It’s a particularly interesting form of warfare, as there’s no way to get air-tight attribution, which creates a fascinating kind of uncertainty.”
Tom Donnelly, a defense and security policy analyst with American Enterprise Institute, told Task & Purpose said, “If you think about the things that are really problematic for the department, it’s as much the [policy] part as it is the technology.”

 
Global Terrorism
In 2015, the Global Terrorism Index listed a nine-fold increase in terrorist-related deaths since 2000. It found that in total, 32,658 people were killed in terrorist attacks across 67 countries in 2014.
“You have America leaving or withdrawing, Iran rising, unrest within Sunni states, and organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda sort of emerging as the champions,” Donnelly said. “So to think of it as a terrorism problem … would probably make the situation worse.”
The climate in the Middle East, caused by remnants of the Cold War, terrorism, extremism, and continued occupational intervention has essentially altered the region, leaving its states and other cultural and religious factions divided and unstable.
“It’s a combination of state and non-state actors,” Zimmerman said. “It’s the hybrid that is possibly the most toxic.” She cited the Taliban as one such example where an armed terrorist group had some functions of a shadow government — adding that it’s difficult to fight conventional wars with unconventional actors.

Narcotics and the Counterinsurgency Campaigns in Afghanistan and Pakistan

Afghanistan: Scanning The Sky For Salvation

strategypage.com, February 11, 2016

The Taliban continue to earn their pay from the drug gangs by disrupting government efforts to halt the production (mostly in Helmand and Kandahar provinces in the south) and exporting of heroin and other drugs via routes in the south, east, north and west). Because of this there is lots of violence in the north, which is largely non-Pushtun (the Taliban is largely a Pushtun outfit) and hostile to Pushtuns and drugs. Pushtuns dominate the drug trade nationwide. There is also a lot of violence in the east, despite the presence of a lot more Pushtuns living there. That’s because Pakistan backed Islamic terrorists have long sought sanctuary along the Pakistan border and often try to control the local tribes via terror. The situation in the east has gotten worse since mid-2014 because of thousands of Pakistani based Islamic terrorists being chased out of their sanctuary (North Waziristan) by a major Pakistani military offensive. This has meant nothing but trouble for the Afghans living in those border areas, which have now turned into a war zone.

The drug gangs prefer to use bribes to create safe smuggling routes but if that doesn’t work the Taliban supply the muscle. That gets the headlines while the bribes rarely do. When a large group (usually less than a hundred) of soldiers or police, including their commanders switch sides the cause is usually cash. Mercenary attitudes are acceptable in Afghanistan and an ancient tradition. Afghanistan is on the “highway” to India and passing armies often offered lucrative, if dangerous, opportunities for Afghan tribesmen. Those who returned with loot told exciting stories that became part of the folklore and tribal history. In this part of the world the legends are a lot more meaningful than elsewhere.

With most foreign troops gone the traditional warfare techniques are more effective. As a result the government is losing control of more territory. The problem is that the traditional methods, as practiced by the Taliban and drug gangs are very effective. These ancient methods use attacks on civilians and lots of terror to demoralize foes and keep allies in line.

Is ISIS in Pakistan? Pakistani Officials Contradict Each Other on Presence of ISIS

Pakistan Says No ‘Organized Presence’ of Islamic State, Despite Intelligence Chief’s Warning
Reuters, February 12, 2016
ISLAMABAD — Different officials in Pakistan’s government have taken seemingly contradictory stands on Islamic State’s influence in the country, after a rare warning by an intelligence chief that the Middle East-based militant group posed a domestic threat.
Reports of stepped-up recruitment by Islamic State and a bloody attack linked to the group last year have stoked fears the movement is gaining momentum in Pakistan, despite the government rejecting its formal presence.
The government reasserted its view on Thursday, a day after Intelligence Bureau director general Aftab Sultan told a parliamentary panel that Islamic State was coordinating with militant groups and that hundreds of people had left Pakistan to join its fight in Syria, media reports say.
“Let me reiterate that there is no organized presence of Daesh in Pakistan,” foreign office spokesman Nafees Zakaria told reporters in Islamabad, using the Arabic acronym for the group.
He declined any further comment when contacted by Reuters on Friday.
The entry of Islamic State, while its numbers may remain small, would complicate Pakistan’s fight against indigenous Islamist militants fighting to overthrow the government.
On Friday, Pakistan arrested 97 al-Qaeda and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi militants in the southern city of Karachi and foiled a planned attack to break U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl’s killer out of jail, the army said.

“MODE OF DENIAL”
The intelligence chief’s assertion that Pakistan should be worried about Islamic State’s role prompted mixed reactions.
"This is the first time it has been officially admitted,“ said Col. Syed Tahir Hussain Mashhadi, an opposition parliamentarian of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) party and a member of the senate committee that Sultan briefed.

Is ISIS in Pakistan? Pakistani Officials Contradict Each Other on Presence of ISIS

Pakistan Says No ‘Organized Presence’ of Islamic State, Despite Intelligence Chief’s Warning

Reuters, February 12, 2016

ISLAMABAD — Different officials in Pakistan’s government have taken seemingly contradictory stands on Islamic State’s influence in the country, after a rare warning by an intelligence chief that the Middle East-based militant group posed a domestic threat.

Reports of stepped-up recruitment by Islamic State and a bloody attack linked to the group last year have stoked fears the movement is gaining momentum in Pakistan, despite the government rejecting its formal presence.

The government reasserted its view on Thursday, a day after Intelligence Bureau director general Aftab Sultan told a parliamentary panel that Islamic State was coordinating with militant groups and that hundreds of people had left Pakistan to join its fight in Syria, media reports say.

“Let me reiterate that there is no organized presence of Daesh in Pakistan,” foreign office spokesman Nafees Zakaria told reporters in Islamabad, using the Arabic acronym for the group.

He declined any further comment when contacted by Reuters on Friday.

The entry of Islamic State, while its numbers may remain small, would complicate Pakistan’s fight against indigenous Islamist militants fighting to overthrow the government.

On Friday, Pakistan arrested 97 al-Qaeda and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi militants in the southern city of Karachi and foiled a planned attack to break U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl’s killer out of jail, the army said.

“MODE OF DENIAL”

The intelligence chief’s assertion that Pakistan should be worried about Islamic State’s role prompted mixed reactions.

"This is the first time it has been officially admitted,“ said Col. Syed Tahir Hussain Mashhadi, an opposition parliamentarian of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) party and a member of the senate committee that Sultan briefed.

"The government of Pakistan has gone into a mode of denial,” he added. “We have to recognize Islamic State’s existence and take action.”

In May, militants boarded a bus carrying members of the minority Shi'ite Ismaili community in Karachi and opened fire on the passengers, killing 45.

Police in charge of the investigation said the militants were “inspired by Daesh,” but did not believe the group had any organizational ties to its leadership in the Middle East.

Authorities have also raised concerns that Islamic State was making inroads in Punjab province late last year “after consolidating its position in Afghanistan,” according to a government circular seen by Reuters.

Islamic State comes to Pakistan It’s here that the IS hopes to set up its sub-HQ, with help from powerful madrasas and clerics

Written by Khaled Ahmed, Updated: Feb 13, 2016,
Khaled AhmedKhaled Ahmed was born in 1943 in Jallandhar during the siege of Stalingrad.
As Pakistan denies the growing footprint of the Islamic State (IS) on its soil, its radicalised citizens keep killing “liberals” and members of Muslim sects they don’t like. There’s evidence that Pakistanis are going to Syria “for training”, one angry academic in Islamabad claimed on Geo TV last month that an ex-chief of the ISI, Hamid Gul, recruited for the IS before he died in 2015. Pakistani wives are abandoning their families to join the IS’s jihad as “jihadi wives” or comfort women. According to Newsweek Pakistan, “Late last year, a group of housewives, all from Lahore, had either left or were on their way to Syria to join the Islamic State.”
Newsweek Pakistan also quoted a Pakistani security official as saying: “As the investigation progressed, a small cabal of government officials was discovered to have been collecting information for IS, allegedly because they supported its holy war on the West. We have thus far arrested four suspected government officials from various parts of the Punjab. But we are also aware of IS presence in Sindh and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provinces.”
But, inexplicably, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan keeps denying the presence of the IS in Pakistan, maybe using as a yardstick the physical presence of Arab representatives of the terrorist outfit. Wall-chalking announcing the presence of the IS has appeared in all big cities, and men have been caught in Karachi writing its message on the walls. But Pakistan doesn’t want to add to its roster of tormentors it has finally decided to confront.

How has the IS made its contact in Pakistan? From evidence, there were communities already softened by the madrasas, charismatic clerics and religious militias, that felt drawn to the pledge of the “khilafat” under “caliph” Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, now killing fellow Muslims in Syria-Iraq. The MBA graduate, Saad Aziz, who killed a woman human rights advocate, Sabeen Mahmud, in Karachi last year, had started his radical revamp with a highly popular 1990s cleric of Lahore, Israr Ahmad, who rhetorically pledged a “bloody khilafat”, without attracting the mischief of the state. Finding the post-Israr movement too tame, he reached out to al-Qaeda before joining the IS.
The latest addition of Pakistani women to the IS took place through the good offices of a former al-Huda member already posted in Syria.
Al-Huda is an Islamabad-supported elitist women’s organisation recommending a reversion to a re-enacted life of piety. It appeals to upper-crust women showing off their hijab and claiming moral superiority with big moola in the bank. Al-Huda’s founder, Farhat Hashmi, shifted to Canada just before her hero, Osama bin Laden, was killed in Pakistan in 2011. An acolyte of Hashmi in 2015 joined her American husband in California to kill 14 innocent citizens, decisively shifting American public opinion in favour of extremist politicians like Donald Trump.

Watch out for China's new, improved, army

February 13, 2016
 http://www.rediff.com/news/column/watch-out-for-chinas-new-improved-army/20160213.htm

Will China's new military reforms endanger Xi Jinping's rule, asks Claude Arpi.
China has undertaken mega military reforms leaving no doubt that it is arming itself.
On December 28, the PLA Daily announced that the People's Liberation Army Navy had just commissioned three new vessels, including a Dongdiao-class auxiliary general intelligence ship named Neptune, to bolster China's intelligence gathering and surveillance capabilities in the disputed South China Sea.
Three days later, Senior Colonel Yang Yujun, spokesman for the ministry of national defence stated: 'Taking various factors into consideration, relevant authority started the research and development of China's second aircraft carrier, which is currently under independent design and construction.'
It will be propelled by a conventional power plant and have a displacement of 50,000 tons; in many ways, it will be similar to the Liaoning, the first Chinese carrier.
The same day (the last day of 2015), President Xi Jinping, who is also Chairman of the Central Military Commission, inaugurated three new PLA 'units' or 'services', namely, the PLA Land Army, the PLA Rocket Force and the PLA Strategic Support Force.
Xi said it was 'an important decision to realise the Chinese Dream and the Dream of a Strong Military, and a strategic initiative to build a modern military power system with Chinese characteristics.'
According to the Chinese president it should 'optimise its power structure and troop formation, speed up the army's transformation and build a powerful, modern and new-type army.'
Regarding the PLA Land Army, The South China Morning Post commented: 'Once the changes are in place the CMC will take direct charge of administering all military wings, including the PLA, the People's Armed Police, and the militia and reserve forces.'
The PLA Rocket Force will take over from the Second Artillery Force to 'strengthen the trustworthy and reliable nuclear deterrence and nuclear counter-attack capabilities, intensify the construction of medium and long range precision strike power.'

Syria’s Future Lies in its Neighbors’ Hands

Dmitri Trenin, Op-Ed February 9, 2016 Financial Times
In the Middle East, it is the regional actors that are at the forefront. They are calling the shots—literally. And they are yet to learn the fine art of co-operation alongside confrontation.
The Syrian army’s success at Aleppo was something Russia had been waiting for since the start of its military intervention last September. Russian air strikes were to soften up the diverse groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad — Isis and others — and create conditions for Damascus to start a counter-offensive.
Until recently, however, there has been a disconnect between Russian activity in the air and the near-inability of Mr Assad’s forces to exploit it on the ground. Now this gap has been bridged. We should not expect a quick victory for Damascus, though Aleppo opposition groups may invite others into Syria: the Saudis and particularly the Turks. If this happens, the war will be transformed again. With the US, Russia and regional powers directly involved, Syria can become the first battleground in the global competition for power and influence that has restarted after a 25-year hiatus. 
Dmitri Trenin, Director, Moscow Center More from this author...
The consequences of such a development are hard to predict. But these are some of the questions that would surely arise. Would Turkey invade with ground troops to occupy the Kurdish-held areas? Would it bomb the Syrian army’s units? Would the Saudis attack just Isis targets or Iranian and Hizbollah formations, too? Would Iran send in more troops? What would the US military be doing? How would the Russians respond if their Syrian allies came under attack and sustained casualties? What would be the Russian reaction to the losses of their own at the hands of the Turks?
Would they open fire at the Turkish tanks and shoot down Turkish fighter jets with the S-400 air defence systems already in place after the incident in November in which a Russian aircraft was shot down by a Turkish F-16? Would Moscow arm the Kurds in Turkey? Would any of this push Nato to invoke Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, which states that an attack on one ally is an attack on all allies? Should any of this happen, the entire global strategic environment would change.

How the Assad regime is winning in Syria, in three seconds

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/02/11/how-the-assad-regime-is-winning-in-syria-in-three-seconds/
Ishaan Tharoor,   February 11
The animated GIF above details the strategic lay of the land in the area around the Syrian city of Aleppo, from the beginning of February to Thursday. The city, once Syria's most populous urban center and commercial capital, sits toward the bottom middle of the map.
In less than two weeks, troops and allied militias loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad — represented by the beige colors — have managed to almost encircle the beleaguered rebel positions in Aleppo and cut off their supply lines to Turkey.
The area in green is loosely controlled by rebels; to the north of Aleppo, the vital corridor to Turkey was increasingly under threat from both the regime forces and the Kurdish militias (represented in yellow). Over the past week, that link was severed, raising the prospect of a grim and deadly siege of the remaining rebel-held areas of Aleppo.
Here's a wider angle map of Syria made by The Washington Post before the regime's latest gains.


As WorldViews and its colleagues have reported in the past two weeks, the capture of Aleppo would mark a potential turning point in the brutal five-year-long Syrian civil war. It would signal perhaps the most important military victory for the Assad regime and has already prompted a new, desperate rush of refugees to the Turkish border.
Assad's campaign to retake Aleppo was significantly boosted both by the involvement of Iranian-backed militias fighting alongside government forces on the ground, as well as months of withering airstrikes carried out by Russian fighter jets. Moscow's bombardment shifted the strategic calculus in Syria, with U.S. officials now grappling with the reality that the embattled Syrian leader may be much harder to dislodge.

If Assad Wins, Islamic State Wins

124 FEB 10, 2016

By Noah Feldman

http://bloombergview.com/articles/2016-02-10/if-assad-wins-islamic-state-wins

The civilians fleeing Aleppo don’t prove definitively that, with Russian backing, President Bashar al-Assad will win the Syrian civil war. But it’s certainly time to game out that scenario and ask: What would victory look like to Assad? And what will happen to the other regional actors engaged in this fight?

The decisive element to consider is whether Assad needs to defeat Islamic State to be a winner. If the answer is yes -- and if Assad could do it -- the world would probably breathe a sigh of relief, and accept Assad’s victory, despite its extraordinary human costs and egregious violations of human rights.

But Assad will probably calculate that he doesn’t need to beat Islamic State, just contain it so that it doesn’t constitute an existential threat to his regime. That would put Islamic State well on its way to becoming a statelet, accepted by its neighbors for lack of will to defeat it. The long-term consequences for the world would be high, but Assad’s regime would be substantially better off.

For now, Assad appears to be moving toward at least a limited victory over the ill-organized Free Syrian Army forces around Aleppo. It isn’t rocket science. He’s combining intense air support from Russian planes with ground forces drawn from what remains of the Syrian army.

The Battle of Aleppo has been going on since 2012. What’s changed in this round is the intensity of Russian airstrikes. Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz may have said that he wants to carpet bomb Islamic State to find out if sand can glow in the dark, but it’s Russian President Vladimir Putin who’s following a version of that strategy against the Syrian opposition.

The Islamic State Will Survive America’s Military Onslaught

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/02/11/the-islamic-state-will-survive-americas-military-onslaught/

In a new report, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon predicts the ranks of the Islamic State will swell in 2016.

BY COLUM LYNCH, FEBRUARY 11, 2016

Is the Islamic State in decline or on the rise?

The U.S.-led air coalition in Syria and Iraq has put the Islamic State on the defensive over the past year, helping allies reclaim conquered territory and cutting into the terrorist group’s oil profits with precision strikes on refineries and trucks.

But the ranks of the self-declared Islamic caliphate are likely to expand in the coming year, as veterans of the Middle East wars move on to other countries, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon forecast in a report released Thursday. That has raised concerns about the spread of terrorist attacks and the possible development of crude chemical weapons, the report concluded.

It is by no means certain that the world’s wealthiest terrorist organization will be driven from the vast tracts of land it has acquired in Iraq and Syria since 2013. But the Islamic State has already established beachheads well beyond its Middle East proving grounds.

Some 34 groups around the world reportedly pledged allegiance to the movement by the end of 2015, according to Ban’s report. The movement and its affiliates have proved their ability to carry out complex terrorist attacks from Paris to Jakarta and to inspire “lone-wolf” terrorists, striking at Americans in San Bernardino last year.

The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, holds territory in Libya, where some 2,000 fighters have pledged allegiance to the movement’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. U.S. and U.N. officials claim the group has a presence in Ajdabiya, Benghazi, and Tripoli, and maintains control over the desert city of Sirte, not far from the birthplace of former Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi.

The United States also claims that many of these groups are not directed by Baghdadi. But the network’s sophisticated use of social media will continue to inspire people around the world to undertake terrorist attacks, according to U.S. and U.N. officials.

“ISIL represents an unprecedented threat to international peace and security,” Ban wrote in the 23-page report. “It is able to adapt quickly to the changing environment and to persuade or inspire like-minded terrorist groups in various regions of the world to facilitate and commit acts of terrorism.”

“The growing threat posed by ISIL to international peace and security is reflected in its strategy of global expansion, the development of which may reflect a reaction to recent territorial losses inflicted in Iraq and [Syria],” Ban said. “It is expected that [its] affiliates will increase in number and that its membership will grow in 2016.”

* Ukraine's Conflict, Rumors of Compromise Grow

http://www.realclearworld.com/articles/2016/02/11/in_ukraines_conflict_rumors_of_compromise_grow_111705.html

February 11, 2016

By Stratfor

Forecast

Recent developments show that previously deadlocked U.S.-Russia talks over the standoff in Ukraine could advance.

A broad deal to end the Ukraine crisis is unlikely, but progress in areas such as cease-fire observations, heavy weaponry pullouts and local elections in separatist regions cannot be ruled out.

Russia's worsening economy, the conflict in Syria and other factors will ultimately shape the extent to which Moscow and the West are willing to compromise.

Analysis

The United States and Russia may be moving closer to an understanding on the conflict in Ukraine. In recent weeks, diplomatic activity between U.S. and Russian officials has resumed at a frenzied pace. There are rumors of a political reshuffle in the separatist territories of Donetsk and Luhansk. Ukrainian and Russian media have even reported that a "secret deal" is in the works that would serve as a compromise between the political and security demands of the separatists and Moscow, on one hand, and Kiev and its Western backers on the other.

Yet there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical of such rumors. Ukrainian officials have made unequivocal statements that there would be no political concessions from Kiev until Moscow completely implemented the security provisions of last year's Minsk agreement. These provisions include the withdrawal of all foreign - meaning Russian - troops in eastern Ukraine as well as the restoration of control of the border between the separatist territories and Russia to Ukraine. Meanwhile, Moscow has reiterated that Kiev must pass key constitutional changes that would grant greater autonomy to the separatist regions before the security components of Minsk are implemented.

The Ukrainian conflict has already had its fair share of fruitless negotiations and cease-firebreakdowns. Simply continuing the status quo would understandably be more likely. But the drop in global oil prices and the subsequent weakening of the Russian economy, as well as Russia's extensive involvement in Syria, could be giving new life to negotiations among Kiev, Moscow and the West. A grand bargain over Ukraine is far from near, but there may be room for compromise over what so far have been intractable issues.

Toward Negotiations

Talk of a potential deal began when U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland held an unannounced meeting with Russian presidential adviser Vladislav Surkov on Jan. 15. Nuland, who was at the time in the middle of a tour of EU and NATO countries in Eastern Europe, flew to the border of Lithuania and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad to meet with Surkov. The meeting, which reportedly lasted over four hours, immediately led to speculation of a "secret agreement" between the United States and Russia over Ukraine. The details of what the deal would entail have varied from source to source. Some outlets claimed the separatist Donbas region would formally be part of Ukraine's territory but would be given special status and allowed to conduct its own foreign policy. Others reported that Russia would concede on granting Ukraine control of its border with the separatist territories. Some even suggested that Russia was considering replacing current leaders of the Donetsk and Luhansk separatist territories with figures who are more cooperative with Kiev in a bid to move negotiations forward.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry then met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Zurich on Jan. 20. Just two days later, Kerry said at the World Economic Forum in Davos that U.S. sanctions against Russia could be lifted "within months" if the Minsk agreement were fully implemented. The statement was notable, since the United States has taken a hard line relative to European countries on maintaining sanctions against Russia. But while the European Union recently voted to extend sanctions on Russia for six months, several European officials have made it clear that they wish to lift EU sanctions on Russia when they come under review in July and have pressured Moscow and Kiev to do more on implementing Minsk protocols.

** Russia’s Ongoing Predicament

https://geopoliticalfutures.com/russias-ongoing-predicament/

Feb. 12, 2016 As Moscow gains ground in Syria, it is faltering in almost every other state objective.

By Lili Bayer and Jacob Shapiro

It may seem counterintuitive to write about Russia being in crisis today. After all, Russia’s limited military deployment in Syria seems to be paying substantial dividends. Backed by Russian air support, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has pushed forward with a two-pronged military offensive. Assad’s forces have managed to drive rebels out of Latakia province. Now instead of a desperate fight to defend core regime territory in the Alawite coastland, Assad’s forces are ready to stage attacks into key rebel positions in Idlib province. Meanwhile, the Assad regime has managed to strike at both Islamic State and rebel positions in Aleppo. Now that the Assad regime has ended the IS siege of Kuweires air base, Russia has deployed hundreds of personnel and air defense systems. Most significant, Assad regime forces have scored key victories around the city of Aleppo, and on Feb. 3 captured the towns of Nubl and Zahraa, cutting key rebel supply lines to Turkey.

Meanwhile, headlines today have focused on the administration of President Barack Obama opening a two-front campaign on Syria: ending the war on Assad through negotiations and stepping up the war on IS. Headlines can often be misleading, but when it comes to Syria, they are especially so. It wouldn’t be a normal week if there weren’t at least one article about a new diplomatic initiative to bring the Syrian civil war to a close and unseat Assad. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and representatives of more than a dozen other nations met on Feb. 11 in Munich. Kerry and Lavrov announced that they had agreed to cease hostilities and facilitate humanitarian aid in Syria, but did not know whether the leaders of rebel groups would adhere to the ceasefire. Of course, the Islamic State and other radical fighters in the region were not included in the ceasefire agreement. But the diplomats will meet again soon, with great fanfare and few concrete results.

The truth is that there are no real steps to take. The U.S. does not have a fundamental interest in seeing the Assad regime removed from power. The U.S. wants to see the Islamic State defeated. And while Russia is indeed striking mostly at Syrian rebel groups, Russia is also fighting against Islamic State. As Assad’s regime gains strength, IS has fewer opportunities to expand. Furthermore, moderate Syrian rebel groups are not the chief combatants of the Russian-backed Assad regime. Many of Assad’s recent gains have come at the expense of Jabhat al-Nusra – al-Qaida’s affiliate in Syria and the strongest of the rebel groups on the ground in Aleppo. If the Islamic State were not so active in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra would be seen as the main radical Islamist threat in its own right.

These movements seem to indicate that Russia has scored a victory in Syria in its support of the Assad regime. And the Russians have indeed succeeded in demonstrating, albeit in a limited capacity, the potential effectiveness of their military. But Syria is ultimately peripheral to Russian interests. Russia became involved with Syria because it wanted to develop leverage in its dealings with the West, particularly with the United States. The primary issues for Russia don’t hang on Assad’s success. They hang on Russia’s precarious domestic situation and on its western frontier.

The Kremlin’s primary concern is Russia’s ongoing economic crisis, which threatens toundermine domestic stability. Low oil prices are forcing the government in Moscow to revise its budget yet again, and decision-makers are scrambling to find opportunities to raise extra revenues. Russia’s GDP fell by 3.7 percent last year, and the value of the ruble has reached record lows. But critically, the crisis has had a tangible impact on the daily lives of Russian citizens. Their real incomes fell by 9.5 percent in 2015 compared to the previous year, according to official figures. For the first time in 18 years, Russians are collectively spending more than they earn. These expenditures are in part due to shrinking incomes and rising prices, but another factor is likely the uncertainty surrounding the value of the ruble and the future of the Russian economy, since foreign currency purchases are considered expenditures in official statistics.

Putin’s regime is in a relatively strong position domestically, but the Kremlin is highly aware that deteriorating economic conditions undermine its core social contract with the Russian people. The Kremlin enjoys widespread legitimacy mainly due to the belief that it is guaranteeing stability.

Moreover, financial troubles are forcing the Kremlin to focus its expenditures inward, thus limiting the amount of funding available to spend on fulfilling foreign policy objectives. While the Kremlin is busy attempting to mitigate the impact of Russia’s economic crisis, it must also continue pursuing the country’s primary strategic goal: maintaining buffer zones between Russia’s vulnerable core and the West. Ukraine is one of these key buffer areas. Ukraine has its own economic troubles, and the government in Kiev is heavily dependent on external financing to pay its bills. At the same time, the Ukrainian government is weak and divided. International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde warned on Feb. 10 that the future of the country’s ongoing $40 billion bailout program may be jeopardized if reforms are not implemented.

On one hand, Russia benefits from a weak Ukraine plagued by financial difficulties. Ukraine is less likely to successfully pursue Western integration if corruption, weak governance and poor economic performance persist. On the other hand, the Kremlin understands that the 2014 regime change in Kiev signified a shift in Ukrainian society and politics as well as in Ukraine’s relationship with the United States. Regardless of their squabbles, the majority of Ukrainian political factions are pro-Western and the annexation of Crimea and war in eastern Ukraine turned the tide of public opinion against Moscow. Most important, the U.S. and key European powers like Germany are committed to the pro-Western regime in Kiev. Moscow does not have the military or financial ability to occupy Ukraine, and cannot afford a direct confrontation with the West. Russia’s options in Ukraine, therefore, are very limited. The best the Kremlin can hope to achieve is a nominally pro-Western but practically neutral Ukraine.

Ukraine, however, is not the only country in the historical buffer area that Moscow is worried about. Following the annexation of Crimea, both the U.S. and NATO committed to boosting their presence along the alliance’s eastern edge.

Ukraine Needs a Reboot

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/02/12/ukraine-needs-a-reboot/
The government in Kiev has reached a dead end. It’s time for a new start.
By Sergii Leshchenko, February 12, 2016 

Ukraine is approaching a critical moment. A great deal has been achieved in the two years since the Euromaidan uprising — now known as the Revolution of Dignity — overthrew the regime of President Viktor Yanukovych. In its wake, voters chose a parliament and a president who were publicly committed to democracy, the rule of law, and the fight against corruption. Civil society, once subdued, has become a vocal and active player in everyday life. Our military managed to stave off defeat and hold its own against the Russian-sponsored separatist revolt in the East.
Yet the hope for change is fading fast. The current government led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has confronted the challenge of entrenched corruption — and failed. Last week a leading reformer, Economy and Trade Minister Aivaras Abromavicius, tendered his resignation, citing efforts by a well-connected businessman and politician who was trying to wield control over the ministry. Abromavicius was only the latest in a string of leading reformers, some of them from outside Ukraine, who have been frustrated in their efforts to push through the urgently needed changes that will finally transform the country into a truly European state.
Public morale has hit a new low.Public morale has hit a new low. In a recent poll, 82 percent of those surveyed disapproved of the current cabinet; 70 percent said the same of President Petro Poroshenko. The economy is in terrible shape. Entire industries are stagnating, and our currency, the hryvnia, has once again plunged in value in recent weeks. Petty corruption remains widespread, while public services are spotty at best. Citizens have watched politically influential businessmen expand their business empires by leveraging their access to the corridors of power.

Israel's Unprecedented Geopolitical Strength

http://www.realclearworld.com/articles/2016/02/12/israels_unprecedented_geopolitical_strength.html

February 12, 2016

By Paul Scham

It may seem counterintuitive, or even downright strange, but Israel's geopolitical position is probably stronger now than at any time in the country's history. This is likely to continue at least in the short-to-medium term, but looming long-term challenges should give some pause to Israel's current leaders. They should recall that even way back in the 1960s, then-Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol sardonically referred to Israel as "Shimshon der nebekhdiker," or "poor little Samson."

It is therefore rich with irony that it is undisputed among Republican presidential candidates that President Barack Obama has "thrown Israel under the bus," while Hillary Clinton promises "no daylight" between the United States and Israel, instead of advocating policies that would strongly encourage Israel to ameliorate the Palestinians' untenable situation. It is, moreover, ironic that Bernie Sanders, who once spent a year on a kibbutz as a young man, prefers to avoid the issue entirely.

It is worth reviewing Israel's markedly changed security situation since its establishment in 1948. At that time Israel considered itself in genuine existential danger from the Arab world, and with good reason. This danger lessened with its victory in the 1967 Six Day War, and the Jewish state's safety from an Arab attack was largely sealed with its 1979 treaty with Egypt. However, a sense of insecurity still pervaded Israel once it became clear that peace with Egypt was not going to be followed by normalization with the rest of the region.

Russia Plays Familiar Hand in Syria

by The Wall Street Journal
Russia Plays Familiar Hand in Syria by Nathan Hodge, Wall Street Journal
President Vladimir Putin gambled that he could reverse the collapse of the Syrian regime when he launched his air war last year; now, with a cease-fire deal, he appears closer to saving Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The agreement early Friday to reach a cease-fire in Syria within one week gives Mr. Putin and his allies crucial time to consolidate new gains on the battlefield. In recent days, the Syrian army and allied Shiite militias, backed by Russian air power, have pushed to encircle Aleppo, Syria’s largest city.
Success would allow Mr. Putin to solidify a pro-regime bastion in Syria and deter any near-term effort to force Mr. Assad to step down as a condition of peace talks…
Read on.

Marines Could Cut Infantry Troops to Expand Cyber Community

Feb 12, 2016 | by Hope Hodge Seck
http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/02/12/marines-could-cut-infantry-troops-to-expand-cyber-community.html
The Marine Corps may be approaching a steady-state end strength of 182,000 troops, but that doesn't necessarily mean personnel cutbacks are over.
Marine Commandant Gen. Robert Neller said Thursday that the Corps may consider scaling back its infantry population or operational forces -- with an emphasis on cutting from the most junior ranks -- in order to create space for an increase in its cyberwarfare community.
Speaking at an Atlantic Council event in Washington, D.C., Neller said he was looking hard at tradeoffs as the Marine Corps sought to develop well-trained, mature cyber warriors.

"I'm willing to take risk in the units we have now," he said. "Once we determine what are the capabilities we need and what are the types of Marines we need to do that, you know, those are not going to be [privates first class] and lance corporals over time."
The Corps, he said, had two options: to ask for an end strength increase after several years of drawing down, or restructure existing forces for a new mission. Neller said he would probably know how many cyber Marines the Corps needed by this summer, and then it would take an unspecified period of time to realize that growth.
In a fragmentary order Neller published in January, he called for growth in information operations and electronic warfare as well as cyberwarfare, giving the Marine Corps a fall 2017 deadline to complete the expansion.

"It takes 22 years to grow a colonel. So if we have to take structure, we'll probably take it from the more junior Marines, because those are the more easy to ... we can replace them," he said. "To grow a cyber Marine is a two-year pipeline, and we're in the process of growing our cyber capability. And the course that they have to go through has got a high attrition rate, so we've got to remission those people. So that's part of this talent management."
Neller said he was also looking to take advantage of existing cyber talent in the Marine Corps Reserve community as a way to stretch resources and training dollars even further.
"The advantage in the Reserves is they have a civilian life and they do this for real," he said. "So now we're going out, trying to find out who they are, how to get them involved in this stuff, because now we've skipped 5,10,15 years of development because somebody owns a cyber protection company and we put them right in there."

** Deep Web Search Engines To Explore The Hidden Internet

February 11, 2016 ·
www.fortunascorner.com
Rakesh Krishnan writes on the February 10, 2016 online website, The Hacker News, about The Dark Web, “a vast section of the Internet which is hidden and not accessible through regular search engines and web browsers — the part of the Internet known as THE DEEP WEB — which is 500 times the size of the Web we now know.”

What Is The DEEP WEB?
“Deep Web is referred to the data which are not indexed by any standard search engine such as Google, or Yahoo,’ Mr. Krishnan writes. “The Deep Web refers to all web pages that [regular] search engines cannot find, such as databases, registration-required web forums [also referred to as digital-gated communities, or invitation-only digital communities], webmail pages, and pages behind paywalls. Then, there is The Deep Web, or Dark Net — a specific part of that hidden Deep Web. Deep Web and Dark Web are intriguing topics for Netizens all around [the globe],” Mr. Krishnan observes. “But, when you hear the term ‘Deep Web,’ or ‘Dark Web,’ you usually categorize them into one.”

What is The DARK WEB?
“The Dark Web is where you can operate without being tracked, maintaining total anonymity,” he writes. Unless each digital conversation is encrypted at both ends, I do not agree with his assertion. And, even if both are, there are very brief periods when the encryption is not actually active — albeit very brief. But, a determined adversary, with enough time, resources, and effort, could probably — eventually unmask someone they are attempting to identify and track — but, if the adversary is clever and careful, I agree with Mr. Krishnan. Under those circumstances, it would be very difficult; but, not impossible. There are other ways to skin a cat so to speak. But, I digress.
“The Dark web is much smaller than the Deep Web; and, is made up of all different kinds of websites that sell drugs, weapons, and even hire assassins,” he writes. “These are hidden networks, avoiding their presence on the Surface Web, and its URLs are tailed up with .onion. These [websitename] onion domains are not indexed by regular search engines, so you can only access the Dark Web with special software — called ‘The Onion Browser,’ referred to as TOR.”
“TOR is free and anyone can download it,” Mr. Krishnan notes.
“Many of us heard about The Dark Web, when the largest online, underground marketplace — Silk Road — was taken down [shuttered], following an investigation [and prosecution of it’s founder], by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),” he adds. “But, what if, you can still be able to dig the Dark Net contents with your regular browsers, without the need of TOR?”
Here’s How To Surf & Search The Deep Web — Without TOR: Solution – Deep Web Search Engines
“Search engines like Google are incredibly powerful,” Mr. Krishnan writes, “but, they can’t crawl and index the vast amount of data that is not hyperlinked, or accessed via public DNS services. However, there are Deep Web Search Engines that crawl over the TOR network, and bring the same result to your regular browser.”

Some of such Dark Web Search Engines are:

— Onion City

— Onion.to

— Not Evil

— Memex Deep Web Search Engine

Here Are Some Deep Web Search Engines:

— The WWW Virtual Library

— Collection of Deep Web Search Tools

— Surfwax

— IceRocket

— Stumpedia

— Freebase

— TechDeepWeb