Indian Strategic Studies: 06/11/19

11 June 2019

Consolidating India’s Indian Ocean Strategy

By Vivek Mishra

Altered national interests in the Indian Ocean are rapidly transforming the region into an arena of reoriented strategic disposition for traditional powers like the United States, France, Russia, and the U.K., as well as an area of emerging interests for China, Australia, and Japan. Since the Cold War, India has remained a peninsular witness to this pivotal shift in the region’s importance, but its recent policy reformulations vis-à-vis the Indian Ocean region and the larger Indo-Pacific are signs of growing awareness to the changes underway. However, despite the gains made, challenges remain in this important maritime domain of remerging Asian geopolitics.

The new government in India starts on the back of quite a few gains, which seem to have consolidated its regional maritime strategy in the Indian Ocean region (IOR). Early in his last term, Prime Minister Narendra Modi significantly visited three important Indian Ocean countries, the Seychelles, Mauritius, and Sri Lanka, in 2015. In the following year, he visited Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, and Kenya, four littoral countries of the Indian Ocean. Besides these, in the last five years India has partly undone the damage to relations with its critical IOR neighbor, the Maldives; ties had suffered under the previous pro-China government in Male under Abdulla Yameen. As for strategic steps in the IOR, securing port access in Duqm, Oman for military use; India’s decision to develop its maiden deep-sea port in Indonesia’s Sabang; furthering talks for a possible military base at Assumption Island in the Seychelles; and securing logistics agreements with the U.S., France, and Singapore have been critical decisions for consolidating India’s regional naval presence as well as deterring external power dominance.

The Secret Profits Behind China's Rare Earth Metals Threat

by Peter Krauth, Money Morning

China's latest ploy in the trade war could be to limit its supply of rare earth metals to the United States. But that's an opportunity for investors too.

China has found its tariffs are having limited effects on the United States. The U.S. had $539 billion worth of imports from China in 2018, compared to $120.3 billion in exports to China. That means China can't match American tariffs.

But China has a few more weapons in its arsenal, and it might be desperate enough to use them. That's why we're taking the China rare earths threat so seriously.

Rare earth metals is one sector where the United States is acutely dependent on China. These are 17 elements crucial to the "green economy" including technology, energy, healthcare, transportation, and even national security.

U.S. President Donald Trump's blacklisting of Chinese telecom giant Huawei may have been the final straw. And in an effort to retaliate, China's recent moves read like an obvious warning that the trade of rare earths could become weaponized.

What to Do About China?

J. BRADFORD DELONG

By attempting to "get tough" with China, US President Donald Trump's administration is highlighting the extent to which America's star has fallen this century. If the US ever wants to reclaim the standing it once had in the world, it must become the country it would have been if Al Gore had won the 2000 presidential election.

BERKELEY – In a recent issue of The New York Review of Books, the historian Adam Tooze notes that, “across the American political spectrum, if there is agreement on anything, it is on the need for a firmer line against China.” He’s right: On this singular issue, the war hawks, liberal internationalists, and blame-somebody-else crowd all tend to agree. They have concluded that because the United States needs to protect its relative position on the world stage, China’s standing must be diminished.

But that is the wrong way to approach the challenge. In the near term (1-4 years), the US certainly could inflict a lot of damage on China through tariffs, bans on technology purchases, and other trade-war policies. But it would also inflict a lot of damage on itself; and in the end, the Chinese would suffer less. Whereas the Chinese government can buy up Chinese-made products that previously would have been sold to the US, thereby preventing mass unemployment and social turmoil, the US government could scarcely do the same for American workers displaced by the loss of the Chinese market.1

US Blacklist On Huawei: Leverage For The US-China Trade Talks? – Analysis

By Lyu Mengting and Chia-yi Lee*

The United States added Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. to the US Entity List of threats to the US telecommunications industry. Google and other US companies suspended some businesses with Huawei after the blacklisting. Trump seems to use the blacklisting as leverage in the US-China trade negotiations, which does not bode well for a successful deal.

President DonaldTrump on 15 May 2019 issued an executive order on “securing the information and communications technology and services supply chain”, which declared a “national emergency” regarding “critical national security threat” to information and telecommunications of the US. Following the order, the US Commerce Department listed Huawei, the Chinese telecom giant, and its 68 affiliates on the Entity List, which prohibits the company from buying components and services from US companies without approval by the US government. Google, Intel, Qualcomm, ARM and other companies were reported to follow the order.

The move of the Trump administration is believed to be a direct blow at Huawei. In an apparent tit-for-tat, Beijing asserted its support for the legal rights of Chinese companies and urged Washington to avoid miscalculations that further strain US-China trade relations. China also reportedly drafted a new cybersecurity law that will result in blocking US telecom companies from entering its market—the largest in the world.

Sierra Leone, 2000: A Case History in Successful Interventionism

Janine di Giovanni

There is one place in the world where Tony Blair, the former British prime minister, is not vilified for his part in the 2003 invasion of Iraq: a West African country where, less than three years earlier, his government’s intervention helped to end one of the most vicious conflicts in recent history. In Sierra Leone, where he is a hero, the “Blair Doctrine” was a rare case of an overseas military operation not for strategic or commercial interest, but for humanitarian purposes and in the name of an ethical foreign policy. Blair would later write in his autobiography that the episode was one of his proudest moments in office.

A paradox of this claim is that the scope and success of the intervention depended less on deliberate policy and careful planning in Downing Street or Whitehall than on a daring degree of improvisation by the commanding officer on the ground. “Operation Palliser,” which began in May 2000, was led by General Sir David Richards, then a brigadier, later appointed chief of the British general staff and NATO commander in Afghanistan. Without official sanction from London, Richards protected the capital Freetown from rebel attacks and prevented it from falling. In so doing, he made a remarkable unilateral decision to go beyond his mandate in order to save a civilian population from the overwhelming likelihood of an all-out slaughter. The military historian David Ucko, writing in the Journal of Strategic Studies in 2015, calls Richards’s action “A rare success story, but… a poorly understood and little studied case.”

Is Russia Having Second Thoughts About Integration With China?

By Bruno Maçães

The last few years made possible a significant rapprochement, but the potential for sudden shifts cannot be excluded.

Everything seems in flux at the moment. Will the two countries move even closer together — is an Eastern Alliance possible? — or will China’s rise face new resistance in this area as well — problems it is now facing almost everywhere?

Beijing has been extraordinarily successful in managing Russia, perhaps the most brilliant success of Chinese foreign policy in recent years. But in the recent Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, president Putin poured some cold water on the Eastern Alliance.

He did not do so explicitly, but the main message was that China’s Maritime Silk Road — one of its routes goes through the Arctic, connecting Europe and Asia — would have to link with Russia’s Northern Sea Route.

Now, on paper the Maritime Silk Road would need no such extension as it is already designed to reach Europe in Norway or Greenland or even Finland. So Putin was essentially saying: not so fast.

Erdogan Pushes to Cement His Hold on Turkey

By Sinan Ciddi

The annulment of the March 31 mayoral election in Istanbul and the ordering of a do-over on June 23 raises questions about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his government's willingness to recognize election results that do not produce favorable outcomes.

If the opposition candidate again wins the Istanbul mayoral election, there is a chance that Erdogan and the ruling Justice and Development Party will not recognize the outcome and will appoint a caretaker appointee.

Erdogan and the ruling party seem determined to maintain their hold on Istanbul, which has served as a base of power for the party and offers lucrative financial resources.

Turkey's Supreme Electoral Board (YSK) last month narrowly voted to annul the results of the March 31 mayoral race in Istanbul and schedule a new election. So, on June 23, voters in Turkey's largest city will once again go to the polls to elect their next mayor. Under strong pressure from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's inner circle, the YSK cited unsubstantiated polling irregularities to justify the revote, thus underscoring a point that many Turkey watchers have long cautioned was coming: For the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), some electoral outcomes are only fair and valid if the AKP wins. Just as they did three months ago, the same candidates of the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the AKP are running to be mayor of Istanbul in what is expected to be another highly contentious race.

As Challenges Mount, Can Europe Correct Its Course?

June 07, 2019

The liberal European order that emerged after World War II and spread after the collapse of the Soviet Union is now under attack from both within and without. The European Union—the ultimate expression of the European project—has become a convenient punching bag for opportunistic politicians in many of its member countries, as anti-EU sentiment has become part of the broader populist platform of protectionism and opposition to immigration. The EU still managed to withstand its latest challenge when the gains made by populist parties in recent European Parliamentary elections fell short of expectations.

Nevertheless, Britain’s withdrawal from the union, known as Brexit, continues to loom over the grouping, and there is no way of knowing whether the populist wave has crested. Illiberal governments hold power in Hungary and Poland, and a far-right party was part of a coalition government in Austria until its recent collapse. Centrist leaders seem unable to come up with a response to immigration that doesn’t alienate more voters than it unites.

Even as leaders like French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel try to fend off challenges from right-wing opposition parties at home, they are also seeking to salvage major international initiatives, including the Paris climate agreement, as the United States under President Donald Trump questions its global role.

RUSSIA/CHINA JOINT STATEMENT ON STRENGTHENING GLOBAL STRATEGIC STABILITY

The Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China, based on the relations of a comprehensive equal trust partnership and strategic interaction between the two states, recognizing their responsibility for ensuring international security and on the basis of the importance of maintaining global and regional strategic stability, state the following.

The parties recognize that at the moment international security is facing serious challenges, in connection with which the Parties intend to deepen mutual trust and strengthen cooperation in the strategic sphere, to insistently protect global and regional strategic stability.

The parties intend to continue to act in the spirit of the Joint Statement of the President of the Russian Federation and the President of the People’s Republic of China signed on June 25, 2016 in Beijing to strengthen global strategic stability and confirm the significance of the principles set forth in it.

Russia and China note with alarm the extremely dangerous actions of individual states, which, on the basis of their own geopolitical and even commercial gain, destroy or alter the existing architecture of arms control and non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). In the pursuit of a strategic advantage in the military sphere, in the intention to ensure “absolute security” and in order to gain unlimited opportunities for military-political pressure on opponents of such states, mechanisms working to maintain stability are unceremoniously destroyed.

World Economic Leaders Warn of Fallout From Trade War Between U.S. and China

By Alan Rappeport

FUKUOKA, Japan — Global finance leaders meeting in Japan this weekend said they were increasingly worried that the trade dispute between the United States and China, which shows no signs of abating, could propel the world economy into a crisis.

The sense of gloom at the gathering of the Group of 20 major economies came amid increasing evidence that global economic growth is slowing amid President Trump’s renewed trade war with Beijing. In a closing statement, or communiqué, officials at the G-20 warned that trade tensions have “intensified” and agreed to address the risks.

But the Trump administration, intent on rewriting the rules of international commerce in America’s favor, gave no sign that it was ready to back down. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin continued to blame China for prolonging the fight and insisted that the trade dispute was not hurting America’s economy or hampering global growth.

“I don’t think in any way that the slowdowns you’re seeing in parts of the world are a result of trade tensions at the moment,” Mr. Mnuchin told reporters on the sidelines of the G-20.

Will There Be Winners in the U.S.-China Trade War?

Andrew Chatzky

With tariffs slowing U.S. trade with China, several countries are hoping their exports will become more affordable and that their economies will reap the rewards.

With recent talks running aground, the trade dispute between the United States and China looks like it’s here to stay. While most experts agree that both sides lose in a trade war, some note that resulting changes to supply chains and investment patterns could set some other countries up to be potential winners.

What’s at stake?

U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports—and China’s retaliatory tariffs on American goods—have already cut bilateral trade. Economists think the spat could eventually reduce global gross domestic product (GDP) by hundreds of billions of dollars.

That’s because the United States buys more goods from China than from any other country, importing $540 billion worth in 2018. American businesses and families benefit from low-priced goods, ranging from industrial machinery to consumer goods such as electronics, furniture, clothing, and toys.

Meanwhile, U.S. exporters send more than $120 billion worth of goods to China’s enormous market each year. The U.S. automotive, aerospace, and agricultural industries in particular have benefited from China’s economic expansion over the past few decades, and the U.S. government calculates that exports to China support more than nine hundred thousand jobs.

Is anyone benefiting from the dispute?

Resolving the US–China Trade Impasse

YUKON HUANG

Summary: The new round of tariffs has put U.S.-China trade negotiations on hold. Just a month ago, a deal to end the trade war was deemed likely. So why did this process unravel so quickly and what is the way going forward?

Just a month ago, an agreement to end the US–China trade war was deemed likely. Then came a flurry of accusations and another round of tariffs that have put negotiations on hold. Why did this process unravel so quickly and what might be the endgame?

Beijing ostensibly recoiled after senior leadership saw the entire package of demands as an infringement on national sovereignty. Meanwhile, Washington became more unified in its objectives and sensed that politically it was not the right time to strike a deal. Under such conditions, many saw an enduring solution as unlikely given the complexity of the issues. Any agreement would have been more of a negotiated truce, transforming the process from an unruly to a more regulated trade war.

Huawei Chairman Willing To Sign A 'No-Spy' Deal With The United States

PALLAVI GOGOI

Huawei Chairman Liang Hua, shown in 2018, said Tuesday that Huawei is willing to sign a "no-spy agreement" to reassure U.S. leaders who worry the company's technology could be used for surveillance.VCG via Getty Images

A top Huawei executive said Tuesday that the company is willing to sign a "no-spy agreement" with the United States to reassure U.S. leaders who say the company's technology could be used for surveillance.

The offer is similar to proposals the Chinese tech giant has made to the United Kingdom and Germany, and it comes after weeks of intense pressure from the Trump administration.

"We are willing to sign no-spy agreements with countries," said Huawei Chairman Liang Hua at the company's headquarters in Shenzhen, China, when asked specifically if Huawei would sign a "no-spy" agreement with the U.S. "But since the U.S. has not bought from us, is not buying from us, and might not buy from us in the future, I don't know if there is such an opportunity to sign such an agreement."

Liang made the comments while speaking with a small group of U.S. journalists who were visiting with the China-United States Exchange Foundation.

The Ever-Shifting 'Strategic Triangle' Between Russia, China and the U.S.

By Eugene Chausovsky

Russia and China are on a trajectory to increase ties across the economic, energy and security realms, but this path is by no means set.

The evolving relationship between Russia and China will inherently be shaped by each country's links to — and contention with — the United States as part of a "strategic triangle" of relations.

As China rises in terms of its relative economic and military power, Russia and the United States could eventually seek a strategic rapprochement to constrain Beijing's ascension.

However, any alignment between the United States and Russia would be limited to specific shared interests and could ultimately shift again with prevailing geopolitical conditions.

The U.S. trade war with China and Washington's prolonged standoff with Russia — over matters from Iran to Venezuela to arms control — are increasingly driving Moscow and Beijing toward each other. Chinese President Xi Jinping is attending the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum June 6-7, but not before meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow earlier in the week. China and Russia have signed economic deals that span everything from 5G networks to hydropower plant construction to establishing a joint research and technology innovation fund. The deals come in the wake of Moscow's recently indicated desire to collaborate with China in the Arctic's Northern Sea Route as part of Beijing's Maritime Silk Road initiative, while the massive Power of Siberia pipeline is completing the final phase of construction and is set to begin pumping ever-larger volumes of Russian natural gas to China by the end of this year.

In Poland, a Fixed U.S. Presence Will Warrant a Russian Response

The United States will likely move forward with plans to expand its military presence in Poland in the coming quarter, which could include more than 1,000 new troops and the permanent stationing of forces in the country.

While Washington's presence may not come in the form of Warsaw's proposed "Fort Trump," it will nonetheless establish a more fixed measure of U.S. security support for Poland as an added layer of defense against Russia.

Moscow will likely respond to such an agreement with military buildups of its own near Poland's borders, most likely by boosting defense assets in Belarus.

Editor's Note: This assessment is part of a series of analyses supporting Stratfor's upcoming 2019 Third-Quarter Forecast. These assessments are designed to provide more context and in-depth analysis of key developments over the next quarter.

Poland has long courted the United States for a permanent military presence to serve as a barricade against Russian influence. Despite Poland's pleas, however, Washington has stuck with a more flexible defense approach in the country. But that may soon change now that U.S. President Donald Trump's at the helm. For more than a year, the United States and Poland have been in talks over such an agreement, which Polish officials have indicated could be finalized by as soon as Sept. 1. However, such a fixed U.S. presence near Russia will undoubtedly spur Moscow to ramp up its own military presence near Poland's borders — placing Warsaw squarely in the middle of Moscow and Washington's increasingly heated great power competition.

How the US government can counter China's growing media influence

The Chinese state media advertorial supplement “China Watch” runs regularly in major U.S. newspapers, and a 2018 supplement in the Des Moines Register took a particularly politicized tone on the U.S.-China trade war.

Chinese Americans have seen posts on Chinese firm Tencent’s WeChat social media platform silenced in group conversations, including when the messages touched on local Asian American political issues.

And Chinese state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) dominates the Chinese-language cable landscape in the United States, relative to the Taiwanese station ETTV and the US-based NTDTV, despite the latter’s online popularity and reports of behind-the-scenes Chinese pressure on U.S. cable companies to keep it off the air.

These are a few examples of the ways in which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is affecting news that Americans consume and share in the United States, noted a Freedom House report released this week on the implications for democracy of China’s global media influence.

Rare Earth Elements: Global Reserves and Production

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With China's recent threat to ban exports of rare earth elements to the United States, it may be time to find an alternative.

Blacklisted Huawei Loses Facebook, Instagram And WhatsApp Preinstalled Apps

Zak Doffman

The impact of the U.S. blacklisting on Huawei's smartphone business continues to increase. Facebook is the latest major U.S. technology player to withdraw support for Huawei smartphones. Reuters was the first to report on June 7 that "Facebook is no longer allowing preinstallation of its apps on Huawei phones... Customers who already have Huawei phones will still be able to use its apps and receive updates, Facebook told Reuters. But new Huawei phones will no longer be able to have Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram apps preinstalled."

A week ago, there were reports that Huawei had shut down a number of Foxconn smartphone production lines as demand for the company's devices dropped. The company flatly denied that those reports were true. But then this week came a second report from Asia, this time claiming that Huawei had slashed its smartphone shipment forecast for the second half of 2019 by as much as 20-30%.

Huawei held onto its lead over Apple for smartphone sales in the first quarter of the year, but will likely struggle to maintain that lead for the rest of the year. SCMP's article quoted Zhao Ming, president of one of Huawei’s brands, acknowledging that the company objective of catching Samsung by the end of next year was at risk. "As the new situation has emerged," he reportedly said, "it is too early to say whether we are able to achieve the goal."

Cyber Diplomacy: The Spirit Of D-Day Can Unite Us

Sam Curry

President Trump has been on tour in Europe this week for D-Day events on the 75th Anniversary of the allied invasion with visits in the UK, Ireland and France. Noticeably absent from the talk track as world leaders gather is the entire subject of cybersecurity. This is remarkable because of the emphasis and slow ramp of attention from the administration on cyber in recent months.

Perhaps the solemnity of the D-Day anniversary events made it hard to talk business, but the opportunity exists now to make a difference. But in the shadow of the 75th anniversary of the largest conflict in Human history, wouldn’t it make sense to talk about the new cyber battlefield and how erstwhile allies and former enemies that have since maintained alignment or built new coalitions can continue to promote global prosperity?

Britain might have a reprieve until October on Brexit, but there’s clearly a cyber dimension brewing and maybe staring down across the channel. Further, cyber relations between the US and Europe and amongst European nations shouldn’t be a back burner discussion; it should be front and center if we’re to avoid an escalation of tension and issues in the future.

Using Public-private Partnerships to Tackle Extreme Poverty

Nena Stoiljkovic, vice president for Asia and Pacific at the World Bank’s IFC, and Djordjija Petkoski, senior fellow at the Zicklin Center and lecturer at the Wharton legal studies and business ethics department, discuss how solid business models that can attract private investment to blend with public funds are the best driver for spreading sustainable growth in underdeveloped regions.

Attracting private capital is a critical complement to government financing if the 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development that the United Nations identified are to be met. For that to happen, it is important to redefine how corporations can work sustainable development into their strategies, say experts from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Wharton’s Zicklin Center for Business Ethics. The IFC is an arm of the World Bank Group that helps leverage private capital for development efforts, such as in “ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity.” The Zicklin Center and the World Bank Group are partners in Ideas for Action, a joint program to connect young leaders with sustainable development goals. Nena Stoiljkovic, IFC’s vice president for Asia and Pacific, and Djordjija Petkoski, senior fellow at the Zicklin Center and a lecturer in Wharton’s legal studies and business ethics department, spoke recently with Knowledge@Wharton about how public-private partnerships can help reduce poverty, especially in the Asia Pacific region. (Listen to the podcast at the top of this page.) Below is an edited version of their discussion.

Don’t let cybersecurity be driven by fear, warns NCSC chief

By Danny Palmer

As cyberattacks and hacking incidents increase in frequency and scope, it's important that organisations and governments don't revert to a fear-based approach to cybersecurity: it won't help users and it doesn't help to prevent attacks.

Today's security threats have expanded in scope and seriousness. There can now be millions -- or even billions -- of dollars at risk when information security isn't handled properly.

Reflecting on how cybersecurity guidance has changed since the UK's National Cyber Security Centre started operating in 2016, NCSC chief executive Ciaran Martin said the cyber-arm of GCHQ began as if its job was scaring people into staying safe online. But now the approach is based around promoting a deeper understanding of threats, he said.

"Four years ago, as GCHQ and government, we were still reluctantly in the role of the 'Monsters Inc' Top Scarcer. We still had to convince people about the threat and that it was all very scary and so forth," said Martin, comparing the government's approach to cybersecurity to that of the Pixar movie during a keynote address at Infosecurity Europe 2019 in London.

States Must Explain When a Cyber Attack Might Draw a Violent Reprisal

BY JONATHAN REIBERHEAD OF CYBERSECURITY STRATEGY, ILLUMIO

Without clear explanations that affirm rules of the road, countries make it easier for conflicts to spiral out of control.

When conducting a kinetic military response to a cyberattack, it’s better to explain why and how you are doing so.

A month ago, the Israeli Defense Forces, or IDF, responded to a Hamas cyberattack with an online counter-attack against the hackers followed by an airstrike that destroyed their building in Gaza. It remains unclear whether any Hamas cyberspace operators died in the operation.

This was the first time that a military has conducted a kinetic operation directly in response to a cyberattack in real time. It occurred in the context of decades-long hostilities between Israel and Hamas, and amid the worst fighting between the parties since 2014.

Pentagon Chief to Suspend Turkey’s F-35 Pilot Training

BY LARA SELIGMAN

Acting U.S. Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan is taking significant steps toward cutting Turkey out of the F-35 fighter jet program over concerns about Ankara’s plans to purchase a Russian missile system, telling his Turkish counterpart that pilots currently training in the United States must leave the country by July 31 and halting training for new students.

Turkey can still change its mind on purchasing the S-400 missile system, which is expected to arrive on Turkish soil as soon as this month, and the steps regarding F-35 training will be reversed, a senior U.S. defense official told Foreign Policy.

The United States has already halted delivery of F-35 materials and related equipment to Turkey. Without the training provided by the U.S. military, future Turkish F-35 pilots will not be able to operate the jet, which will provide the bulk of tactical airpower for the United States and many of its allied militaries for decades to come.

Freedom and the Media: A Downward Spiral

By Sarah Repucci

Freedom of the media has been deteriorating around the world over the past decade.

In some of the most influential democracies in the world, populist leaders have overseen concerted attempts to throttle the independence of the media sector.

While the threats to global media freedom are real and concerning in their own right, their impact on the state of democracy is what makes them truly dangerous.

Experience has shown, however, that press freedom can rebound from even lengthy stints of repression when given the opportunity. The basic desire for democratic liberties, including access to honest and fact-based journalism, can never be extinguished.

Unconventional Warfare: Think Outside the G-Base

George Schwartz

The Green Berets are in danger of self-inflicted irrelevancy because of shortcomings in their training. Most current Unconventional Warfare (UW) training events take the Unconventional Warfare template from Robin Sage and simply impose it on other environments and threat situations. This trend has persisted despite the lack of modern UW examples that resemble Robin Sage. Green Berets should be considering other models of UW that may be more relevant today.

Special Forces doctrine depicts resistance partner forces as having three elements: a rural-based full-time paramilitary guerrilla force, an urban-based underground, and an auxiliary that serves as the link between the two. The ODA partners with the guerrilla force and teaches them US-style small unit tactics. That is what every Green Beret did in Robin Sage. It is the common understanding of UW shared by all SF Soldiers. Virtually every UW exercise I have taken part in (Cobra Gold, Foal Eagle, Jade Helm, home station UW mission profiles) mirrors this model. That is what I mean by the “Robin Sage” model.

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