A More Balanced U.S.-India Strategic Partnership

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Despite turbulent politics in both nations and a festering trade dispute, the defense and foreign ministers of the United States and India came together in Washington, D.C. on December 18 and took new steps to secure a long-term security partnership. Notably, the list of agreements in the 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue highlight an increased focus on cooperation in the Indian Ocean—an increasingly contested maritime domain. The two sides also discussed important agreements that go beyond security cooperation, expanding the promise of the new summit format.

This week’s dialogue was the second minister-level meeting in the new 2+2 format. Last year’s summit, held in New Delhi, set a high bar. The two nations finalized the Communication Interoperability and Security Memorandum Agreement (COMCASA), a military technology sharing pact. They also announced a new tri-service exercise and agreed India would get increased access to U.S. Central Command—providing more balance to the “Indo-Pacific” partnership.

What ‘The Afghanistan Papers’ Got Wrong

Scott Smith
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The problem was not that U.S. officials lied to the public—it’s that for so long many believed that the war was winnable.

The Washington Post last week published a series, “The Afghanistan Papers,” that made the case that U.S. officials consistently lied about the prospects for success in Afghanistan and deliberately misled the public. As someone with an intimate knowledge of the effort described in the reporting, there is a recurring line I find particularly problematic: that officials hid “unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.” That was not the problem. The problem was that for so long many officials believed that the war was winnable.

I have been working on Afghanistan since before the war even started, in different capacities for different organizations since the mid-1990s. I have been involved enough to know almost everyone cited in the papers and have been interviewed for more than one of the SIGAR reports that are the basis of the Post’s expose.

What We Already Knew

The Afghanistan Papers give Trump what he needs to bring the troops home

By Zachary Yost
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When the Afghanistan Papers were released last week by The Washington Post, we finally got definitive proof of what many of us have known for years: The foreign policy establishment is lying. For nearly two decades, we’ve been told victory in the Afghan war is nigh, but they’ve merely thrown away countless lives and taxpayer dollars in a fruitless forever war. 

To his credit, President Trump recognized this reality back in 2012, taking to Twitter (as he’s wont to do) to complain. “Afghanistan is a total disaster. We don’t know what we are doing. They are, in addition to everything else, robbing us blind,” Mr. Trump wrote. Since he took office, he’s continued with that same line.

Of course, even though it seems that he wants to, he hasn’t ended the war.

I Helped Write the Afghanistan Papers. What They Reveal Shouldn’t Be a Surprise

Candace Rondeaux 

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If there is one big takeaway from The Washington Post’s publication of thousands of pages of documents detailing the extent of policy failures in Afghanistan, it is the great lengths that it takes to wake the American public up to the costs of pursuing a war without a strategy. As The Post’s examination of interviews produced as part of a wide-ranging and years-long review of U.S. policy by the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, known as SIGAR, clearly shows, few officials charged with leading the war effort were willing to openly admit that most of what passed for strategy was purely ad hoc. I should know—I was one of the lead analysts and interviewers who led the “Lessons Learned” inquiry into U.S. strategy for SIGAR.

Since the publication of the Afghanistan Papers, veterans of America’s longest war have pointed out that the shortcomings of U.S. policy were well known to anyone who had ever done a tour of duty in Afghanistan. Those failures were advertised by members of the U.S. government in congressional testimony and by U.S. military officials themselves. They were also meticulously documented in the myriad audits produced by both SIGAR and the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

Why Both Russia And America Failed In Afghanistan

by Lyle J. Goldstein
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During the early days after the 9/11 attacks and the initiation of the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan, it was relatively common to reference the woeful Soviet experience in that country. Here was a clear paradigm of what not to do in order to avoid getting stuck in a quagmire. Surely, American leaders would be more adroit. By employing advanced U.S. technology along with a more sensitive effort to win “hearts and minds,” the Taliban—what was left of it—would be quickly vanquished.

So much for that theory.

But it might be worth exploring yet again some historical aspects of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, 1979–1989, in order to shed some light, not only on the present predicament of the American war in Afghanistan, now lamentably in its sixteenth year, but perhaps also to gain some insights into contemporary Russian foreign policy and society too. A detailed appraisal covering the military aspects of the Soviet war appeared in the mid-April 2018 issue of the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta to commemorate the thirtieth anniversary of the agreement on 14 April 1988 to withdraw all Soviet forces from Afghanistan. The writer of this interesting piece is the rather conservative but quite independent-minded Russian defense analyst Alexander Chramshikin. The piece appears under the headline “The Afghan Lesson for Russia: A Collision with Islamic Extremists Was Inevitable [Афганский урок для России: Столкновение с исламским экстремизмом было неизбежно].”

Trump shakedowns are threatening two key U.S. alliances in Asia

Bruce Klingner, Jung H. Pak, and Sue Mi Terry

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For decades, President Trump has derided America’s allies as “free-riders” who don’t pull their own weight. That is an inaccurate depiction of the large contributions provided to the U.S. by South Korea and Japan over the decades, argue Bruce Klingner, Jung Pak, and Sue Mi Terry. This piece originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.

The U.S. is moving toward a rupture with two important allies, South Korea and Japan. Already, President Trump has reportedly demanded a five-fold increase in the amount South Korea pays toward the cost of stationing U.S. forces there, raising the amount to $5 billion a year. Reports suggest that Washington is likely to seek a similar increase from Tokyo to support the cost of U.S. troops based there in next year’s negotiations.

For decades, Trump has derided America’s allies as “free-riders” who don’t pull their own weight. That is an inaccurate depiction of the large contributions provided to the U.S. by South Korea and Japan over the decades.

South Korea spends 2.6% of its gross domestic product on defense; that’s more than any of our European allies. By 2022, South Korea will be among the world’s top five or six highest spenders on defense. Seoul paid 92% of the $11-billion cost for building Camp Humphreys, the largest U.S. base on foreign soil, and over the last four years, South Korea has purchased $13 billion in arms from the United States.

China consumer report 2020: The many faces of the Chinese consumer

By Johnny Ho, Felix Poh, Jia Zhou, and Daniel Zipser
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Five trends emerged in the latest research from our Chinese Consumer Survey, offering insight into what over 5,000 consumers in the region think about spending, brands, health, and more.

China’s slowing GDP and the trade dispute with the United States have injected a cloud of uncertainty into the Chinese economy. Some observers have predicted that these developments will spell bad news for Chinese consumption, which has thus far been a powerhouse for economic growth.

Our research shows that they may not need to worry too much.

Although traditional drivers of China’s economy—investment, exports, and manufacturing—are struggling, the country’s consumers remain confident. After dipping in the second half of 2018, the Consumer Confidence Index hit a ten-year high earlier this year (Exhibit 1).

Exhibit 1

How is China advancing its space launch capabilities?

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Conducting activities in space embodies the pinnacle of technological achievement. While space technologies like communications satellites and navigation systems underpin much of modern life, only a handful of countries have the capability to indigenously launch payloads into space. China sits among this elite group of spacefaring nations. Closing the technology gap with more-advanced space powers will, however, require China to make significant headway.

China’s Growing Presence in Space

The successful launch of Sputnik 1 by the Soviet Union in October 1957 ushered in a new era where countries around the world raced to develop and launch their own satellites. The US launched Explorer 1 in January 1958. France and Japan delivered their own satellites into orbit in the following years. With the launch of Dong Fang Hong 1 (East Is Red 1) in April 1970, China became the fifth country to indigenously launch a satellite into orbit.

Throughout the Cold War, activity in space was dominated by the US and the Soviet Union. Between 1957 and 1991, Soviet rockets completed an impressive 2,309 successful launches.1 This was more than double the 938 launches by the US. For its part, China launched only 28 rockets over the same period; all other countries completed a combined 225 launches.

Exclusive: U.S. probe of Saudi oil attack shows it came from north - report

Humeyra Pamuk

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States said new evidence and analysis of weapons debris recovered from an attack on Saudi oil facilities on Sept. 14 indicates the strike likely came from the north, reinforcing its earlier assessment that Iran was behind the offensive.

In an interim report of its investigation - seen by Reuters ahead of a presentation on Thursday to the United Nations Security Council - Washington assessed that before hitting its targets, one of the drones traversed a location approximately 200 km (124 miles) to the northwest of the attack site.

“This, in combination with the assessed 900 kilometer maximum range of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), indicates with high likelihood that the attack originated north of Abqaiq,” the interim report said, referring to the location of one of the Saudi oil facilities that were hit.

It added the United States had identified several similarities between the drones used in the raid and an Iranian designed and produced unmanned aircraft known as the IRN-05 UAV.

However, the report noted that the analysis of the weapons debris did not definitely reveal the origin of the strike that initially knocked out half of Saudi Arabia’s oil production.

Who Exactly Is Turkey Resettling in Syria?

BY TESSA FOX
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NORTHEAST SYRIA—Just two months after the launch of Turkey’s most recent incursion into Syria, dubbed Operation Peace Spring, civilians’ return to areas now occupied by Turkish forces has already begun.

Turkey launched its long-anticipated operation in October in order to clear the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) from the border region of Syria and Turkey and create a so-called safe zone to settle millions of Syrian refugees who fled to Turkey over the course of the Syrian war. The Turkish government deems the YPG a terrorist organization and an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, which has waged a decadeslong and deadly campaign for Kurdish autonomy inside Turkey.

According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), more than 75,000 people still remain displaced from areas in northeast Syria and are now sheltering in relatives’ homes and camps for internally displaced people after fleeing the Turkish operation. More than 17,000 people have crossed the border to Iraqi Kurdistan to seek safety, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

Starting With “Why”: The National Security Strategy and America’s National Interests

Theresa Cross, Aaron Bazin and Montgomery Erfourth

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Introduction 

In many ways, national interests are the DNA of strategy and the underlying structure upon which every nation bases its strategic thinking. To understand America’s current actions on the international stage requires a look deeper than the partisan-inspired rhetoric in the headlines. One way to approach this is to elevate the discussion beyond threats and adversaries to an analysis of national interests. Interests drive political decision-making and help us understand U.S. foreign policy. They describe the “why,” reveal the underlying logic, and provide the standards of measurement upon which to base decisions.[1]

Strategic thinkers with military backgrounds often tend to fixate on threats. Without question, at the tactical and operational level, threats provide a valuable lens. However, when facing strategic-level complex adaptive problems, such as great power competition and trans-regional violent extremism, a focus solely on threats could quickly lead to miscalculation and loss of focus. If this occurs, the U.S. could find itself trying to chasing competitors everywhere, thereby remaining reactive instead of proactive, hence, strategically adrift. 

Beyond this, discussion of interests is valuable because it helps strategic thinkers approach problems with a more open mind. Fundamentally, if strategic thinkers focus on interests it helps move beyond one-dimensional discussions on positions. Positions change, interests are less dynamic and remain more stable over time. Where positions are solutions, interests reveal the concerns, desires, and motives that underpin those positions.[2]

A NATO Urban Delaying Strategy for the Baltic States

Gary Anderson
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Eastern Europe was once the bulwark of the old Soviet Union but is has become NATO’s first line of defense against a resurgent Russia. The NATO alliance now faces the same problem that French-British coalition faced at the dawn of World War II. Great Britain and France had assured Poland that they would come to its aid in the event that it was attacked, but when the Germans crossed the Polish border in 1939, there was no way that the allies could move quickly enough to assist their eastern partner. A 2016 Rand Corporation war game showed that -while the situation is better today- it will be hard to quickly reinforce Eastern Europe in time to prevent the Russians from overrunning the Baltic States.

The game would tend to vindicate critics who believe that NATO’s eastern expansion was ill-advised, but that is now water under the bridge. US military planners have been trying to come up with non-traditional ways to deter the Russians from adventurism in the Poland and the Baltics for several years. One of their schemes has been to turn the Russian use of hybrid warfare against them in the form of non-uniformed and uniformed partisans in the event of a Russian invasion.

The Post-American Middle East

RICHARD N. HAASS
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NEW YORK – It was August 5, 1990, just days after Saddam Hussein’s Iraq had invaded and conquered all of Kuwait, and US President George H.W. Bush could not have been clearer as he spoke from the South Lawn at the White House: “This will not stand, this aggression against Kuwait.” Over the next six months, Bush proved to be a man of his word, as the United States sent a half-million soldiers to the Middle East and led an international coalition that liberated Kuwait.

If artificial intelligence and other labor-saving technologies come anywhere close to fulfilling the promises of today's techno-utopians and pessimists, we will have to rethink our most basic assumptions about human nature and the good life. We should welcome the challenge as an unprecedented opportunity.7Add to Bookmarks

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Three decades later, a very different American president embraced a very different US policy. In the wake of abandoning its Kurdish partners in Syria who had fought valiantly in defeating Islamic State (ISIS) terrorists, the US stood by as Iranian drones and missiles attacked Saudi Arabian oil installations, temporarily taking half of its capacity offline.

Northern Ireland wants to be heard on Brexit

By ANNABELLE DICKSON

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With Brexit all but certain to happen following the Conservatives' convincing election win — killing any hopes in the Remain-voting corner of the U.K. that Brexit might be canceled — businesses and politicians are turning their attention to what it will mean in practice.

The Brexit deal struck between the European Union and U.K. in October is far from "oven-ready," as Johnson repeatedly claimed on the campaign trail, and the decisions made in the months ahead could have huge economic and political consequences for the region.

Businesses say they have had minimal engagement with London about Johnson's Brexit blueprint, and the U.K. government remains tightlipped about its progress in setting up the joint committee with the EU that is mandated by the Withdrawal Agreement. That body will have the crucial job of thrashing out what the day-to-day reality of Brexit will look like on the ground.

Economic Possibilities for Ourselves

ROBERT SKIDELSKY

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LONDON – The most depressing feature of the current explosion in robot-apocalypse literature is that it rarely transcends the world of work. Almost every day, news articles appear detailing some new round of layoffs. In the broader debate, there are apparently only two camps: those who believe that automation will usher in a world of enriched jobs for all, and those who fear it will make most of the workforce redundant.

This bifurcation reflects the fact that “working for a living” has been the main occupation of humankind throughout history. The thought of a cessation of work fills people with dread, for which the only antidote seems to be the promise of better work. Few have been willing to take the cheerful view of Bertrand Russell’s provocative 1932 essay In Praise of Idleness. Why is it so difficult for people to accept that the end of necessary labor could mean barely imaginable opportunities to live, in John Maynard Keynes’s words, “wisely, agreeably, and well”?

The fear of labor-saving technology dates back to the start of the Industrial Revolution, but two factors in our own time have heightened it. The first is that the new generation of machines seems poised to replace not only human muscles but also human brains. Owing to advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence, we are said to be entering an era of thinking robots; and those robots will soon be able to think even better than we do. The worry is that teaching machines to perform most of the tasks previously carried out by humans will make most human labor redundant. In that scenario, what will humans do?

There are fewer wars when you take power away from men in big castles

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Those who have power want to be told they have it and how to keep it. Those that don't have power want someone to envy. As a result, the audience for books on power is seemingly endless.

So I was initially cautious about another one released this week – but New Power by Jeremy Heimans and Henry Timms turns out to be a nifty guide to the 21st century that is genuinely new. Instead of one more catchy way of describing how the world works, they have written a manifesto for organising that world with more humanity and purpose.

Ultimately you'll either hate it or wish you had written it, depending on whether you believe in old or new power.

But what does that actually mean? For Heimans and Timms, old power is closed, inaccessible, top down and spent carefully. Think of a traditional currency. Old power values are more formal and managerial. Old power thrives on competition, confidentiality and exclusivity. You can picture the colleague. Donald Trump's "I alone can fix this" is the motto of this power model. It has dominated history.

The Illusion of a Rules-Based Global Order

BRAHMA CHELLANEY

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BANGKOK – When the Cold War ended, many pundits anticipated a new era in which geo-economics would determine geopolitics. As economic integration progressed, they predicted, the rules-based order would take root globally. Countries would comply with international law or incur high costs.

If artificial intelligence and other labor-saving technologies come anywhere close to fulfilling the promises of today's techno-utopians and pessimists, we will have to rethink our most basic assumptions about human nature and the good life. We should welcome the challenge as an unprecedented opportunity.7Add to Bookmarks

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Today, such optimism looks more than a little naive. Even as the international legal system has ostensibly grown increasingly robust – underpinned, for example, by United Nations conventions, global accords like the 2015 Paris climate agreement, and the International Criminal Court – the rule of force has continued to trump the rule of law. Perhaps no country has taken more advantage of this state of affairs than China.

Empty Gestures on Climate Change

BJØRN LOMBORG

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MALMÖ – Switch to energy-efficient light bulbs, wash your clothes in cold water, eat less meat, recycle more, and buy an electric car: we are being bombarded with instructions from climate campaigners, environmentalists, and the media about the everyday steps we all must take to tackle climate change. Unfortunately, these appeals trivialize the challenge of global warming, and divert our attention from the huge technological and policy changes that are needed to combat it.

If artificial intelligence and other labor-saving technologies come anywhere close to fulfilling the promises of today's techno-utopians and pessimists, we will have to rethink our most basic assumptions about human nature and the good life. We should welcome the challenge as an unprecedented opportunity.7Add to Bookmarks

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For example, the British nature-documentary presenter and environmental campaigner David Attenborough was once asked what he as an individual would do to fight climate change. He promised to unplug his phone charger when it was not in use.

2020 Foresight: What’s Ahead in Global Economics

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As one eventful year ends and another looms, we highlight five issues in international economic affairs that the Simon Chair will be tracking in 2020. As we did at the start of this year, we discuss both the “known knowns” about these issues and the “known unknowns”—that is, the questions we have today that will only be answered as the year unfolds.

Trade: The final months of 2019 saw a flurry of international activity in trade policy. Two major regional trade agreements were concluded: the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) among 15 Asian economies. The United States reached “phase-one” trade deals with the world’s second- and third-largest economies, China and Japan. At least temporarily, these developments brought a welcome reduction of uncertainty to the global economy.

But there is plenty of room for trade surprises in 2020. One big question is how long the mini-deal with China will hold in the face of criticism that it leaves most of the deeper differences between Washington and Beijing unresolved. Moreover, while details remain sketchy, the enforcement mechanism appears to depend on sustained uncertainty, with the United States able to “unilaterally, basically, retaliate if the Chinese violate the agreement,” according to White House trade adviser Peter Navarro. Meanwhile, the World Trade Organization (WTO) faces an existential crisis after its appellate body lost a quorum this month due to U.S. refusal to approve new members; this will roil the global trading system ahead of the biennial meeting of trade ministers in Kazakhstan in June.

Russia Is Waging Asymmetric Warfare Against the US — And We’re Letting Them Win

BY SARAH CHAYES

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Not too long ago, I watched the Taliban lose major offensives in Afghanistan and yet infiltrate the same zones afterwards, gaining strategic ground. Now I am watching Moscow do the same, inside the American homeland, and the national security establishment is hardly reacting. It is time for us to counter this threat with appropriate force. That means mounting a public campaign to harden targets throughout our economy, including hedge funds and their investments, educational institutions, and the public at large. And it means publicly demanding the impeachment and removal from office of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s apologist in chief, President Donald Trump.

The penetration we’re witnessing could never have been achieved during the Cold War. But Russia’s approach and our meek response call to mind Afghanistan, where I witnessed asymmetric warfare close up for the better part of a decade. In 2007, after the death of a fierce local opponent, Taliban moved in on Arghandab District, just north of their former capital and my home, Kandahar. They overran it, literally dancing on the roof of their late foe’s house.

The Asian Development Bank: A Strategic Asset for the United States

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The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is the most important development institution in the Asia-Pacific region, addressing regional development problems using financing in the form of grants, loans, and advisory services.1 The ADB is one of two Asian regional development banks, the other being the Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Both banks occupy the same space, have cofinanced numerous projects, and are subject to the economic volatility of the U.S.-Chinese trade war.

Since the ADB’s establishment in December 1966, the Asia-Pacific region has enjoyed one of the most extensive and durable economic expansions of any region or continent in the world. The region’s global share of GDP (based on purchasing power parity) skyrocketed from 10 percent in the 1950s to approximately 50 percent in 2019.

At the time of the ADB’s inception, Asia had a lower per capita GDP than Africa or South America. The 1960s was a crucial period of growth for Asia, known as the “Asian Miracle,” and marked the start of Japan’s high growth. Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan—known as the Four Asian Tigers—underwent sustained industrialization from the 1960s to 1990s. Policy reforms during the 1990s also led to the emergence of two of today’s largest economies—China and India. The overall economic outlook for the Asia-Pacific region continues to look strong for the next fiscal year (FY 2020). Emerging economies in Vietnam and the Philippines have predicted growth rates above 6 percent and are set to overtake the economies of Belgium and Switzerland by 2023.

Starting With “Why”: The National Security Strategy and America’s National Interests

Theresa Cross, Aaron Bazin and Montgomery Erfourth
Source Link

Introduction 

In many ways, national interests are the DNA of strategy and the underlying structure upon which every nation bases its strategic thinking. To understand America’s current actions on the international stage requires a look deeper than the partisan-inspired rhetoric in the headlines. One way to approach this is to elevate the discussion beyond threats and adversaries to an analysis of national interests. Interests drive political decision-making and help us understand U.S. foreign policy. They describe the “why,” reveal the underlying logic, and provide the standards of measurement upon which to base decisions.[1]

Strategic thinkers with military backgrounds often tend to fixate on threats. Without question, at the tactical and operational level, threats provide a valuable lens. However, when facing strategic-level complex adaptive problems, such as great power competition and trans-regional violent extremism, a focus solely on threats could quickly lead to miscalculation and loss of focus. If this occurs, the U.S. could find itself trying to chasing competitors everywhere, thereby remaining reactive instead of proactive, hence, strategically adrift. 

Why U.N. Climate Talks in Madrid Were a Massive Failure

Sagatom Saha 

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The annual United Nations Climate Change Conference wrapped up Sunday in Madrid, after nearly two weeks of wrangling. Despite a two-day extension that made this the longest round of U.N. climate talks ever, the meeting was a massive failure. Instead of setting more ambitious targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, negotiators went home mostly empty-handed, having punted the most difficult climate-related questions to next year’s conference in Glasgow, Scotland.

“The international community lost an important opportunity to show increased ambition on mitigation, adaptation & finance to tackle the climate crisis,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres declared in a tweet Sunday. The disappointing result was largely due to the unwillingness of the world’s largest economies to commit to deeper emissions cuts and hammer out a promised international carbon trading scheme. Meanwhile, warnings from climate scientists are only becoming more dire. According to the latest U.N. assessment, even if countries fulfill their current pledges to reduce emissions, the world is on track to warm by 3 degrees Celsius by the end of the century—a potentially catastrophic result. ...

Russia Is Waging Asymmetric Warfare Against the US — And We’re Letting Them Win

BY SARAH CHAYES
Source Link

Not too long ago, I watched the Taliban lose major offensives in Afghanistan and yet infiltrate the same zones afterwards, gaining strategic ground. Now I am watching Moscow do the same, inside the American homeland, and the national security establishment is hardly reacting. It is time for us to counter this threat with appropriate force. That means mounting a public campaign to harden targets throughout our economy, including hedge funds and their investments, educational institutions, and the public at large. And it means publicly demanding the impeachment and removal from office of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s apologist in chief, President Donald Trump.

The penetration we’re witnessing could never have been achieved during the Cold War. But Russia’s approach and our meek response call to mind Afghanistan, where I witnessed asymmetric warfare close up for the better part of a decade. In 2007, after the death of a fierce local opponent, Taliban moved in on Arghandab District, just north of their former capital and my home, Kandahar. They overran it, literally dancing on the roof of their late foe’s house.

Tech-Politik: Historical Perspectives on Innovation, Technology, and Strategic Competition CSIS Briefs

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Technological innovation represents a central arena of great power competition that demands policy action informed by historical perspective. The speed of today’s technological progress and nature of the competition makes historical comparison seem daunting, but several critical periods in twentieth century science and technology policy can offer insights on the value of government investment, technological exchange, and centralization.

Technology is becoming the most complicated and central challenge of U.S.-Chinese strategic competition, with implications for military, political, and economic power. The capacity to harness emerging technology for military purposes has an important impact on the balance of military power. Innovation drives the modern economy and serves as the foundation of national power. Innovation and scientific breakthroughs provide tangible metrics of progress in the competition between systems and are symbols of national vitality in any ideological contest for the hearts and minds of the world’s people. Navigating economic cooperation and competition with China—particularly in high tech sectors with deep interdependencies and strategically important secrets—will pose vexing problems for policymakers as they weigh economic opportunity and strategic risk.

Confronting the risks of artificial intelligenceApril 2019 | Article

By Benjamin Cheatham, Kia Javanmardian, and Hamid Samandari
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Article (PDF-670KB)

Artificial intelligence (AI) is proving to be a double-edged sword. While this can be said of most new technologies, both sides of the AI blade are far sharper, and neither is well understood.

Consider first the positive. These technologies are starting to improve our lives in myriad ways, from simplifying our shopping to enhancing our healthcare experiences. Their value to businesses also has become undeniable: nearly 80 percent of executives at companies that are deploying AI recently told us that they’re already seeing moderate value from it. Although the widespread use of AI in business is still in its infancy and questions remain open about the pace of progress, as well as the possibility of achieving the holy grail of “general intelligence,” the potential is enormous. McKinsey Global Institute research suggests that by 2030, AI could deliver additional global economic output of $13 trillion per year.

Yet even as AI generates consumer benefits and business value, it is also giving rise to a host of unwanted, and sometimes serious, consequences. And while we’re focusing on AI in this article, these knock-on effects (and the ways to prevent or mitigate them) apply equally to all advanced analytics. The most visible ones, which include privacy violations, discrimination, accidents, and manipulation of political systems, are more than enough to prompt caution. More concerning still are the consequences not yet known or experienced. Disastrous repercussions—including the loss of human life, if an AI medical algorithm goes wrong, or the compromise of national security, if an adversary feeds disinformation to a military AI system—are possible, and so are significant challenges for organizations, from reputational damage and revenue losses to regulatory backlash, criminal investigation, and diminished public trust.

IDF holds surprise cyber defense drill simulating critical systems shutdown

By JUDAH ARI GROSS

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Illustrative. An IDF soldier from the C4I Corps types on a computer. (Israel Defense Forces)

The Israel Defense Forces on Wednesday launched a surprise cyber defense exercise simulating an attack that shuts down critical computer systems, the military said.

This was the third surprise check of the military’s readiness under IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi, who entered his position nearly a year ago.

“During the exercise, hundreds of command and control computer stations were disabled in IDF units,” the military said.

The computer systems of senior officers and command centers were among those shut down in the exercise. The drill was managed by a small team of information systems and cyber defense experts, the army said.

The IDF said the exercise was meant to test “the functioning of the army during a cyber attack and the disabling of vital information systems.”

Companies, not people, should bear the burden of protecting data

David Medine and Gayatri Murthy

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Privacy isn’t dead as some would suggest … but consent is. When was the last time you read a privacy policy for the apps on your mobile phone? Did you know that apps have privacy policies? How about reading the cookie notice on web pages you visit? Or reading the privacy notice on Internet-of-Things devices like your baby monitor?

Let’s face it—almost nobody spends time reading privacy notices, and if you did it would take 76 work days per year to get through them. Despite this, privacy policy in the European Union and the United States is largely based on the myth that people read these notices and make informed decisions about how their data will be used, disclosed to third parties, and retained. Privacy notices are filled with legalese that often grants the company free rein to use your data. It’s time to move beyond consent.

When we go into a restaurant, we do not check the kitchen to make sure hygiene standards are being met. We expect that the government will impose reliable food safety requirements. For credit bureaus, we do not provide consent for their collection and use of our data. Instead, laws require bureaus to limit access to our data and correct any disputed errors. Why shouldn’t the data we provide companies, websites and apps be automatically protected by law?

DATA PROTECTION BEYOND CONSENT

AI & Robots Crush Foes In Army Wargame

By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR.

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Textron Ripsaw M5 robot in an armed configuration

WASHINGTON: How big a difference does it make when you reinforce foot troops with drones and ground robots? You get about a 10–fold increase in combat power, according to a recent Army wargame.

“Their capabilities were awesome,” said Army Capt. Philip Belanger, a Ranger Regiment and Stryker Brigade veteran who commanded a robot-reinforced platoon in nearly a dozen computer-simulated battles at the Fort Benning’s Maneuver Battle Lab. “We reduced the risk to US forces to zero, basically, and still were able to accomplish the mission.”

That mission: dislodge a defending company of infantry, about 120 soldiers, with a single platoon of just 40 attackers on foot. That’s a task that would normally be assigned to a battalion of over 600. In other words, instead of the minimum 3:1 superiority in numbers that military tradition requires for a successful attack, Belanger’s simulated force was outnumbered 1:3.

This Little-Used Area of the Electromagnetic Spectrum Might Be the Future of Battlefield Communications

BY PATRICK TUCKER

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If commercial 5G millimeter-wave gear can be hardened against jamming, the U.S. Army thinks it might gain a real battlefield edge.

You may not have heard of millimeter waves, but they will play a critical role in tomorrow’s super fast and capable 5G wireless internet environment. Because the 30-to-300-gigahertz band has only recently been harnessed for use by new antennae and other technology, bandwidth is plentiful. Because millimeter waves are inherently directional, they make signals hard to intercept. All this has drawn the attention of the U.S. Army, which may put them to use for swarming drones, rapid maneuvering, and a battlefield Internet of Things.

Commercial telephone companies are pouring money into research into mm waves, but that isn’t likely to generate military-grade communications technology that can stand up to the harshest enemy jamming. So the Army has hired various wireless technology companies to look into hardening commercial 5G networking equipment. 

Among these firms chosen for phase one of the mmWave for Army Tactical Communications program is InterDigital, company officials told Defense One. The company is expected to make an announcement on Thursday.