Indian Strategic Studies: September 2024

16 September 2024

Rethinking Economic Warfare with China

Adam Leslie & Mariana Rosado-Rivera

In recent years, the Chinese Communist Party has waged an aggressive economic campaign against the United States and Australia in the Indo-Pacific to achieve economic and technological dominance. Through predatory economic policies, coercive Belt and Road Initiatives (BRI), and large-scale industrial espionage, China is working towards regional hegemony in the Indo-Pacific. Given China’s notion of unrestricted warfare—which includes economics, trade, finances, and technology as domains—the United States and Australia must adapt and respond to this threat.

China’s Economic Warfare Tactics

The CCP’s campaign for economic and technological dominance is a strategic effort to alter Western responses without risking direct military conflict. This approach, often termed “gray zone” activities, blurs the lines between peace and war. By exploiting the lack of a comprehensive Western strategy, China seeks to circumvent U.S. dominance in conventional warfare, as evidenced in the Indo-Pacific, where the United States struggles to maintain focus and where Australia’s efforts are overstretched and uncoordinated with allied initiatives.

India’s Secret New Submarine Could Be the Key to Preventing a Nuclear War With China

Sébastien Roblin

On August 29, India’s defense minister presided over the commissioning ceremony of S3 Arighat, the country’s second-ever home-built nuclear-powered submarine. The nuclear-armed sub is a manifestation of India’s progress toward deploying a diversified “triad” of of air, sea, and land-based nukes. At the same time, the U.S. and its allies are seeking deeper military cooperation with the Indian Navy due to mutual tensions with Beijing. So, the overall goal is to provide round-the-clock sea-based nuclear deterrence—especially against China.

Arighat, which translates to “slayer of enemies,” and the preceding Arihant submarine, which the new ship is based on, are initial stepping stones in the Indian Navy’s ambitious program to build a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines loaded with nuclear-armed ballistic missiles.

Rather than hunting enemy ships, ballistic missile submarines (also known as “boomers” or SSBNs) lurk quietly in hiding. They await a signal transmitted from national leadership via very-low-frequency radio before releasing a volley of nuclear ballistic missiles on distant targets.

Did The September 11 Attacks Start And End US ‘Forever Wars’? – Analysis

Michael Scollon

In the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the United States, Secretary of State Colin Powell gave assurances that America would deal with the tragedy by bringing those responsible to justice while protecting the world’s democracies.

“They will never be allowed to kill the spirit of democracy,” Powell said. “They cannot destroy our society. They cannot destroy our belief in the democratic way.”

President George W. Bush, who won office in 2000 as a candidate who would be cautious about committing U.S. troops to foreign wars, quickly made fighting global terrorism a top policy, and set about establishing an international “coalition of the willing” to carry out the mission.

The U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan had the primary goal of punishing the Al-Qaeda terrorist network, which had been given refuge in Afghanistan and carried out the deadly 9/11 attacks. And once on Afghan soil, Washington quickly ousted the Taliban regime accused of sheltering Al-Qaeda from power.

Costly Campaign

But the U.S. experience in Afghanistan ultimately ended in failure, and with the hard-line Taliban group back in power. The nearly 20-year war ended with immense costs in terms of lives lost and money spent. And it made the U.S. public and politicians on both sides of the aisle in Washington reluctant to get involved in “forever wars” that could not be won.

On U.S. Steel, America Must Not Take Our Allies For Granted

Heino Klinck

The proposed $14.9 billion merger between U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel has sparked a heated debate in Washington. As someone who has spent a significant portion of my career fostering U.S.-East Asia relations, I find the opposition to this deal on national security grounds frankly difficult to understand. It is not only hypocritical and inconsistent with our long-standing alliance with Japan, but there are no national security concerns that can serve as legitimate reasons to reject this deal.

For seventy-two years and running, Japan has been one of America’s oldest and most trusted allies. President Biden himself has repeatedly emphasized the strength of this relationship. In a joint statement with Prime Minister Kishida Fumio, Biden declared, “The U.S.-Japan Alliance has reached unprecedented heights. Our nations, individually and together, took courageous steps to strengthen our collective capacity in ways that would have seemed impossible just a few years ago.”

This sentiment was echoed by senior administration officials who have consistently highlighted Japan’s critical role in the region. Most notably, Democratic presidential nominee and Vice President Kamala Harris said during her trip to Tokyo in September 2022 that our alliance with Japan is “a cornerstone of what we believe is integral to peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region.”

Japan Restructures to Create ‘Fleet Information Warfare’ Comman

Christine Casimiro

The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) is overhauling its intelligence operations, replacing its Fleet Intelligence Command with the soon-to-be-established “Fleet Information Warfare Command.”

In a major restructuring move, several key JMSDF units — including the Fleet Intelligence Command, Oceanography ASW Support Command, Guard Post, and Communications Command — will be merged into a single, unified entity focused on information warfare.

The new Fleet Information Warfare Command will then comprise two groups, Operational Intelligence and Cyber Defense.

It will carry out a broad range of information warfare (IW) duties, such as enemy movement analysis, submarine sound signature analysis, cyber warfare, electronic warfare, and C4ISR.

This reorganization will enable Japan’s Navy “to strengthen response capabilities to information warfare, including in the cognitive domain, and to establish a system capable of rapid decision-making,” according to the country’s Ministry of Defense.

Former JMSDF intelligence officer Kenji Yoshinaga revealed to Naval News that this new command was modeled after the US Fleet Cyber Command/US 10th Fleet.

The 12 elements of cold war 2.0

Graeme Dobell

The contours of a new and dangerous era are in place. The world has gone from a chilly peace to a new cold war.

Cold war 2.0 has rhymes from version 1.0, yet the origin stories emphasise the differences.

The 20th century cold war was bred by victory and failure, a child of war and depression; ideology was its heart as two secular religions—communism and democracy—fought Europe’s last ‘religious’ war.

The new cold war carries less ideological baggage, born from decades of peace in Europe and Asia and a wonderful period of economic and scientific achievement.

Version 2.0 draws on the successes of globalisation in the post-cold war space, a golden age. But that warmth has faded and turned icy as it veers away from borderless optimism to revive the contest of great powers.

Is US losing the AI arms race to China?

James Johnson

The US government, long a proponent of advancing technology for military purposes, sees artificial intelligence as key to the next generation of fighting tools.

Several recent investments and Pentagon initiatives show that military leaders are concerned about keeping up with – and ahead of – China and Russia, two countries that have made big gains in developing artificial-intelligence systems.

AI-powered weapons include target recognition systems, weapons guided by AI, and cyberattack and cyber defense software that runs without human intervention.

The US defense community is coming to understand that AI will significantly transform, if not completely reinvent, the world’s military power balance. The concern is more than military.

As Chinese and Russian technologies become more sophisticated, they threaten US domination of technological innovation and development, as well as global economic power and influence.

Is Gaza war feeding ISIS resurgeance in Middle East?

Ali Rizk

Recent developments suggest that the ISIS threat has metastasized to a level that the United States believes requires stronger action.

In the span of less than a week, U.S. forces conducted two major operations targeting the group’s forces in Syria and Iraq. A broad joint U.S.-Iraqi operation was launched in Anbar province that reportedly killed at least 14 ISIS militants and was followed by the capture of an ISIS leader accused of assisting members of the terrorist group who had escaped detention in Syria.

The two operations indicate that the U.S. military is taking a more aggressive approach to the terrorist group than in recent years. A report by the New York Times described the Anbar operation, with over 100 U.S. Special Operations forces taking part, as one of the largest-scale anti-ISIS offensives conducted in Iraq since the fall of the caliphate in 2019. American commandos reportedly led the initial raid of the operation during which seven U.S. soldiers suffered injuries.

Iran can’t save Hamas

Patrick Hess

Another week, another Gaza ceasefire proposal. CIA Director William Burns, speaking alongside MI6 Director Richard Moore, recently told an audience in London that a new US-backed proposal would be put forward in the coming days. Burns has had the thankless task of leading US efforts to broker a truce between Hamas and Israel.

Currently, negotiations have stalled over the Philadelphi Corridor, the strip of land along the Gaza-Egypt border, under which the IDF says it has discovered dozens of tunnels used by Hamas to smuggle weapons and ammunition. Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel must maintain a presence there to prevent its use as a rearmament route. Hamas, implicitly agreeing with this interpretation, has said such a presence would constitute a red line.

The singular focus on rearmament routes shows that Israel is confident that it has, as it stands, neutralised the threat from Gaza. The initial war aim of destroying Hamas was always slightly vague and overly maximalist. But after 10 months of war, Israel has devastated Hamas’s military capabilities and infrastructure, killed thousands of its fighters and assassinated many of its leaders, enough for Netanyahu to be able to plausibly declare victory.

Rise Of Far Right In 2024 And Weakening Of Western Liberal Democracy In Europe: A Southeast Asian Perspective – Analysis

Simon Hutagalung

The rise of far-right movements in Europe in 2024 reflects deep-seated concerns about identity, economic security, and governance. Once considered fringe political elements, far-right parties have gained significant traction in national parliaments, shaping public discourse and challenging the core tenets of liberal democracy.

This shift has highlighted a broader weakening of Western democratic institutions, marked by growing polarisation, distrust in political systems, and declining faith in the European Union (EU). As Europe grapples with these issues, Southeast Asia’s experience with multiculturalism, political resilience, and balancing sovereignty with regional cooperation provides valuable lessons. The rise of far-right movements reveals profound crises, but with thoughtful reforms, Europe can counter these challenges and restore its democratic foundations.

Economic Factors and Political Disillusionment

One of the key drivers behind the rise of the far right in Europe is economic instability, which has persisted since the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic exacerbated existing vulnerabilities, from inflation to unemployment, leading to economic discontent across the continent. In particular, rising living costs, wage stagnation, and weakened social safety nets have disproportionately affected lower-income groups, fuelling frustration with traditional political parties.

How the US Army is rethinking howitzers

SHAUN MCDOUGALL

The U.S. Army’s search for its next howitzer remains in motion, six months after service leaders scrapped efforts to upgun its current M109 Paladin self-propelled howitzer.

Even as the Army was terminating the ERCA program in March, the service was reinvigorating its search for a longer-ranged Paladin replacement to serve until 2040 and beyond. Its fiscal 2025 budget request included $8 million for initial next-generation howitzer studies.

Meanwhile, service leaders are surveying the existing field. An industry day was held in April, attended by representatives from American Rheinmetall, AM General, BAE Systems, Elbit, Hanwha, and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann. This group builds a mix of wheeled and tracked options: Rheinmetall and KMW jointly produce the tracked PzH-2000; KMW also has the wheeled RCH 155; AM General makes the Brutus system that can be equipped on a truck; incumbent BAE Systems has tested the Paladin with a Rheinmetall L52 cannon, and the company also manufactures the wheeled Archer howitzer; Elbit makes the wheeled M454; and Hanwha produces the tracked K9 Thunder.

DARPA ‘quantum skeptic’ challenges industry: Prove me wrong

Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.

As entrepreneurs, researchers, and executives gather this week at the Quantum World Congress outside Washington, how can anyone cut through the hype and figure out which nascent technology has real potential? That’s why DARPA has issued an open challenge to anyone developing a quantum computer to submit themselves to rigorous government testing, led by a self-described “quantum skeptic.”

The deadline to submit a brief abstract of one’s project is Sept. 19. That date is not negotiable, warned program manager Joe Altepeter, who’s heading what the agency announced in July as the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI). Contenders deemed promising will be eligible, for starters, for $1 million to help their testing, but DARPA expects them to be spending that much and more of their own money.

“I have a reputation in the DARPA building as a quantum skeptic,” Altepeter said in an interview with Breaking Defense. “I was definitely the reviewer you absolutely did not want to get on your quantum submission, because I measured my success based on how much money I could save the US taxpayer by not funding dumb quantum ideas — and trust me, there are plenty of dumb quantum ideas to go around.”

Forgotten Wars: The Essequibo Crisis

Matteo Balzarini Zane

The historical roots of the conflict between Venezuela and Guyana go back to 1899 when an international arbitration court awarded the largest territory of Essequibo to British Guiana. Since then, Venezuela has argued that the decision was unfair, and has tried several times to revise the terms of the decision. The dispute was unresolved for decades until the discovery of some 11 billion barrels of oil off the coast of Essequibo a few months ago revived Caracas' interest.

The situation worsened in December 2023, when the Venezuelan government held a referendum in which Essequibo's unilateral merger was approved by a majority. Although the result was expected, the turnout was lower than expected, suggesting that the Venezuelan population is less enthusiastic than the government had hoped. However, President Nicolas Maduro used the election to consolidate his internal power, accusing the opposition and foreign entities such as ExxonMobil of opposing Venezuela's sovereignty.

International reactions to the referendum were swift. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has condemned moves aimed at changing the current borders, and many countries, including the United States, have expressed their support for the Guyanese monarchy. At the regional level, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) confirmed its support for Georgetown, while other South American countries, led by Brazil, expressed concern about the instability in the region.

Blocking the Nippon Steel Acquisition: Politics Versus Policy

Matthew P. Goodman

Reports that President Joe Biden has decided to block the proposed acquisition of U.S. Steel by Japan-based Nippon Steel have created a stir in Washington. If true, a decision to block the deal would be widely understood to be a political move to appeal to voters in Pennsylvania and the industrial Midwest. Politics matters, but so does policy, and neither would be well served by this action.

It is difficult to see what U.S. policy objectives would be advanced by a decision to block the Nippon Steel transaction. Indeed, the move would do damage to three of the Biden administration’s own policy priorities: First, it would weaken U.S. economic competitiveness and supply-chain resilience. U.S. Steel has been unprofitable for most of the past fifteen years, and the billions of dollars that Nippon Steel proposes to invest in modernizing U.S. Steel’s plants in Pennsylvania and Indiana would likely save American jobs and help make the company more competitive against China’s now-dominant producers. Blocking the deal could have a chilling effect on other prospective foreign investment into the United States, which the administration has touted as strengthening the U.S. economy and reducing vulnerabilities caused by far-flung supply chains.

Israel and the Coming Long War

Assaf Orion

In the weeks since late July, when Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran and Hezbollah senior commander Fuad Shukr was killed in Beirut, there has been much speculation about the eruption of a wider conflict in the Middle East. According to this view, if Iran and Hezbollah choose to retaliate through major direct attacks on Israel, they could transform Israel’s current campaign in Gaza into a regional war. In this scenario, Israeli forces would then be engaged in high-intensity fighting on multiple fronts against multiple armed groups, terrorist militias, and a nuclear-threshold state’s military equipped with a huge arsenal of long-range missiles and drones.

In some ways, this wider regional war is already at hand. From the outset, “the Gaza war” was a misnomer. Ever since Hamas’s heinous October 7 attack nearly one year ago, Israel has faced not one but numerous antagonists in what has already become one of the longest wars since Israel’s founding. The day after Hamas’s assault from Gaza, Hezbollah began attacking Israel from Lebanon, declaring that it would continue its attacks as long as the fighting in Gaza continued. Shortly thereafter, the Houthis in Yemen also joined in, launching continual attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea and launching missiles and drones at Israel, including one that exploded in central Tel Aviv.

Meanwhile, Shiite militias in Iraq, and sometimes Syria, have also menaced Israel with drones and rockets. And in mid-April, after Israel carried out a deadly airstrike near an Iranian diplomatic complex in Damascus, Iran retaliated by launching more than 350 ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones at Israel, creating a new precedent for direct and open combat between the two countries. At the same time, Iran has been flooding the West Bank with funds and weapons to encourage terrorist attacks against Israel and undermine security within Israel itself.

Permitting reform is back from the dead. Will lawmakers sacrifice America’s public lands to the fossil fuel industry?

Dustin Mulvaney

Like a zombie returned from the dead, permitting reform is back on the Congressional agenda. The Energy Permitting Reform Act of 2024, a bill recast out of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and championed by Senators Joe Manchin (I-WV) and John Barrasso (R-ID), could be headed to the Senate floor for a vote soon. It contains provisions for everything from undoing the pause on building new liquified natural gas facilities, to letting mining companies dump waste on public lands, to promises to expedite the siting process for electricity transmission lines and fossil fuel infrastructure. In typical bipartisan fashion for energy legislation, western public lands are for sale to energy and mining industries. Oil and gas producers will get access to more onshore and offshore energy, force the approval of new liquified natural gas facilities along the Gulf of Mexico to export, and reverse an important court decision and allow mining companies to treat public lands like a hazardous waste dump.

More than 360 environmental organizations sent a letter to the committee chair asking the vote be denied passage, calling it “the latest Dirty Permitting Deal.” The letter cites the impacts from new fossil fuel infrastructure that will be enabled by the legislation, which one estimate found would lock-in carbon burning infrastructures that would emit greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 165 coal-fired power plants over their lives.

Could the U.S. Army Fight and Win Without Tanks?

Kyle Mizokami

In 1994, the U.S. Army dumped decommissioned M60 main battle tanks into the ocean off the coast of Florida. Replaced by the M1A1 Abrams, the tanks were surplus and the service no longer needed them. Their new mission, becoming a haven for sea life, was wildly successful; today, the tanks are a popular diving destination, attracting fish, sharks, lobsters, and other animals.

Now let’s imagine: what if, in a fit of madness, the service dumped all 2,300 of its Abrams tanks into the ocean? While that would create a housing boom for the lobsters, what would happen to the Army’s job of defending the nation, our allies, and our interests abroad? Would the loss of the tank force affect the service’s ability to carry out essential wartime missions?

What the Tank Does

The tank is the principal offensive land weapon of the army. According to the U.S. Army, the fundamental mission of tank units is to “close with and destroy the enemy.” This is an offensive mission that allows an army to take ground and eventually win the war. Tanks do this with a combination of speed, protection, and mobility. Speed gives tanks the ability to advance to the enemy lines, enter them, and move beyond them, while protection permits tanks to shrug off hits from enemy weapons and keep advancing. Firepower, in the form of a large-caliber main gun and machine guns, means tanks can blast away at enemy defenses, including other tanks, allowing the attack to move forward.

Why This New Armored Vehicle Is the U.S. Army’s Unsung Hero

Kyle Mizokami

A new armored vehicle is joining the U.S. Army—one that won’t grab a lot of headlines, but will form the backbone of the armored corps for decades to come. The new M1283 Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle (AMPV) is designed to keep up with the fast-moving armored force, providing mobility and protection for commanders, mortarmen, medics, surgeons, and wounded troops.

An Aging Warhorse

One of the most common armored vehicles in the U.S. Army today, at least one that isn’t a tank or infantry fighting vehicle, is the M113 armored personnel carrier, which was designed and built in the early 1960s. Lightly armed and armored, it was something like a battlefield Uber, carrying infantry up to the edge of the battlefield, and then dropping them off to fight dismounted.

In the late 1970s, the new mechanized infantry concept called for a new vehicle, with better weapons and armor, to keep pace with tanks as they fought across the battlefield. This led to the introduction of the M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle; the M113 was relegated to other combat support roles, including as a command post vehicle, ambulance, mortar vehicle, and a ride for combat support troops such as combat engineers and air-defense troops.

Experts Are Worried About Cyber Threats To Infrastructure

A small water authority just outside Pittsburgh seemed like an unlikely victim of an international cyberattack.

On Nov. 25, however, a terrorist group successfully targeted the Municipal Authority of Aliquippa, raising concerns about further attacks in the United States and the vulnerability of the nation’s critical infrastructure. The risks associated with these attacks are forcing the worlds of operational technology and information technology to collide, but each field’s methodologies and solutions are vastly different, a disconnect that affects policy decisions and interventions.

This past summer, 16 interdisciplinary Pitt students worked to create solutions and inform action related to cyber-informed engineering (CIE) through the Summer Honors Undergraduate Research Experience in Electric Grid, or SHURE-Grid.

The 12-week program is a collaborative partnership between the David C. Frederick Honors College, the Swanson School of Engineering, Pitt’s Office of Research and the Idaho National Laboratory. With SHURE-Grid more firmly established, leading faculty took an innovative and interdisciplinary approach.

McKinsey’s latest analysis of 15 core technology trends points to a new “influencer” role for generative AI as well as growing interest in robotics and digital trust.

Lucia Rahilly and Roberta Fusaro

The state of technology

Roberta Fusaro: This is the fourth year in a row that McKinsey has released its outlook on technology trends. The research covers 15 trends, including advanced connectivity, cloud and edge computing, quantum computing, generative AI [gen AI], and applied AI. What parameters did you use for this research?

Roger Roberts: We look at several different dimensions. One, we look at innovation. So we try to assess how much innovation is happening in each trend. Then we look at interest, which tries to assess the volume and depth of dialogue that’s happening about each of these trends in the world. And then we look at investment—how much money is flowing into the companies and technologies that are enabling and driving the trends.

Roberta Fusaro: According to the latest research, innovation and overall interest in technology remains strong, although investment in new technology did fall. Lareina, what accounts for these findings?

Lareina Yee: In many ways, that’s not surprising. We are in a golden age of innovation and possibility in terms of technology. The drop in investment was between 30 percent and 40 percent, which is about $570 billion. What’s interesting is that, despite that drop in investment, we do see that there are pockets amongst the trends that are continuing to see a rise in investment. To no surprise, an example of this is gen AI. But what might be less expected is in areas such as robotics, as well as in climate and sustainability technology.

Air-Gapped Networks Vulnerable to Acoustic Attack via LCD Screens

Nate Nelson

A newly devised covert channel attack method could undermine diligently devised air gaps at highly sensitive organizations.

In industrial control systems security, the term "air gap" is contested. It typically describes a total physical separation between networks — a literal gap through which no Wi-Fi signals, wires, etc., can pass. The most critical military, government, and industrial sites use air gaps to prevent Internet-based cyber threats from penetrating the kinds of networks that protect state secrets and human lives.

But any medium capable of transmitting information can, in theory, be weaponized to transmit the bad kind. Mordechai Guri of Israel's Ben-Gurion University has long researched ways of crossing air gaps with sound waves: via computer fans, hard disk drives, CD/DVD drives, and more. His latest attack scenario, "Pixhell," enables data theft using sounds produced by specially generated, rapidly shifting bitmap patterns on an LCD screen.

How Pixhell Works

It's midnight, and everyone working at the top secret intelligence facility has long gone home for the night, when all of a sudden a computer screen flashes with what appears to be random noise, as if it's missing a signal. It isn't missing a signal — the apparent noise is the signal.

6 Best Free Alternatives to Microsoft Word

Aminu Abdullahi

Best for sharing and real time collaboration: Google Docs
Best for long and complex documents: Apache OpenOffice Writer
Best for automation: Zoho Writer
Best for customization: LibreOffice Writer
Best for advanced features: WPS Office Writer
Best for users who prefer Microsoft Word's interface: Microsoft Office Word Online

Microsoft Word has its devotees, but find one person who loves it, and you’ll probably find several who don’t. From redesigns that hide familiar menu items to overly complicated and often unused features, there’s a lot to be desired in a simple word processor that Microsoft Word doesn’t deliver due to its complex nature.

Microsoft Word as a part of Microsoft Office is expensive — for instance, Microsoft 365 Business Premium costs $22 or £18.10 for each user per month.

If you don’t need all the features that Microsoft Word offers, it can be hard to justify paying that price, especially in a small business environment where you just need a word processor. Don’t pay for what you won’t use and take a look at one of these six free Microsoft Word alternatives instead.

Apathy and hyperbole cloud the real risks of AI bioweapons

Filippa Lentzos, Jez Littlewood, Hailey Wingo & Alberto Muti

“Can chatbots help you build a bioweapon?” a headline in Foreign Policy asked. “ChatGPT could make bioterrorism horrifyingly easy,” a Vox article warned. “A.I. may save us or construct viruses to kill us,” a New York Times opinion piece argued. A glance at many headlines around artificial intelligence (AI) and bioweapons leaves the impression of a technology that is putting sophisticated biological weapons within the reach of any malicious actor intent on causing such harm with disease.

Like other scientific and technological developments before it, AI is dual use: It has the potential to deliver a range of positive outcomes as well as to be used to support nefarious activity by malign actors. And, as with developments ranging from genetic engineering to gene synthesis technologies, AI in its current configurations is unlikely to result in the worst-case scenarios suggested in these and other headlines—an increase in the use of biological weapons in the next few years.

Bioweapons use and bioterrorism has been, historically, extremely rare. This is not a reason to ignore AI or be sanguine about the risks it poses, but managing those risks is rarely aided by hype.

Apple Intelligence Promises Better AI Privacy. Here’s How It Actually Work

Lily Hay Newman

The generative AI boom has, in many ways, been a privacy bust thus far, as services slurp up web data to train their machine learning models and users’ personal information faces a new era of potential threats and exposures. With the release of Apple’s iOS 18 and macOS Sequoia this month, the company is joining the fray, debuting Apple Intelligence, which the company says will ultimately be a foundational service in its ecosystem. But Apple has a reputation to uphold for prioritizing privacy and security, so the company took a big swing. It has developed extensive custom infrastructure and transparency features, known as Private Cloud Compute (PCC), for the cloud services Apple Intelligence uses when the system can't fulfill a query locally on a user's device.

The beauty of on-device data processing, or “local” processing, is that it limits the paths an attacker can take to steal a user's data. The data never leaves the computer or phone, so that's what the attacker has to target. It doesn't mean an attack will never be successful, but the battleground is defined and constrained. Giving data to a company to process in the cloud isn't inherently a security issue—an unfathomable amount of data moves through global cloud infrastructure safely every day. But it expands that battlefield immensely and also creates more opportunities for mistakes that inadvertently expose data. The latter has particularly been an issue with generative AI given the unintended ways that a system tasked with generating content may access and share information.

West Point Needs a Reset

Tony Lentini

When I attended West Point back in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, cadets used to joke that we got a “$50,000 education, shoved up our a** a nickel at a time.” Times have sure changed. Today, the cost of an education at the nation’s service academies has risen to an estimated quarter-of-a-million dollars per cadet or midshipman, all of which is funded by our tax dollars.

In the past, such an investment was more than worthwhile; West Point has produced such luminaries as Presidents Grant and Eisenhower, World War II Generals MacArthur, Patton, Arnold and Bradley, and scores of other accomplished military, political and business leaders ever since its inception in 1802.

But in recent times, things have changed. Not only has the taxpayer cost of a West Point education risen, but the Academy’s moral and professional compass seems to have shifted.

The U.S. Military Academy was the nation’s first engineering school, and rightly so, because engineering is a crucial skill on the battlefield. Soldiers must plan and build fortifications, bridges and other infrastructure as well as find ways to destroy them. But over the last few decades, the Academy has become more of a Liberal Arts College, offering battlefield-irrelevant course materials in such areas as Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Critical Race Theory and Gender Studies. West Point now offers a minor in Diversity & Inclusion Studies.

15 September 2024

ER&D has become crucial engine for TCS’ growth: Sreenivasa Chakravart

Shraddha Goled

Engineering research and development (ER&D) is a burgeoning space because of the emphasis on digital innovation globally. The ER&D spending is expected to grow at an 8-9% CAGR in the 2023-2030 time period, a Nasscom-BCG report in October 2023.

The growth in this sector has prompted traditional IT service providers to rush for a piece of the pie. Case in point, the largest IT services provider in the country Tata Consultancy Services. ER&D offers a fresh approach, not necessarily in engineering itself, but in areas such as re-engineering products, improving energy efficiency, digitalising products, and advancing software and autonomous systems, said Sreenivasa Chakravarti, Vice President, IoT and Digital Engineering.

“This is a high-growth driver and has become a crucial engine for TCS’ growth. It’s helping us build significant, marquee relationships because we’re now engaging with the very core of these businesses. We’ve moved beyond just managing enterprise systems and are now working deeply with many manufacturing-centric companies,” he added.

Getting Bin Laden What happened that night in Abbottabad.

Nicholas Schmidle

Shortly after eleven o’clock on the night of May 1st, two MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters lifted off from Jalalabad Air Field, in eastern Afghanistan, and embarked on a covert mission into Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden. Inside the aircraft were twenty-three Navy SEALs from Team Six, which is officially known as the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, or DEVGRU. A Pakistani-American translator, whom I will call Ahmed, and a dog named Cairo—a Belgian Malinois—were also aboard. It was a moonless evening, and the helicopters’ pilots, wearing night-vision goggles, flew without lights over mountains that straddle the border with Pakistan. Radio communications were kept to a minimum, and an eerie calm settled inside the aircraft.

Fifteen minutes later, the helicopters ducked into an alpine valley and slipped, undetected, into Pakistani airspace. For more than sixty years, Pakistan’s military has maintained a state of high alert against its eastern neighbor, India. Because of this obsession, Pakistan’s “principal air defenses are all pointing east,” Shuja Nawaz, an expert on the Pakistani Army and the author of “Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within,” told me. Senior defense and Administration officials concur with this assessment, but a Pakistani senior military official, whom I reached at his office, in Rawalpindi, disagreed. “No one leaves their borders unattended,” he said. Though he declined to elaborate on the location or orientation of Pakistan’s radars—“It’s not where the radars are or aren’t”—he said that the American infiltration was the result of “technological gaps we have vis-à-vis the U.S.” The Black Hawks, each of which had two pilots and a crewman from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, or the Night Stalkers, had been modified to mask heat, noise, and movement; the copters’ exteriors had sharp, flat angles and were covered with radar-dampening “skin.”

China and the Taliban Team Up on Coppe

Christina Lu

Three years after seizing power in Afghanistan, the cash-strapped Taliban are desperate to finally unlock the country’s bounty of copper, a crucial input in electric vehicle batteries and semiconductors. And they’re aiming to do so with the help of a key partner: China.

The Afghanistan Papers: Lies, Damn Lies, and Strategy

Monte Erfourth

Introduction

In the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the United States launched Operation Enduring Freedom, targeting the Taliban regime in Afghanistan for harboring al-Qaeda, the group responsible for the attacks. What began as a swift mission to dismantle al-Qaeda and oust the Taliban spiraled into a prolonged and costly twenty-year effort to reshape Afghanistan’s political and social landscape. Drawing from "The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War" (2021) by Craig Whitlock, along with additional analyses and firsthand accounts, this article examines the rationale behind U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan, the evolution of its mission, and the factors that led to the ultimate failure of U.S. efforts there. It also explores the consequences of the American withdrawal in 2021 and reflects on the broader strategic implications of two decades of flawed policies, lack of strategy, and poor management.

The Initial Rationale for U.S. Military Intervention

The initial objective of the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan was clear: to destroy al-Qaeda and remove the Taliban from power for providing a safe haven to the terrorist group. In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, there was widespread international support for U.S. actions, and the mission seemed straightforward. However, as outlined in "The Afghanistan Papers," internal government documents obtained through freedom of information requests reveal a different narrative. From the outset, the U.S. mission had significant ambiguities and contradictions. President George W. Bush’s administration did not clarify whether the goal was solely to punish the Taliban or to eliminate them, nor was there a cohesive strategy for what would follow once these initial objectives were achieved.

China Enables Russia’s War of Aggression Against Ukraine

Taras Kuzio

On July 23–26, former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba conducted an official visit to China—the first visit of a Ukrainian high-ranking official to China since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion. The visit resulted in positive diplomatic rhetoric that, unfortunately, did not match reality (Radio Svoboda, July 23; Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, July 24). During the visit, Beijing told Kuleba it supported Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, did not supply Russia with military equipment, and was neutral in the war (Korrespondent, July 24). All three claims, however, have been disputed. Robin Brooks, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has tracked exports to Russia directly or through other countries, such as Kyrgyzstan, wrote, “Since Russia invaded Ukraine, there is no country that’s helped Putin as much as China” (X.com/robin_j_brooks, August 12). He added, “Putin wouldn’t be able to keep fighting in Ukraine if it weren’t for China” (X.com/robin_j_brooks, August 16). While China is apparently a supporter of the territorial integrity of states and a critic of separatism, it has undermined Ukraine’s peace-making proposals and even boycotted Ukraine’s June 15–16 peace summit in Switzerland (Holos Ameryky, June 3; President.gov.ua, June 16). China’s support of Russia in its war of aggression against Ukraine is enabling Moscow to continue the long war by providing the necessary materials to maintain its military-industrial complex.

Despite evidence of military trade with Russia, China denies these “allegations,” which it claims “have no factual basis, but are purely speculative and deliberately hyped up” (Novyny, July 31). US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said China is trying to have friendly relations with Europe both ways while “fueling the biggest threat to Europe” since 1991.

The Coming Clash Between China and the Global South

James Crabtree

Chinese President Xi Jinping has promised to open his country’s vast economy to the world’s emerging nations, pledging on Sept. 5 to introduce a regime of zero tariffs for the world’s least developed countries. The move, unveiled as dozens of leaders gathered at the China-Africa summit in Beijing, seemed deliberately designed to contrast China with the United States, which has largely abandoned its role as a champion of free trade as it drifts toward protectionism. But Xi’s promise also aimed to counter growing alarm among emerging countries that major shifts in global trade flows—as China’s export-heavy economic model meets Western resistance—now risk swamping much of the global south with cheap Chinese goods and undermining their fragile progress in economic development.

China in the Atlantic

George Friedman

News reports tying China to Brazil are fairly rare from a military perspective. Generally speaking, Brazil holds no great interest for China other than run-of-the-mill resource acquisition and U.S. irritation. So the fact that China for the first time is sending a People’s Liberation Army Navy Marine Corps detachment to participate in joint Brazilian military exercises is worth a discussion. These multilateral exercises, known as Formosa 2024, will take place within the next several weeks. So far, it’s unclear if U.S. assets will participate alongside the Chinese.

China and Brazil have had a relationship since the 19th century, minus a brief interruption after China went communist. Relations were reestablished in the 1970s. Since then, there has been robust trade between the two as Brazil helped replace U.S. soy and grain supplies. (This gave Beijing room to breathe when the trade war started under the Trump administration.) China has become Brazil’s largest trade partner with exports to China in 2023 approaching $105 billion. More recently, Brazil was almost alone in its support of Chinese efforts to build 5G infrastructure in the Western Hemisphere. But Brazil’s invitation to China to participate in military exercises attests to their improved standing and that the partnership is growing beyond economic sectors.

Chinese leader Xi meets US national security adviser as the two powers try to avoid conflict

KEN MORITSUGU & HUIZHONG WU

Chinese leader Xi Jinping met with U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on Thursday as the latter wound up a three-day visit with the stated aim of keeping communications open in a relationship that has become increasingly tense in recent years.

Sullivan, on his first trip to China as the main adviser to President Joe Biden on national security issues, earlier met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and a top general from the Central Military Commission.

Starting with a trade war that dates back to 2018, China and the United States have grown at odds over a range of issues, from global security, such as China’s claims over the South China Sea, to industrial policy on electric vehicle and solar panel manufacturing. Sullivan’s trip this week is meant to keep the tensions from spiraling into conflict.

“We believe that competition with China does not have to lead to conflict or confrontation. The key is responsible management through diplomacy,” he told reporters at a news conference shortly before leaving Beijing.

Suicide Drones Are Killing Civilians From Syria to Ukraine

Faine Greenwood

On March 11, Syrian farmer Ali Ahmad Barakat was driving a tractor to his fields in the fertile rebel-held lands of the Al-Ghab plain, just a few miles away from the front line with Assadist forces. For years, Al-Ghab’s farmers had refused to let the violence scare them away from working their fields.

How Washington Learned to Stop Worrying and Embrace Protectionism

Bob Davis

Shortly before the U.S. presidential race turned upside down (the attempted assassination of Republican nominee Donald Trump) and upside down again (President Joe Biden dropping out) and upside down again (Vice President Kamala Harris surging in polls compared to Biden), the president made a decision that upended decades of Democratic White House rule. He ordered heavy new tariffs on Chinese imports of high-tech items and continued the massive tariffs he inherited from his Republican predecessor.

U.S. Army Collaborates with Finland Army on Joint Open Source Intelligence Collection Mission

Cpl. Marvin Lopez

In a rapidly changing digital world where information is of utmost importance, the 66th Military Intelligence Brigade's Northern Raven Team collaborated with Finnish Army to carry out a joint open-source intelligence (OSINT) collection mission in Finland in late August 2024. The joint U.S.-Finland OSINT mission takes place as Finland officially joins the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in April 2023. As a newly inducted member, Finland has strengthened its security cooperation with NATO allies, particularly the United States. Both nations share strategic interests in maintaining stability in the Baltic region and Northern Europe, especially given heightened geopolitical tensions with Russia in recent years.

Both armed forces utilized advanced OSINT tools and methodologies to accomplish the mission. AI-driven algorithms were utilized to sift through massive amounts of data, flagging relevant information based on keywords, phrases, and geographic locations. In addition, geospatial analysis tools enabled the teams to gather intelligence from publicly available satellite imagery. This allowed them to detect infrastructure changes, movements of military assets, and other indicators that could inform their strategic assessments.

Israel’s Assassination of Hamas Head Creates Dilemma for Tehran

Reza Parchizadeh

The assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, chairman of Hamas’s Political Bureau, in Tehran on July 31 was a significant tactical and propaganda victory for Israel (Middle East Monitor, August 19). The operation both eliminated the leader of a hostile terrorist group aligned with the Iranian regime and demonstrated Israel’s ability to penetrate Iran during a major international political event—in this case, the inauguration of President Massoud Pezeshkian (see Terrorism Monitor, July 31). [1] The assassination was a clear statement that Israel could target any leader of the Islamic Republic at will.

Netanyahu’s Short-Term Concerns

The operation should be seen first in the context of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s immediate concerns. Netanyahu is under intense pressure from various quarters. Domestically, moderate opposition figures have been pushing to oust Netanyahu and reverse his government’s judicial reforms (Al Jazeera, November 16, 2023; Anadolu Agency, August 28). Internationally, the Arab world, some Western countries, international organizations, as well as Russia and China are all pressuring Israel to end the war in Gaza—and in some cases, to recognize a Palestinian state (New York Times, May 31; Amnesty International, February 20; Moscow Times, November 6, 2023; Egypt Today, May 30). During Netanyahu’s recent trip to Washington, American leaders urged him to try to reach a ceasefire with Hamas before all of his conditions were met (AP News, July 25). Israel’s failure so far to achieve its primary objective in the war—eliminating the threat of the Islamist terrorists backed by both the Iranian regime and the Muslim Brotherhood—further compounds these pressures.

The Harris-Trump Debate Taught Us Very Little About U.S. Plans for the World

Ravi Agrawal

On Tuesday night, tens of millions of Americans watched as Vice President Kamala Harris marched up to former President Donald Trump and shook his hand—it was their first-ever meeting—before they tussled on stage for 90 minutes on a range of domestic and foreign-policy issues.

Germany Isn’t Nearly as Important as the U.S. Thinks

Dalibor Rohac

A lot of ink has been spilled on Germany’s supposed stinginess, hypocrisy, and lack of a geopolitical compass. The country’s 2025 draft budget, approved by the governing coalition after some acrimony, is halving aid to Ukraine to just over $4 billion and offers little prospect of future assistance while narrowly meeting NATO’s 2 percent defense spending target—all of it to satisfy the country’s strict public debt rules.

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)