Indian Strategic Studies: 08/20/24

20 August 2024

Starlink’s Passage: Hard In India, But Smooth In Sri Lanka – Analysis

P. K. Balachandran

Starlink has faced procedural, business and security issues in India, but had none of these issues in Sri Lanka when the deal was struck.

Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service Starlink has had a remarkably smooth entry into Sri Lanka in contrast to its experience in India where it has been facing procedural, business and security issues.

It was in June this year that Elon Musk and the Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe met on the side lines of an international conference in Indonesia and set the ball rolling for Starlink’s entry into Sri Lanka.

By August 12, Starlink had got the license to operate. Starlink is not a telecommunications company in Sri Lanka and yet the Telecommunication Regulatory Commission of Sri Lanka (TRCSL) approved it under Sections 17 and 22 of the Telecommunications Regulatory Act, and granted it a frequency license.

Starlink is a satellite-based high-speed internet connectivity system which can reach people in remote areas where signals are weak currently. It consists of thousands of satellites (6500 by one estimate) which orbit the earth at a height of 550 km. Because of its relative proximity to the earth’s surface, Starlink’s satellites offer considerably faster signals.

Starlink is already operational in multiple countries including Nigeria, Peru, Mexico, Portugal, the Philippines, Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Justifying his decision to bring Starlink to Sri Lanka, President Wickremesinghe said: “This initiative aims to address Wi-Fi connectivity issues, particularly in areas outside Colombo.”

According to datareportal.com there were 12.34 million internet users in Sri Lanka in January 2024. Internet penetration is 56.3% of the total population. Internet users increased by 460,000 (3.9%) between January 2023 and January 2024.

India’s Quest for Nuclear Energy: In Pursuit of Clean Energy Goals, Despite Protests

Shanthie Mariet D’Souza

On the afternoon of August 2, a small hamlet in India’s Rajasthan state bore witness to the on-ground challenges that impede India’s gradual transition to clean energy. In the Chhoti Sarwan area of Banswara district, tribal protesters – men, women and children – violently clashed with the police for three hours over a proposed nuclear plant. Many were injured as the police removed protesters from the area.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will lay the foundation stone for the plant in the coming month.

Spread over 660 hectares, the proposed Mahi-Banswara Rajasthan Atomic Power Plant project, to be built at a cost of approximately $6 billion, will produce 2.8 gigawatt (GW) of power. It will also displace over 3,000 people from eight villages, which will be vacated and demolished. While some of the displaced people have been compensated monetarily and have been provided with alternate land in nearby locations, others are demanding jobs in the power plant, citing job losses tied to the project. Local politicians say that people are also concerned about the environmental impact the plant can have on their land, water, and air. The displaced were unaware of the exact nature of the project for which they were asked to part with their land.

The protests may have shown local opposition, but the police actions clearly displayed the Indian state’s unwavering resolve to push past objections and achieve its clean energy goals for 2032 and 2070.

Indeed, nuclear energy has a critical place in India’s plans to implement a diverse portfolio of its energy mix policies nationally and within individual states to improve energy efficiency, develop clean energy sources, and prepare for the impacts of climate change. Official assessments have indicated that without substantial investment in nuclear as well as other green energies, India’s net-zero emission goals will not be met by 2070. The government seems to have prioritized setting up nuclear plants.

Starlink’s Passage: Hard In India, But Smooth In Sri Lanka – Analysis

P. K. Balachandran

Starlink has faced procedural, business and security issues in India, but had none of these issues in Sri Lanka when the deal was struck.

Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service Starlink has had a remarkably smooth entry into Sri Lanka in contrast to its experience in India where it has been facing procedural, business and security issues.

It was in June this year that Elon Musk and the Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe met on the side lines of an international conference in Indonesia and set the ball rolling for Starlink’s entry into Sri Lanka.

By August 12, Starlink had got the license to operate. Starlink is not a telecommunications company in Sri Lanka and yet the Telecommunication Regulatory Commission of Sri Lanka (TRCSL) approved it under Sections 17 and 22 of the Telecommunications Regulatory Act, and granted it a frequency license.

Starlink is a satellite-based high-speed internet connectivity system which can reach people in remote areas where signals are weak currently. It consists of thousands of satellites (6500 by one estimate) which orbit the earth at a height of 550 km. Because of its relative proximity to the earth’s surface, Starlink’s satellites offer considerably faster signals.

Starlink is already operational in multiple countries including Nigeria, Peru, Mexico, Portugal, the Philippines, Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Justifying his decision to bring Starlink to Sri Lanka, President Wickremesinghe said: “This initiative aims to address Wi-Fi connectivity issues, particularly in areas outside Colombo.”

According to datareportal.com there were 12.34 million internet users in Sri Lanka in January 2024. Internet penetration is 56.3% of the total population. Internet users increased by 460,000 (3.9%) between January 2023 and January 2024.

The nature and extent of the Taliban’s involvement in the drug trade before and after the regime change (1994–2022): insights from experts

Hamid Azizi

Introduction

The convergence of organized crime and terrorism has been an ongoing concern. The United Nations Security Council Resolution 2482, adopted in 2019, warned governments about the increasing cooperation between terrorist and organized crime groups worldwide. This crime-terror cooperation occurs in diverse environments and involves groups, with a wide range of motivations, ready to engage in various criminal activities.Footnote1

State weakness, in conflict and post-conflict settings, serves as a catalyst for the emergence of the crime-terror nexus. When states exhibit vulnerability, and the inability to exert territorial control and enforce law, they inadvertently create fertile ground for the proliferation and empowerment of both terrorist entities and organized crime syndicates.Footnote2

According to Makarenko’s crime-terror model,Footnote3 terrorist and criminal organizations form alliances which can be one-off, a short-term or a long-term relationship. These alliances occur for various reasons, including mutual economic benefits, operational support, and the exchange of knowledge and expertise. Makarenko suggests that terrorist and criminal organizations ultimately converge into a single entity, at the midpoint in the crime-terror continuum. This convergence creates a hybrid entity that exhibits both ideological and economic motivations simultaneously. Examples of such hybrid entities include the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the Irish Republican Army (IRA), and the Dawood Ibrahim company.Footnote

Myanmar’s Quagmire: China’s Strategic Interests And Indonesia’s Potential As A Peacebroker – Analysis

Simon Hutagalung

The protracted conflict in Myanmar, known for its ongoing repression of opposition groups and ethnic minorities by the military junta, has resulted in significant regional instability. The recent meeting between former Myanmar military leader Than Shwe and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi underscores China’s increasing influence in the region. While China presents itself as a mediator, there are concerns about its true intentions and whether its actions are genuinely aimed at restoring peace or driven by self-interest.

Given these circumstances, it is crucial to critically examine Indonesia’s role and potential under President-Elect Prabowo to assume a bridging role in the diplomatic landscape of Southeast Asia. The political turmoil in Myanmar has persisted since the military coup in February 2021, which deposed the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. The junta’s rule has been characterised by severe crackdowns on dissent, widespread human rights abuses, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of individuals. Ethnic minority groups, particularly the Rohingya population, have faced considerable persecution, while the country’s economy has suffered due to mismanagement by the military.

The ongoing violence and instability in Myanmar have not only exacerbated the domestic crisis but also had far-reaching implications for regional security and international relations. In response to this situation, Myanmar has increasingly relied on China for support. The recent meeting between Than Shwe and Wang Yi highlights Myanmar’s dependence on Chinese assistance in sustaining the junta’s hold on power. Than Shwe’s request for help from China in restoring stability provides insight into the deepening relationship between the two nations. However, China’s involvement in Myanmar is primarily driven by strategic interests rather than altruistic motives.

China’s involvement in Myanmar is multifaceted. On the one hand, Beijing has offered diplomatic and military assistance to the junta, shielding it from international condemnation and sanctions. This support has been crucial in enabling the regime to survive despite widespread international isolation. On the other hand, China has also engaged with ethnic insurgent groups in Myanmar, helping to broker ceasefires and serving as a mediator in conflicts.

The Big Picture

We all know the trope: a machine grows so intelligent that its apparent consciousness becomes indistinguishable from our own, and then it surpasses us – and possibly even turns against us. As investment pours into efforts to make such technology – so-called artificial general intelligence (AGI) – a reality, how scared of such scenarios should we be?

According to MIT’s Daron Acemoglu, the focus on “catastrophic risks due to AGI” is excessive and misguided, because it “(unhelpfully) anthropomorphizes AI” and “leads us to focus on the wrong targets.” A more productive discussion would focus on the factors that will determine whether AI is used for good or bad: “who controls [the technology], what their objectives are, and what kind of regulations they are subjected to.”

Joseph S. Nye, Jr., agrees that, whatever might happen with AGI in the future, the “growing risks from today’s narrow AI,” such as autonomous weapons and new forms of biological warfare, “already demand greater attention.” China, he points out, is already betting big on an “AI arms race,” seeking to benefit from “structural advantages” such as the relative lack of “legal or privacy limits on access to data” for training models.

As Oscar-winning filmmaker and tech investor Charles Ferguson explains, China now “dominates world markets for mass-produced dual-use hardware such as drones and robots.” And while the US, Western Europe, Taiwan, and South Korea still lead China (and Russia) in most of the technologies comprising the “stack” that underpins AI-driven products, their “lead is narrowing.” Given the slow pace of policy debates and legislative processes – “not to mention the product cycles of the Pentagon and legacy defense contractors” – they may soon fall behind.

Another area where China is advancing fast is surveillance technology, such as facial-recognition AI. As MIT’s Martin Beraja, Harvard’s David Y. Yang, and the University of Oxford’s Noam Yuchtman found in a recent study, “autocracies and weak democracies” are lining up to buy what China is selling. Worryingly, they are particularly likely to do this in years when they experience domestic unrest, and these countries appear to be “less likely to develop into mature democracies than peer countries with low imports of surveillance AI.” As with other goods that generate negative externalities, “tighter AI trade regulation” is in order.

Vientiane’s New Strategic Returns To Hanoi – Analysis

Collins Chong Yew Keat

Vietnam’s President To Lam made a first trip abroad since taking office with a visit to Laos in July last month, in enhancing a 62-year relationship between the two neighbours.

This serves as a message of intent and strong trust building capacity to preserve and elevate the values-based approach and basis of the bilateral ties between the two nations, as both share similar governance systems and external challenges and threats.

The visit is in response to the invitation from his Lao counterpart Thongloun Sisoulith, who is also Secretary General of the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party Central Committee.

With different agreements signed, it signals the intent by both sides to deepen the ties that will be firstly pinned on economic and trade enhancement and interdependence, and by using this as a basis and the fundamental platform for deeper ideological and political coordination and linkages.

As the first primary factor, Hanoi will want to consolidate regional economic friendshoring as a solid fundamental factor to build on more rapport and trust in securing security and geopolitical interests.

As Hanoi is traditionally dependent upon China and the greater archipelago members of the Southeast Asian nations for trade, investment and economic advancement, and with Russia and the US for the greater security and defence support, the Mekong region remains critical and strategic for Hanoi to increase its fallback and leverage options.

Two-way trade between Laos and Vietnam in the first quarter of 2024 reached US$476.8 million, an increase of 12 percent as compared to last year.

With a total registered capital of US$5.5 billion, Vietnam is among the top three foreign investors in Laos.

Economic Hostility: United States vs. China A Great Power Competition Report

Monte Erfourth

The Strategy Central Great Power Competition report series details the United States and China’s great power competition in the first half 2024. It offers an analysis to help strategists grasp the current rivalry between these two superpowers regarding national power, economics, military power, and diplomacy. This is the second of five segments covering each aspect of great power competition and will focus on economic competition.

The economic aspect of great power competition between the United States and China is the most dynamic dimension of their rivalry. It has far-reaching implications for global stability and the balance of power. This article delves into the economic hard edges that define this competition, examining how each nation leverages its economic strengths and addresses its vulnerabilities to outmaneuver the other. The analysis covers the strategies both nations employ, including trade policies, technological advancements, and investment initiatives, and how these efforts shape the global economic landscape.

The ongoing economic tensions between the two superpowers, including the imposition of tariffs, export controls, and investment restrictions, will also be examined. These measures reflect a broader strategy by both the United States and China to secure critical resources, dominate key technological sectors, and influence global markets. The great powers’ pursuit of resources impacts other nations, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region, where the competition between China and the United States is most intense.

Ultimately, this article aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the economic strategies and policies driving the great power competition between the United States and China. By examining the strengths and weaknesses of both nations' economies and the broader geopolitical implications of their rivalry, the article offers insights into the future trajectory of global power dynamics and the potential outcomes of this ongoing competition.

Iran Finesses Its Deterrence Strategy – OpEd

M.K. Bhadrakumar

The latest Israeli spin has it that Iran cannot make up its mind whether to retaliate or not for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on July 28 while on a visit to Tehran for the inaugural of President Masoud Pezeshkian.

The hypothesis here is that there must be a standoff between Pezeshkian and hardliners of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) with the new president pushing back against any aggressive strategy against Israel.

Prima facie, it is a ridiculous spin. But Iran rebutted it, nonetheless, with the Acting Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani stating as recently as on Saturday night that Tehran “will make the aggressor Israeli regime pay the price for its aggression in a legitimate and decisive action.” Those were carefully chosen words.

But how come Iran didn’t act for a fortnight already? Several factors are in play here. First, Pezeshkian has not yet formed his government. He submitted his list of proposed ministers to the Parliament for approval only yesterday. The executive branch of the government is carrying on with day-to-day functioning.

Nonetheless, according to Russian media, Pezeshkian did speak about Iran’s retaliatory strike against Israel at a meeting with the visiting Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu on July 5 in Tehran.

That said, do not rule out that there could be some calibration in the timing. After all, Israel is in panic and reports say people stay awake at night fearing Iranian attack. According to IRNA, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for all his bravado, evacuated four of Israel’s important intelligence and security bases in Tel Aviv.

Second, Iran will not act as “spoiler” when regional states and the US are pulling all stops to pick up the threads of the Gaza ceasefire talks between Hamas and Israel. The fact that Israel agreed to the talks on Thursday suggests that Netanyahu also sees advantages in returning to the negotiating table.

Of course, Iran will also be carefully weighing the scale of its attack on Israel. After all, Haniyeh was killed in a covert operation in which there was no Iranian casualty.

The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization: Reform Challenges

Tana Johnson

Carnegie’s Global Order and Institutions Program identifies promising new multilateral initiatives and frameworks to realize a more peaceful, prosperous, just, and sustainable world. That mission has never been more important, or more challenging. Geopolitical competition, populist nationalism, economic inequality, technological innovation, and a planetary ecological emergency are testing the rules-based international order and complicating collective responses to shared threats. Our mission is to design global solutions to global problems.Learn More

There have been many calls—not least from developing countries—to reform major economic institutions such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the World Trade Organization (WTO). But before entertaining reform ideas, we must grapple with a pair of uncomfortable questions. Are these three organizations fully devoted to poorer countries’ economic and social development? And, are they uniquely equipped to deal with development? These questions are especially pertinent today, as the organizations wrestle with making economic growth “environmentally sustainable,” promoting climate-oriented development, and adding climate action to their already-complex portfolios. On both questions, there are reasons for skepticism.

Questioning Devotion to Development: Self-Preservation

The devotion to development is worth scrutinizing because all three organizations initially pivoted toward development less out of convicton than as broader moves toward organizational self-preservation. The World Bank pivoted first. Designed in 1944 with the primary task of helping advanced European countries with postwar reconstruction, the World Bank was sidelined in this task by early 1948, when the United States launched its own European Recovery Program (more colloquially known as the Marshall Plan) as part of geopolitical efforts to contain the Soviet Union.

Russia Is Being Drawn Deeper Into the Middle East Conflict

Nikita Smagin

Carnegie Politika is a digital publication that features unmatched analysis and insight on Russia, Ukraine and the wider region. For nearly a decade, Carnegie Politika has published contributions from members of Carnegie’s global network of scholars and well-known outside contributors and has helped drive important strategic conversations and policy debates.Learn More

The Middle East is experiencing a level of conflict unseen for decades. The spiral of escalation that began with the terrorist attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023, has now lasted almost a year and looks increasingly less like an aberration and more like a new stage in the region’s history.

For many years, Russia has striven to keep its distance from events in the Middle East, maintaining channels of communication with all parties. But the new, post-October 7 reality has made this an ever more difficult tightrope to walk. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine led Moscow to seek warmer relations with Iran, which has caused serious concern in the United States and Israel. That concern has been aggravated by the confrontation between the United States and Russia, which pushes Moscow further into Tehran’s arms. Even if Russia would like to continue to perform a balancing act in the Middle East, regional powers increasingly believe it has taken a side—and they will act accordingly.

Moscow’s deepening ties with Tehran have been obvious since the start of the war in Ukraine. In official statements, Russia often now takes Iran’s side against Israel, while in Syria, the two sides team up to pressure the United States, with Russian jets maneuvering dangerously close to U.S. aircraft while pro-Iranian groups attack U.S. assets on the ground.

Nevertheless, Russia has not been in a hurry to ditch its previous role as a mediator. Even though there is no longer any dialogue between Moscow and Washington, Moscow continues to try to talk to other powers—even Israel. That is entirely rational: after all, a full-on spat could lead to Israel retaliating, perhaps by sending arms to Ukraine. As time passes, however, Russia will find it harder to claim neutrality while deepening its cooperation with Iran.

EU Initiative To Arm Ukraine: Beset By Allegations Of Mismanagement And Corruption – Analysis

James Durso

It is encouraging to see European nations stepping up to arm Ukraine, but their flagship effort at a coordinated strategy is faltering badly. According to a report released Monday by the Czech Senate, the Czech Munitions Initiative—a key component of this strategy—is falling short of its goals.

The Czech Munitions Initiative was conceived to leverage the Czech Republic’s historical strengths in the arms industry, pooling allied resources to procure munitions for Ukraine. The initiative had two primary objectives: first, to purchase arms from jurisdictions that would not sell directly to Ukraine, and, second, to create a single buyer, avoiding twenty allied nations competing for the same limited supplies. Germany, Denmark, Norway, and several other nations supported the effort, contributing between €1.4 billion and €1.6 billion. However, France, Britain, and Italy refused to participate, a decision that now appears prudent in light of this week’s report.

Czech opposition leader Andrej Babiš was among the first to criticize the initiative, accusing arms companies of price gouging and the government of favoritism or corruption in awarding contracts. Babiš broke a political taboo by alleging that a contractor previously employing the initiative’s coordinator, Tomáš Pojar, was making exorbitant profits of €1,000 per shell. His criticism was met with personal attacks accusations he was a Russia sympathizer, overshadowing the substance of his claims.

A case in point is the procurement of 180,000 units of 155mm M107 artillery shells, funded by Germany. These shells were sold to Ukraine at €3,200 per unit, despite an alternative Turkish supplier offering them for €2,500 per unit. This transaction alone cost Ukraine over $110 million—money that could have purchased up to an additional 40,000 shells.

This overpricing is not an isolated incident. The Czech government has repeatedly bypassed competitive bidding processes, instead relying on a non-transparent system with a narrow selection of suppliers. This practice not only inflates costs but also stifles competition and innovation, depriving Ukraine’s military of potentially better and more cost-effective solutions.

Ukraine’s Russia Advance Changes War Narrative – Analysis

Luke Coffey

For the first time in more than 80 years, Russian territory has been invaded. Ukrainian forces crossed the state border in a surprise move, entering the Kursk Oblast with thousands of troops and hundreds of armored vehicles.

There has been heavy fighting, with Russia scrambling to reinforce the area. The Ukrainians have captured more than 70 villages. More than 130,000 Russian civilians have been displaced since Ukraine launched its operation on Aug. 6. According to open-source intelligence, Ukraine now controls approximately 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory — an area slightly larger than Bahrain.

While Ukraine’s audacious military operation may have caught some off guard, the location and timing of this offensive were far from coincidental.

Kursk Oblast has deep historical ties to Ukrainian culture. In the 17th and 18th centuries, Ukrainian peasants, Cossacks, and other settlers were granted “slobodas” in what is now modern-day Kursk, Belgorod and Voronezh oblasts in Russia, and Sumy and Kharkiv oblasts in Ukraine. This region was known as Sloboda Ukraine. These slobodas enjoyed significant governing autonomy and tax-free status, fostering a unique cultural identity that is still evident to this day. Although accurate census data is scarce, it is believed that tens of thousands of ethnic Ukrainians currently reside in Russia’s Kursk Oblast. Consequently, a military operation in Kursk resonates positively, emotionally and sentimentally with the Ukrainian public.

Kursk Oblast is also home to crucial transport links, including major highways for the movement of military supplies and troops. The Sudzha gas terminal, critical for the remaining Russian natural gas exports to Europe, is in Kursk Oblast. Ukrainians control the terminal, but there has been no noticeable reduction in gas flow thus far. The Kursk railway hub connects central Russia with southwestern regions, including the border areas near Ukraine, making it vital for logistical support. Ukrainian military planners were undoubtedly aware of the logistical importance of Kursk.

US Has Ukraine’s Back In Kursk Incursion – OpEd

M.K. Bhadrakumar

As the Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region rolls on, war conditions have appeared in Russia for the first time since the Second World War. It is a stunning experience that an estimated 180,000 people have become internally displaced.

Ukrainian military was apparently gasping for breath, per Russian narrative. But Ukrainian mastery of combined arms warfare is on display and it is impressive — deploying everything from air defence to electronic warfare and armour and infantry. Ukraine made its point that it is capable of mounting a combined arms assault and bring some pain to Russians.

The best spin that pro-Russian analysts could think of is that the Kremlin had set a trap actually so that Ukraine’s soldiers could once again be put into the meat grinder. It Is hogwash. It’s impossible to cover up the naked truth that Russian military has been caught with its pants down.

Of course, Russians will eventually bring in enough forces to overwhelm the invading Ukrainians but it may take time as there’s no front-line. Kiev, which claims to be in control 1000 sq. km of Russian territory, says it is not interested in “taking territory” but will continue its offensive until Moscow agrees to “a just peace.” But Ukraine has set up a command centre inside Russia, hinting at prolonged occupation.

Without doubt, this is a huge political and diplomatic setback for Russia and highlights that a Russian victory in Ukraine’s battlefields is not yet a foregone conclusion. That is not surprising, since this Clausewitzean war is absoluter Krieg (‘pure war’) — “the collision of two living forces” — and, therefore, a complex of interactions, multi-layered and often unpredictable exists where goals of the warring states will be invariably influenced by the course of the war.

Is Drill Everywhere Good For The Oil Companies? – OpEd

Dean Baker

The Trump campaign has made “drill everywhere” one of its main campaign slogans, implying that it will radically weaken environmental and other restrictions on oil drilling. This is supposed to be good for both the economy, since it would in principle mean lower gas and energy prices more generally, but also the oil industry since it won’t have to worry about government regulations in deciding where and how to drill. Increased oil production would be bad news for the environment since it likely means more local contamination, but more importantly, it will increase greenhouse gas emissions which will accelerate global warming.

The bizarre aspect to this story is that somehow lower oil prices is supposed to be a good thing for the oil industry. Predicting oil prices is not an easy thing to do, and as a practical matter the U.S. is already producing oil at record levels, so “drill everywhere” may not mean much additional oil production. But if the campaign’s promise comes true, and oil prices do fall sharply, that is not likely to be good news for the industry.

The figure below shows the combined profits for the oil and coal industry (the bulk of this oil) since 2013. The numbers are in 2017 dollars, so they are adjusted for inflation.

Territorial Integrity Means Everything

CARL BILDT

Because Ukraine has made no claim to any Russian land, its recent incursion into Russia’s Kursk region is fundamentally different from the Kremlin’s many violations of Ukrainian territorial integrity. Nonetheless, Ukraine’s surprising offensive has brought a foundational principle of European security back into focus.

Since 2014, Russia has brazenly violated Ukraine’s territorial integrity with incursions, illegal annexations, and a full-scale invasion. And now, Ukraine is violating Russia’s territorial integrity with its own incursion into the Kursk region.

Ukraine’s Incursion Into Russia Flips the Script on Putin

Anton Troianovski and Alina Lobzina

Families fleeing invading Ukrainian troops sought shelter from strangers. Russian parents feared that their children might be sent into battle for the first time.

And in a televised crisis meeting on Monday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia flipped through a white legal pad, reading aloud from handwritten notes, suggesting that his aides did not have the time to type up a speech for him as they usually do.

Ukraine’s surprise incursion into a sliver of Russia’s Kursk region last week has not shifted the overall course of the war, but it has already struck a blow well beyond the few hundred square miles of Russia that Ukraine now controls: It has thrust a Russian government and society that had largely adapted to war into a new phase of improvisation and uncertainty.

Mr. Putin has said nothing about the incursion since meeting with security and regional officials, a tense gathering in which the president at one point berated the Kursk governor for revealing the depth and breadth of Ukraine’s advance into Russia. Near the border, where, the authorities say, more than 130,000 people have fled or been evacuated, regional officials appeared unprepared for the crisis — prompting grass-roots aid initiatives to jump in.

To opposition-minded politicians, including some of the few remaining inside Russia, Ukraine’s incursion has offered a rare chance to puncture the Kremlin’s narrative that Russia is steadily heading toward victory — even if it was far from certain that Russians would blame Mr. Putin for their ills. One opposition figure, Lev Shlosberg, in the western city of Pskov, compared the state of Russian society to magma gathering beneath a volcano in which it was unclear when or how it would burst to the surface.

“Current events are, of course, intensifying the crisis,” Mr. Shlosberg said in a phone interview. “But we don’t know where and how this energy of dissatisfaction will go.”

In the city of Kursk, about 50 miles from the border where Ukraine invaded, the politician Yekaterina S. Duntsova described meeting people at a shelter who were so disoriented by having to flee that “they hope that this is all some kind of dream.”

Deploying on U.S. Soil: How Trump Would Use Soldiers Against Riots, Crime and Migrants

Charlie Savage, Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman

During the turbulent summer of 2020, President Donald J. Trump raged at his military and legal advisers, calling them “losers” for objecting to his idea of using federal troops to suppress outbreaks of violence during the nationwide protests over the police murder of George Floyd.

It wasn’t the only time Mr. Trump was talked out of using the military for domestic law enforcement — a practice that would carry profound implications for civil liberties and for the traditional constraints on federal power. He repeatedly raised the idea of using troops to secure border states, and even proposed shooting both violent protesters and undocumented migrants in the legs, former aides have said.

In his first term in office, Mr. Trump never realized his expansive vision of using troops to enforce the law on U.S. soil. But as he has sought a return to power, he has made clear that he intends to use the military for a range of domestic law enforcement purposes, including patrolling the border, suppressing protests that he deems to have turned into riots and even fighting crime in big cities run by Democrats.

“In places where there is a true breakdown of the rule of law, such as the most dangerous neighborhoods in Chicago, the next president should use every power at his disposal to restore order — and, if necessary, that includes sending in the National Guard or the troops,” Mr. Trump said at a conservative conference in Dallas in August 2022, shortly before announcing that he was running to be that next president.

During his time out of power, allies of Mr. Trump have worked on policy papers to provide legal justifications for the former president’s intent to use the military to enforce the law domestically. In public, they have talked about this in the context of border states and undocumented immigrants. But an internal email from a group closely aligned with Mr. Trump, obtained by The Times, shows that, privately, the group was also exploring using troops to “stop riots” by protesters.

Interview – Colin Flint

Colin Flint

Colin Flint, a geographer by training, is Distinguished Professor in the Department of Political Science at Utah State University. His research interests include geopolitics and peacebuilding. He is the author of Near and Far Waters: The Geopolitics of Seapower (Stanford University Press, 2024), Introduction to Geopolitics (Routledge, 4th ed. 2022), Geopolitical Constructs: The Mulberry Harbours, World War Two, and the Making of a Militarized Transatlantic (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), and co-author, with Peter Taylor of Political Geography: World-Economy, Nation-State and Locality Routledge, 7th edition, 2018). He is editor emeritus of the journal Geopolitics. His books have been translated into Spanish, Polish, Korean, Mandarin, Japanese and Farsi.

Where do you see the most exciting research/debates happening in your field?

First, I should tell everyone that I am a geographer by training. All three of my degrees are in the discipline of geography. For many people, geography is a quiz category, a list of facts about mountains, capital cities, etc. How can you get an advanced degree in that?! Academic geography is a theoretically based social science, with some overlap with the humanities, that sees the social construction of places, territories, regions, networks, and scales as inseparable from the processes studied by political science and international relations scholars.

I don’t mean to give a lecture, but this understanding of who I am and what, as a geographer, I do is important to get at the term “field” in the question. I am a political geographer who is informed by world-systems analysis writing on the topic of the relative decline of the US as a hegemonic power, and the rise of China as a challenger, with a focus on seapower. Relations between the Global North and Global South play a big role in how I approach this topic.

The Effects of Wars: Lessons from Ukraine

Ra Mason, Pierre Bocquillon, Suzanne Doyle, Toby James, Soul Park and Matilde Rosina

The devastating war in Ukraine has transformed our understanding of military combat and international politics in the 21st Century. Until now, analyses of the effects of wars – including this one – have tended to be compartmentalised by sub-disciplines. These include International Relations (IR), Security Studies, International Political Economy (IPE), History, Historical Sociology, Public Administration and Psychology, among many others. In contrast, taken together, and addressed from an interdisciplinary perspective, a new set of studies shows how the war has had deep and complex “ripple” and “washback” effects. These are affecting human life; human development; economies; values and attitudes; policy and governance; and power distribution and relations around the world. This complexity, therefore, derives from both the number of actors involved, areas of human society affected and their interconnections. In other words, each of these layers of society have scope to feedback on one another and feedback loops may in turn affect the evolution of conflict and the possibility of its resolution in the future.

Reductive approaches must, therefore, be replaced with a more comprehensive, integrated analysis if specific lessons which are essential to preventing comparable future conflicts are to be learned from the War in Ukraine. Figure 1 (see below) illustrates the framework that we introduce. The integrated study of these ripple effects provides an invaluable understanding of the impact of the war. As such, the remainder of this article looks at these aspects in turn while highlighting their interconnections.

The war in Ukraine continues to rage on with daily deadly effect. Beyond the immediate death and trauma being dealt to life, which has, deservedly, been the focus of much media and public attention, it is also worth considering the impact upon human capital and the wider economy. The long-term consequences of the war on Ukraine’s total productivity are incalculable. For the time being, results show that losses in total productivity are estimated to plummet by about 7% up to 2035 and that the negative effects will fade away only slowly over the following decades. Moreover, these results should actually be taken with a degree of caution, as they might underestimate the true extent of the conflict’s impact.

US Has Ukraine’s Back In Kursk Incursion – OpEd

M.K. Bhadrakumar

As the Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region rolls on, war conditions have appeared in Russia for the first time since the Second World War. It is a stunning experience that an estimated 180,000 people have become internally displaced.

Ukrainian military was apparently gasping for breath, per Russian narrative. But Ukrainian mastery of combined arms warfare is on display and it is impressive — deploying everything from air defence to electronic warfare and armour and infantry. Ukraine made its point that it is capable of mounting a combined arms assault and bring some pain to Russians.

The best spin that pro-Russian analysts could think of is that the Kremlin had set a trap actually so that Ukraine’s soldiers could once again be put into the meat grinder. It Is hogwash. It’s impossible to cover up the naked truth that Russian military has been caught with its pants down.

Of course, Russians will eventually bring in enough forces to overwhelm the invading Ukrainians but it may take time as there’s no front-line. Kiev, which claims to be in control 1000 sq. km of Russian territory, says it is not interested in “taking territory” but will continue its offensive until Moscow agrees to “a just peace.” But Ukraine has set up a command centre inside Russia, hinting at prolonged occupation.

Without doubt, this is a huge political and diplomatic setback for Russia and highlights that a Russian victory in Ukraine’s battlefields is not yet a foregone conclusion. That is not surprising, since this Clausewitzean war is absoluter Krieg (‘pure war’) — “the collision of two living forces” — and, therefore, a complex of interactions, multi-layered and often unpredictable exists where goals of the warring states will be invariably influenced by the course of the war.

Clausewitz wrote in his classic work On War that the complexity of actual war is evident in what he called a “remarkable trinity” of passion, reason and chance that underlie wars.

Ukraine’s Russia Advance Changes War Narrative – Analysis

Luke Coffey

For the first time in more than 80 years, Russian territory has been invaded. Ukrainian forces crossed the state border in a surprise move, entering the Kursk Oblast with thousands of troops and hundreds of armored vehicles.

There has been heavy fighting, with Russia scrambling to reinforce the area. The Ukrainians have captured more than 70 villages. More than 130,000 Russian civilians have been displaced since Ukraine launched its operation on Aug. 6. According to open-source intelligence, Ukraine now controls approximately 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory — an area slightly larger than Bahrain.

While Ukraine’s audacious military operation may have caught some off guard, the location and timing of this offensive were far from coincidental.

Kursk Oblast has deep historical ties to Ukrainian culture. In the 17th and 18th centuries, Ukrainian peasants, Cossacks, and other settlers were granted “slobodas” in what is now modern-day Kursk, Belgorod and Voronezh oblasts in Russia, and Sumy and Kharkiv oblasts in Ukraine. This region was known as Sloboda Ukraine. These slobodas enjoyed significant governing autonomy and tax-free status, fostering a unique cultural identity that is still evident to this day. Although accurate census data is scarce, it is believed that tens of thousands of ethnic Ukrainians currently reside in Russia’s Kursk Oblast. Consequently, a military operation in Kursk resonates positively, emotionally and sentimentally with the Ukrainian public.

Kursk Oblast is also home to crucial transport links, including major highways for the movement of military supplies and troops. The Sudzha gas terminal, critical for the remaining Russian natural gas exports to Europe, is in Kursk Oblast. Ukrainians control the terminal, but there has been no noticeable reduction in gas flow thus far. The Kursk railway hub connects central Russia with southwestern regions, including the border areas near Ukraine, making it vital for logistical support. Ukrainian military planners were undoubtedly aware of the logistical importance of Kursk.

Understanding Russia’s war against Ukraine: Political, eschatological and cataclysmic dimensions

Katri Pynnöniemi & Kati Parppei

Introduction

Research communities play a key role in assessing and interpreting significance of major military events.Footnote1 Historically, wars have been categorized into regular, irregular, and inter-state wars or distinguished in terms of scale from major wars of global significance to civil wars and wars fought for national liberation. Another set of conceptualizations address developments in specific domains (cyber, economic, information war) or their combination as a hybrid warfare.Footnote2 Inherent in these different conceptualizations are political and normative assumptions in accordance with which research communities explain wars and deem the just or unjust, irrational or rational.Footnote3

At the eve of Russia’s large-scale invasion against Ukraine, many in the western research community continued to think that ‘wars occur due to irrational behaviour or accident’Footnote4 and were therefore surprised by Putin’s decision. This was followed by discussion on reasons why expectations of Russia’s military performance fell short, and the attack did not lead to quick capitulation of Ukraine.Footnote5 Whereas, in the Russian context, escalation of the ten-year long conflict into an invasion (‘special military operation’) was framed with an aura of inevitability.Footnote6 The texts published in the Russian military and military-historical periodicals fell mostly silent on actual conduct of war, and instead, called for systematic destruction of Ukrainian political institutions and society, denied Ukraine’s sovereignty, and blamed the ‘collective West’ for waging a global hybrid war against Russia.Footnote7 The war became thinkable for the Russian political leaders due to the long-term discursive patterns that shaped the way in which they saw the strategic environment and threats to Russia’s national interests.Footnote

The digital cult of the offensive and the US military

Jacquelyn Schneider

For the US, the information age seemed to advantage the offense, with technologies and campaigns of long-range, fast, and overwhelming first strike advantage. But where did the US digital cult of the offensive come from? To answer this question, I examine the development of two key US warfighting concepts – the Army’s field manual 100-5 and the 2012 Air Sea Battle. The exploration reveals a complicated relationship between civ-mil relations, an American and Army culture at a key domestic moment, and a geopolitical context which culminated to create a digital cult of the offensive in the information age.

In the mid-twentieth century, inventors discovered they could condense the labyrinth of vacuum tubes – the brain of first computers – into a tiny silicon disc called the microprocessor. The microprocessor fundamentally changed the world’s relationship with information, creating potential for vast quantities of data. The subsequent advent of the internet and its ability to connect data stored on these tiny silicon chips across thousands of miles enabled the introduction of precision-guided missiles, remotely controlled weapons, and increasingly long-distance and autonomous intelligence collection.

The growing menace of cyber warfare

Maryum Khalid

Cyber warfare refers to the use of digital attacks to harm a nation, organization, or individual by damaging or disrupting their computer systems, networks, or information. It can range from espionage and data theft to sabotage and even physical damage through hacking critical infrastructure.

Cyber warfare typically involves a state perpetrating cyber attacks on another. However, in some cases, the attacks are carried out by terrorist organizations and non-state actors seeking to further the goal of a hostile nation. There are several examples of alleged cyber warfare in recent history, but there is no universal and formal definition for how a cyber attack may constitute an act of war.

Types of cyber warfare attacks

Below are given some of the main types of cyber attacks.

Espionage

Refers to monitoring other countries to steal secrets. In cyber warfare, this can involve using botnets or spear phishing attacks To compromise sensitive computer systems before exfiltrating sensitive information. Usually, governments and organizations engage in cyber espionage to steal confidential information like military secrets, trade secrets, intellectual property, etc.

Cyber sabotage

This can involve sabotaging or disrupting critical infrastructure such as power grids, transportation systems, or financial networks. This can cause widespread chaos and damage to a state's economy and security.

Distributed denial of service (DoS attacks)

The use of botnets to bombard websites with fake requests is known as a DoS and it is designed to overwhelm systems and take critical operations or services offline.

Supervision

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