The National Interest

Much to the chagrin of traditional Georgia watchers in the West, an undeniable return of great power competition has compelled the current political leadership in Tbilisi to pursue a more pragmatic foreign policy. However, this has not spared the current ruling party, Georgian Dream (GD), from Western criticism. Tbilisi stands being accused of deviating from Georgia’s traditional pro-Western course.

This criticism is astonishing, mainly because recent excoriations of the ruling GD government inaccurately reflect the collective spirit of Georgian society. Georgia’s storied history is embedded in its pro-Western strategic culture. Even the ultranationalist but democratically elected first president, Zviad Gamsakurdia, attempted to use his “strategic idealism” with Washington, but to no avail. Georgia, in other words, has been offering itself to the collective West on a silver platter throughout its early and modern history without any takers. Still, Tbilisi is openly being accused, for all the wrong reasons, of deviating from its traditional Western-oriented foreign policy.

So, what is lurking behind this tactical change in Tbilisi? The gist of it seems to center around the fact that Georgian society has started to awaken from Tbilisi’s strategic slumber from the previous decades. And while the country remains overwhelmingly pro-Western, the overall anti-Russian hysteria that defined the presidency of the now-jailed Mikhail Saakashvili—the boisterous golden boy of the Bush administration—has subsided. In turn, Washington’s foreign policy community has expressed explicit irritation with Tbilisi for being out of tune with Washington’s drumbeat, which in the past has kept Georgia firmly in line with the high pitch of Moscow-bashing. 

Consider the accusations from former U.S. ambassador to Georgia, Ian Kelly. The ambassador blames Tbilisi for straying from the West and not showing enough solidarity with Ukraine. Such commentary is suggestive of political spin, if not of an intentional omission of facts. Kelly’s meaning following his peculiar statement that “…this is a very bad time for all this when there is a real discussion about NATO enlargement,” is also unclear. It is precisely because of the unfettered promotion of Georgia for NATO membership that Russia felt threatened and invaded it in 2008. Were it not for Saakashvili’s recklessness, Georgia could have kept Moscow not only from invading it, but also from recognizing the two regions of Abkhazia and Tskhinvali as independent states—something that Eduard Shevardnadze had achieved by balancing with Moscow. In other words, Georgia’s strategic stance went from bad to worse in a matter of five days. And yet, judging from these comments, this existential threat to Georgia seems to matter little to the ambassador, as long as the NATO expansionism talk continues unfazed.

In yet another instance, Luke Coffey suggested that Georgia should be pushed into NATO, but without the Article V guarantees for the two separatist regions. But again, such fantastical innovations augment the existential threat Georgia faces from Russia. The reason Moscow supports separatist movements in these regions is to ensure that not a sliver of Georgian territory joins NATO. Therefore, it is far from clear how Russia will ever accept what would amount to a separate peace with Abkhazia and Tskhinvali while the rest of Georgia receives Article V protection. Even the most ardent proponents of liberal internationalism must suspect that such a policy would further weaken Georgia’s sovereignty by once again enraging Moscow. 

Needless to say, the gradual accumulation of such views created a toxic political climate. Most recently, pushback came from Georgia Dream, the party of Georgia’s own prime minister. It claimed that “certain forces” in Ukraine close to the United National Movement (UNM) were engaged in machinations to push Georgia into opening the second front against Russia. Even U.S. ambassador to Georgia Kelly Degnan had to explicitly deny such rumors to calm political waters. Degnan also had to face her own audience in Washington, when members of U.S. Congress became interested. However, the damage had already been done; four former members of the current government wrote an open letter claiming that the European Union (EU) would not grant Georgia its candidate status if it “does not join the war or join the sanctions against Russia.”

And of course, the current context of political petulance would not be complete without the ominous shadow of the UNM that continues to loom large in Georgian politics. The criminality of Saakashvili’s regime has deeply stigmatized the population and made it wary of UNM’s return. So far, a good indication of this shift in public perspective is that Saakashvili’s arrest has not generated the level of support among his electorate that he had hoped. Bereft of political and moral legitimacy, it is unlikely that he will return to politics in Georgia any time soon. 

To be sure, GD has been far from innocent in this political quagmire. Having skillfully used this uncertainty, it has dangled the prospect of UNM’s return as the resumption of state terror. Having won an unprecedented third term, GD has managed to keep the population at bay even with its consistent failure to improve the economy and its blatant withdrawal from EU-brokered agreements. Ironically, this failure has not prevented it from exploiting the existing public perception that the UNM is being egged on against GD by Georgia’s Western partners. 

In order to diffuse tensions, the West must take the high road and de-escalate the political climate in Tbilisi. The current political duel is shabby theatrics and only deepens polarization. The West exerts much more influence over Tbilisi, but political officials in Washington must understand how to properly take advantage of it. One aspect of the relationship they must leverage is Georgia’s long-held tradition of using personal relations as a way to engage in robust diplomacy behind the scenes. Further, Washington must forego its infatuation with Saakashvili, recognize harsh realities on the ground, and treat the GD as an equal player.

Lastly and most importantly, geopolitics is part and parcel of the region. Western officials must consider this vital fact, prior to equating Tbilisi’s pragmatism with an anti-Western shift. Georgia has bandwagoned before with its northern neighbor. This geopolitical consideration should not come as a surprise to Washington, given that it cannot guarantee Georgia’s security in either the short- or long-term. Georgians have started to pay closer attention to this dynamic, if only because the historic visit of the American president to their country frustrated their hopes for NATO membership. 

Ironically, the United States and Georgia are tied together. Even though Georgia does not represent a “vital” security interest for the United States, Washington has made enormous political, financial, and military investments to strengthen Georgia’s legitimacy and sovereignty. If Washington wants to strengthen this tie with Georgia, American policymakers must show strategic flexibility by reducing pressure on the leadership in Tbilisi. No great decisions can be made while Georgian policymakers are constantly squeezed between a rock and a hard place.

Giorgi Lasha Kasradze is an academic liaison and strategic business development officer at Sokhumi State University and a graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.

Image: Shutterstock.

In the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there has been much speculation about Taiwanese citizens’ willingness to defend themselves against a Chinese attack. A poll in March 2022 revealed that the Taiwanese public, rather than chickening out, has actually become much more willing than in the past to support the country’s self-defense. Since then, more than half a year has elapsed. With the threat of a war with China continuing to loom large and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s significant setback in Taiwan’s local elections, there is renewed interest in gauging the pulse of the public on this critical national security issue. 

We draw insights from the results of the most recent Taiwan National Security Survey (TNSS), conducted in mid-December 2022 with over 1,0000 respondents. The TNSS is one of the most consistent sources of national security research on Taiwan, as it has conducted annual surveys since 2002. TNSS survey results are often seen as representative of the entire voting population in Taiwan. We feel reassured that, overall, attitudes toward self-defense continued to stay at a high level. In an open-ended response setting, 31 percent of respondents gave responses that could be seen as defending Taiwan when asked, “If Taiwan and China were to fight a war, what action would you take?” Their answers ranged from joining the military to joining local defense groups to donating money. Owing to the complexity of this open-ended question, 15 percent answered, “Don’t know,” and another 15 percent answered, “Follow whatever the government decided.” Comparing this result to previous versions of the TNSS reveals that support for self-defense has grown. Support for self-defense from the past eleven waves hovered around 15 to 27 percent and never surpassed the threshold of 30 percent.

Such attitudes have been channeled into support for various proposals to boost Taiwan’s security. Since April, the Ministry of National Defense has increased the duration of military leave from five days to two weeks. Moreover, the government just announced it is extending the duration of conscription from four months to one year. Both proposals enjoy widespread support, and the recent TNSS showed that such support has not dropped. When citizens were asked if they would support the government bringing back a one-year conscription period, 33 percent indicated support, with another 46 percent saying they “strongly support” such a measure. On a related question, a majority of respondents said they would back the government if it decided to enlist all males between eighteen and sixty years old to fight against a Chinese invasion, with 31 percent supporting and 29 percent strongly supporting it.

Despite the promising signs, two worrying trends could overshadow this positive development. First, the Taiwanese generally do not believe their military can protect the country, with  66 percent answering “no” when asked, “If Mainland China attacks Taiwan, but the U.S. decides not to help, do you think our military is powerful enough to defend Taiwan?” In addition, the public is divided over whether the Tsai administration is prepared for such a contingency. About 50 percent of respondents thought the government had not “taken the necessary steps to safeguard Taiwan’s survival if a war breaks out with China.” Only 40 percent of respondents said that the government is prepared.

Another worrying trend is the weakening of the belief that the United States would send troops to help Taiwan if a war broke out. Weeks after the invasion of Ukraine began, multiple polls in Taiwan showed that the long-standing belief among most citizens that the U.S. government would send troops to help Taiwan had been shattered. Only a minority now holds such a belief. The results from the TNSS did not deviate from this new reality. In the TNSS survey, in a scenario in which Taiwan does not declare independence, only about 34 percent of citizens believed that the United States would send troops; another 35 percent thought it would only send weapons. Moreover, only 19 percent believed the United States would send troops if a conflict arose due to Taiwan declaring independence. Taiwanese citizens might draw an unfortunate lesson after seeing the United States refuse to intervene in Ukraine.

In sum, both Taipei and Washington should feel confident that the Taiwanese people would stand up for themselves should China invade. The Tsai administration’s recently announced conscription extension—and the public’s support for it—signals that the country is moving in the right direction regarding self-defense. However, other existing concerns persist. Low trust in the Taiwanese military and doubts about U.S. military assistance need to be dealt with urgently, as they might chip away at the hard-earned efforts by the Taiwanese government to strengthen the country’s security against a Chinese invasion.

Charles K. S. Wu is an assistant professor of political science at the University of South Alabama. Find him on Twitter @wupolisciusa.

Fang-Yu Chen is an assistant professor of political science at Soochow University, Taiwan. Find him on Twitter @FangYu_80168.

Yao-Yuan Yeh is the Fayez Sarofim – Cullen Trust for Higher Education Endowed Chair in International Studies, chair of the International Studies & Modern Languages Department, and chair of the Political Science Department at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. Find him on Twitter @yeh2sctw.

Austin Horng-En Wang is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Find him on Twitter @wearytolove.

Image: Shutterstock.

Indonesia has long been an up-and-coming country on the world stage, leading the way among its developing peers. As the world’s third-largest democracy, it continues to play an important role in balancing and harmonizing Southeast Asia, and its G20 leadership this year has brought long-deserved international recognition. Indonesia’s constant efforts to participate in and support international initiatives, work with the United Nations, and move forward the quest for global peace, have earned the country praise.

Apart from its role as a regional peacekeeper, Indonesia has historically tended to focus its policy efforts domestically. While President Joko Widodo is embracing the trust and responsibility the international community has given the country, from tackling global issues with the Global Crisis Response Group to its G20 leadership, the government more often than not has preferred to work only to improve the domestic state of Indonesia.

As a nation of hundreds of islands, however, harmony is part of Indonesia’s culture. Uniting across different languages and ethnicities to share a common identity as Indonesians is something people in this diverse country do every day. This harmonizing nature is something the world needs, and the spotlight of G20 leadership has given Indonesia an opportunity to show off this “soft power.” This soft power can further be seen in an analysis of the Indonesian school curriculum, conducted by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), a research and policy institute that analyzes school curricula and produces policy recommendations.

The study in question refers to Indonesia’s education system and exemplifies how this system reflects the country’s national values of self-confidence, humility, and unity in harmony. Radicalism, racism, and colonial history are all addressed; tolerance is the overall message. The country teaches the values its people believe in and holds at the core of its identity, and this is not lost on the major players of the international system. Indonesia’s harmonizing nature is an essential part of its political power, and it is what has helped the country step forward as an important geopolitical player.

The G20 summit in Bali this year, as well as the ASEAN chairmanship in 2023, are opportunities for Indonesia to wield this power in a way that benefits global peace and stability. With growing recognition for his country’s international contributions, President Widodo hopes to also attract international investment and support for his own domestic agenda, especially the intensive green transition, and the infrastructure and economic transition needed to accompany it. The United States, Japan, and other partners have already promised $20 billion in financing toward shutting down coal plants and reducing energy emissions by 2030, a tangible result of the country’s growing status.

The current need for a global peacemaker such as Indonesia is especially evident with the ongoing Russia-Ukraine War. From harmonizing relations to addressing the resulting food crisis, Indonesia has already begun to show how suited it is to play the role of mediator. With Widodo’s visits to Kyiv and Moscow in June of this year, he set out to urge a ceasefire, ensure the creation of a grain corridor from Ukraine, and resume Russia’s fertilizer exports. He also chose to invite Russia to the G20 while extending an invite to Ukraine, in a bid to bring Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy together with other world leaders.

Indonesia’s approach to democracy and harmony has made it a natural leader of the world’s emerging powers, and has given it this opportunity for global leadership. These same approaches are essential to addressing the Russia-Ukraine War and are an important aspect of why now is Indonesia’s time to act. Playing a role in brokering an agreement between Ukraine and Russia would, for example, prove to both the global community as well as to Indonesians that they are ready for this mantle of responsibility.

This new role would also allow Indonesia to move forward on other geopolitical issues of importance, such as normalizing relations with the State of Israel. Not only would this be an incredible show of leadership on the part of Indonesia, but, as is clear from history, doing so would bring a formidable boost to its economy. When the United Arab Emirates signed the Abraham Accords only two years ago to normalize relations with Israel, its trade increased by 500 percent, bringing $1.2 billion in one year. Such a level of trade influx would be incredible for the Indonesian economy, bringing in opportunities for investment, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Indonesia lacks high-tech and digital industries, and a partnership with Israel would allow the country to expand into these sectors.

The economic benefits and expansion of Indonesian industries would be welcome, especially as its transition toward a green economy and normalized relations with Israel would set the nation apart from its neighboring countries. Indeed, the IMPACT-se study in question shows why, at least through an investigation of its educational curriculum, Indonesia is ready to play an even greater leading role on the international stage.

As Indonesia moves into this position of international leadership, there are many aspects of that status that the country must keep in mind. Its harmonizing nature as well as ideals of peace and stability continue to be praised, and its education system will impart these values to the next generation. Its focus on sustainable growth deserves to be emulated, and the preservation of democracy is admirable. With this role, however, also comes the responsibility of applying these values beyond its own borders. By playing a role in important international events, such as hosting the G20 and mediating the Russia-Ukraine War, Indonesia is slowly and surely proving that it is ready for this new challenge.

Jay Ruderman is the President of the Ruderman Family Foundation.

Image: Shutterstock.

Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Temple Mount has served as a narrative that Palestinians and extremists from the Arab-Israeli community have used to institutionalize the culture of the Al-Aqsa Mosque. This is a culture that arouses the masses, is emotional, and can mobilize the Arab-Israeli street and the Palestinians, as well as the Arab street in other Sunni countries.

Events surrounding the Temple Mount can pour fuel on the fire of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and ignite an inferno, literally, within hours.

On the Israeli-Jewish side, the issue also serves as a detonator for extremist radical elements, who preach incessantly for the establishment of a Jewish foothold on the Temple Mount and wish to fly a red flag in front of the bull. Activities of this nature can upend Israeli government policies and the State of Israel’s ability to maintain law and order in Jerusalem.

In Benjamin Netanyahu’s new cabinet, several parties have full-fledged right-wing lawmakers coming to power for the first time. The Temple Mount is part of the political hardcore environment that they grew up in.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s ascension to the Temple Mount on January 3 has far-reaching implications as it threatens the delicate security balance in Jerusalem, in the territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority, and in Gaza. His decision to ascend the Temple Mount in one of his first acts as a minister was a deliberate provocation against Arab citizens of the State of Israel, Palestinians, and the Arab states of the region. It is clear that from now on, every move and every statement made by Ben Gvir and some of his colleagues will come under scrutiny and in the near future will trigger a response, perhaps in words but also possibly in actions.

Before ascending to the Temple Mount, Ben Gvir should have adopted the maxim, “think first, act later.” Still, it is important to clarify that the status quo on the Temple Mount has not changed, and there is no plan to change it.

Netanyahu had the option—one that he has adopted in the past—to instruct his ministers to refrain from visiting the Temple Mount and allow only rank-and-file ministers of the Knesset to do so. So far, he has yet to implement such a policy this time around.

At the same time, Hamas has good reasons to avoid going to war over this issue. The current situation (where Gaza is quiet, but the West Bank is witnessing an increase in terrorist attacks and clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces), together with the declining status of the Palestinian Authority, serves Hamas’s strategy well. This has been the case since May 2021 when Hamas initiated a conflict with Israel to portray itself as the protector of Al Aqsa.

Hamas is currently hard at work rehabilitating its military force in Gaza, while at the same time exploiting opportunities to improve the strip’s economy and alleviate some of the pressure on it.

Israel has granted some 20,000 work visas for Gazans, who bring much-needed cash into the Gazan economy. Meanwhile, Hamas is strengthening its collaboration with Hezbollah, Iran, and regional terror elements to optimize its position on the day the ceasefire is called off.

In the near future, the Islamic holiday of Ramadan, which begins on March 26, could have game-changing potential in the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel. And the Temple Mount’s role could be critical here.

The month preceding Ramadan is historically associated with an increase in hatred and religious agitation. This is when it will be easiest to spark an explosion among Palestinians and Arab Israelis on the streets of East Jerusalem and in Israel. Israel’s strategy, particularly that of this new government, must be aimed at preventing this scenario wherever possible. 

Major General Eitan Dangot is a publishing Expert at The MirYam Institute. He concluded his extensive career as the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (C.O.G.A.T.) in 2014.

Image: Shutterstock.

Despite the Air Force’s intention to retire the Raptor within the coming decade, the aircraft is expected to remain in service until its replacement—the Next Generation Air Dominance fighter—comes online. As a result, updates, and upgrades are still underway for America’s F-22 fleet—some of which are intended to offer a bridge between the Raptor and the NGAD fighter to come.

In April 2022, we got a glimpse at what some of these upgrades will entail, thanks to social media posts from U.S. Air Force’s Air Combat Command’s General Mark Kelly, and the branch’s 2023 budget request. Among them were new stealthy underwing fuel tanks and associated pylons, missiles, and what could be new electronic warfare or infrared search-and-track (IRST) pods.

Stealth fighters like the Raptor are designed to fly without any external munitions or fuel tanks when maintaining a stealth profile. Yet, fighting over the sprawling expanses of the Pacific (for example) would demand that the Raptor carry more fuel than its internal stores allow. Today, the Raptor has 600-gallon fuel tanks it can carry underwing, but these tanks reduce its observability to a degree. The new fuel tanks intended for the F-22 are meant to offset some of that reduction.

The Warzone posted excerpts from the budget request that provide more details:

“Due to the advancement of adversary technologies in detection and emergence of fighter, cargo, and refueling platforms increasing engagement ranges, it is critical to future mission execution and success to provide the Raptor with an increased range capability while maintaining own-ship survivability.“

The upgraded fuel tanks, listed in the Air Force’s budget request as the F-22 Low Drag Tank and Pylon (LDTP) capability, aim to replace the previous tanks and the pylons with a new, stealthier design. This will allow the Raptor to fly further without giving itself away. Importantly, they’re designed to eject from the wing and leave a smooth surface behind, which is vital for maintaining stealth.

“The pylons are equipped with smart rack pneumatic technology to accurately control ejection performance and smooth wind swept surface for minimum drag without store,” the Warzone adds.

The sun rises over a U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptor during the Sheppard Air Force Base Guardians of Freedom Air Show, Oct. 28, 2019. The Raptors were in town to perform during the two-day air show in Wichita Falls, Texas. (U.S. Air Force photo by 1st Lt. Sam Eckholm)

A separate set of underwing pods were also featured in the image shared by Gen. Kelly that many have asserted may house a new electronic warfare suite or perhaps the Raptor’s long-awaited IRST capability.

Infrared Search and Track, or IRST, is a passive means of detecting and targeting enemy aircraft and is among the most effective ways of engaging radar-wicking stealth fighters. As the name suggests, IRST systems identify heat signatures, which allows a stealth fighter like the Raptor to hunt for enemy jets without broadcasting radar waves that would announce its presence. It also allows a fighter to lock onto stealth targets via the heat of their exhaust.

These pods could also house updated electronic warfare capabilities meant to improve upon the F-22’s stealth by jamming enemy radar arrays.

Finally, a new missile that could represent the forthcoming (and quite secretive) AIM-260 long-range radar-guided air-to-air missile is also shown, demonstrating the Raptor’s ever-growing suite of Beyond Visual Range (BVR) weapon systems.

Alex Hollings is a writer, dad, and Marine veteran who specializes in foreign policy and defense technology analysis. He holds a master’s degree in Communications from Southern New Hampshire University, as well as a bachelor’s degree in Corporate and Organizational Communications from Framingham State University.

This article was first published by Sandboxx News.

Image: DVIDS.

In episode 18 of the Israel Defense and Diplomacy Forum (IDDF), Prof. Chuck Freilich, former Israeli deputy national security advisor, and Danny Ayalon, former deputy foreign minister and ambassador to Washington, discuss two very different issues: the dramatic changes that Israel’s new government has already begun making to its judicial and democratic processes and China’s rising influence in the Middle East, following the recent visit of President Xi Jinping to Saudi Arabia.

The new government is moving rapidly to pass legislation that will dramatically alter the role of Israel’s judiciary and the balance of powers. If, as appears likely, the legislation goes through, Chuck believes that Israel will have become an illiberal democracy, akin to Turkey and Hungry, within a matter of weeks. In effect, Israel will have only one branch of government, the executive, which will control both the legislative and judicial branches and in which those under indictment, including the premier, appoint their own judges. Danny agrees regarding the primary reform, the so-called “override law,” but sees merit to at least some of the other changes. He is particularly concerned by the proposed reforms’ impact on Israel’s international standing, including the danger of Israel being referred to the International Court of Justice. Both are deeply concerned by the politicization of Israel’s civil service and breakup of ministries for purely political purposes.

China is rapidly becoming a major player in the Middle East; no longer just in terms of oil imports, but in regional security affairs, as well. Xi’s visit to Saudi Arabia was designed at least partly as a counterbalance to China’s ties with Iran. Chuck emphasizes that one of the reasons for the Gulf countries’ interest in expanded ties with China is their decreasing confidence in the U.S. security commitment to them and the understanding that Israel, especially under the new government, cannot constitute even a substitute for the United States. Danny starts a discussion of the impact of U.S.-Chinese ties on U.S. ties with Israel, including the Phalcon case, one of the worst crises in U.S.-Israeli relations.

Join us as they agree and disagree, in detail and in-depth, always respectfully, on the critical issues Israel faces.

Benjamin Anthony is Co-Founder & CEO of The MirYam Institute. Twitter: @BenAnthony1948

Chuck Freilich is a former deputy national security adviser in Israel. He is a senior fellow at The Miryam Institute and the author of “Israeli National Security: A New Strategy for an Era of Change” and the forthcoming “Israel and the Cyber Threat: How the Startup Nation Became a Global Superpower.” Twitter: @chuck_freilich

Danny Ayalon is a publishing expert with The MirYam Institute. He served as Israel’s Ambassador to the United States from July 2002 to November 2006, during which time, relations between the two countries reached an all-time high.

Image: Shutterstock.

Less than a week after the swearing-in of Israel’s new government, Itamar Ben-Gvir, now the minister of national security, paid another contentious visit to the Temple Mount/Haram Al-Sharif in Jerusalem. When still a regular Knesset member, Ben-Gvir paid periodic visits to the site, which is holy to Jews and Muslims, as well as to other disputed areas in the Israeli-Palestinian arena. Ben-Gvir’s visit on January 3 immediately reignited controversy within Israel and sparked outspoken condemnations and clear warnings from across the world. At the request of the United Arab Emirates, a recent Israeli ally, the matter was swiftly referred to a separate meeting of the UN Security Council.

While the Israeli-Palestinian question is, of course, not new, the attention on a single geographical focal point may lead observers to lose sight of the larger picture. The bigger picture, however, is crucial to understanding the intricate web of perspectives on the Temple Mount/Haram Al-Sharif issue, as well as its explosiveness.

As far as the complex itself is concerned, the current “status quo” implies, in a nutshell, that while Israel considers itself the sovereign over all of Jerusalem, the Temple Mount/Haram Al-Sharif is administered through the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, or endowment, appointed and financed by Jordan. Muslims have unrestricted access—though Palestinians from the West Bank or Gaza need an Israeli permit to reach Jerusalem—whereas non-Muslims are allowed at certain times, without a right to pray at the site. Israeli police present at the spot have variably enforced the latter prohibition.

Interestingly, Ben-Gvir defends his visit, which was short and featured no public praying, as an action to counter the “discrimination of Jews on Temple Mount,” casting the debate as a freedom of religion issue. Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, was also quick to emphasize that Jewish visits to the site do not constitute a violation of the status quo.

While both statements do not seem outrageous at face value, the Temple Mount/Haram Al-Sharif question can not be seen as disconnected from the fact that there is no stable, agreed solution for the territories that came under Israeli control in 1967 and that are home to a large Palestinian population—namely the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem. The lack of such a solution means that Palestinians cannot build a vision for a political future (whatever that future will be), nor see any substantive improvement in terms of mobility and economic opportunities. For Israel, the absence of a solution entails the persistence of security issues in territories both within its control and beyond (Lebanon, Syria, Iran), as well as restricted or risky access to sites considered holy in Judaism, such as the Temple Mount and Joseph’s Tomb in the Palestinian city of Nablus. Crucially, the lack of a solution, combined with internal political instability and crises—between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA), within the PA, and within Israeli politics—has led to frustration and extremism on both sides. This is reflected in the Israeli government Ben-Gvir is a member of, in the radicalization amongst Palestinian youth, and in a general loss of belief in the two-state outcome traditionally proposed as a solution to the issues.

In this context, it is not surprising that Ben-Gvir’s thirteen minutes on the site in question sparked such outrage. To him and his followers, the “status quo” in the place where two Jewish temples are believed to have stood, illustrates that the “Jewish sovereignty” they aspire to is not complete yet. For Palestinians, the status quo is one of the last straws they clutch to after coming to feel that they have lost their historic homeland. In the wider Muslim world, although Haram Al-Sharif is considered Islam’s third-holiest place after Mecca and Medina, upholding the status quo is considered the minimum that Israel can do in the context of a protracted conundrum. It is not without reason that during the Israel-Gaza conflict in May 2021, one of Hamas’ main propaganda lines was that it was “defending” Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is located at the Temple Mount.

More generally, the largely non-overlapping, even mutually exclusive, narratives of the Israelis and Palestinians go so far as to ignore or deny outright the other group’s historical, cultural and religious ties to the land and its sites. This phenomenon affects not only the city of Jerusalem but also Israeli areas where the Arab presence prior to 1948 has been erased, as well as West Bank sites, where the importance of Jewish historical and religious sites is either disregarded or exalted. When only half of a story is told, it should not come as a surprise that words or actions revealing the other half are seen as disconcerting and threatening.

It is clear that any path toward a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian issue must include arrangements regarding Jerusalem, including its places of worship. However, the Temple Mount/Haram Al-Sharif fallacy consists of thinking that this particular site is the main question at stake or that it can be treated as a separate issue. While the site is certainly important for many, the opposite is actually true. If the Israelis and Palestinians can make progress on their opposing security, economic, and political issues, a compromise on the highly symbolic site will be much more likely.

Dr. Alexander Loengarov is a senior affiliated fellow at the Institute for International Law at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven, Belgium) and a former official of the European Economic and Social Committee of the European Union. He coordinated the first rounds of the EU’s Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window scheme for academic mobility with Israeli and Palestinian institutions. In addition to his thesis on the entanglement of politics and law in the issue of recognition of Palestinian statehood, he has published analysis for think tanks like the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and Israel Policy Forum, as well as opinion pieces on Middle East and Israeli politics for the Brussels Times.

His writings reflect solely his own views, and not those of the European Economic and Social Committee or the European Union, which cannot be held responsible for any use made of it.

Image: Shutterstock.

With plans now underway to equip Ukraine’s armed forces with America’s Patriot Air Defense System, the internet is aflutter with debate about just how effective it really is, and whether or not it stacks up against its Russian competition.

The MIM-104 Patriot Air Defense System first entered service in the early 1980s as a replacement for both Nike Hercules high-to-medium air defense and MIM-23 Hawk medium tactical air defense systems. Today, the Patriot is operated by 18 nations, with the United States operating the largest fleet of systems, with 16 Patriot battalions operating upwards of 50 Patriot batteries that have more than 1,200 interceptors in the field.

In comment sections and forums around the world, you’ll find no shortage of self-appointed air warfare experts citing seemingly imagined statistics about American, Russian, and other air defense platforms to justify their hyperbole… But the complicated truth about air defenses at large comes in the form of two equally hard-to-swallow pills for those waging war in the comment section:

1. Publicly-released details about most air defense systems tend to be as rare as they are dated.

2. Air defenses at large are simply not as effective as they’re often perceived to be.

However, with those two points in mind, the evidence seems clear that the MIM-104 Patriot is among and potentially even the most effective air defense system in the world. But if that’s the case, why is it so often dismissed, while Russia’s S-400 is so frequently touted as practically invincible?

The truth is, understanding how perceptions of the Patriot system relate to the platform’s actual performance requires a pretty thorough understanding of not only the complexity of the air defense enterprise… but also the marketing tactics leveraged by nations fielding different systems.

Related: It’s a myth that hypersonic missiles can’t be stopped because of their speed

The world’s first air defense system to shoot down a missile…

Patriot air defense system (DoD photo)

On January 18, 1991, a CNN crew recorded from Saudi Arabia as an American Patriot system was used for the first time to engage a reported incoming Scud missile. The SS-1 Scud was a post-World War II tactical ballistic missile developed by the Soviet Union and based on Germany’s V-2. Iraq operated a modified iteration of the upgraded Scud-B during the Gulf War.

“There’s a streak of light,” Charles Jaco, of CNN, said describing the intercept, “The [Patriot] missile goes North, cants slightly to the East, goes North again, disappears into the clouds, and then there’s an illuminating flash…”

It wasn’t until later that the Department of Defense would admit that the internationally lauded Patriot intercept caught on camera hadn’t actually occurred at all. Iraq had never fired a Scud missile into Saudi Arabia that day, and instead, the Patriot system had fallen prey to a false alarm and gone after it. Because of the cloud cover obscuring everyone’s view, the assumption when no Scud found a target was that “the Patriot did its job perfectly” — which is a direct quote from ABC News correspondent Forrest Sawyer at the time.

While this may have been nothing more than an honest mistake, analysts would continue to question the claimed efficacy of the Patriot system throughout and well beyond the conflict. The Patriot did eventually become the first system to ever intercept an inbound ballistic missile, but as the war went on, the Army claimed the Patriot had an 80% success rate in Saudi Arabia and 50% in Israel. Not long after, the Army reduced those figures to 70% and 40%, but many within the United States still weren’t buying it.

After a 10-month investigation by the House Government Operations Subcommittee on Legislation and National Security also seemingly questioned the Army’s claims in 1992, the General Accounting Office also started looking into the Patriot’s efficacy. Before long, these investigations prompted a flood of negative press coverage, and as a result, the Patriot system soon became known as an ineffective system.

Related: A Patriot missile battery from the US could create new headaches for Russia in Ukraine

Did the Patriot system really only intercept 9% of Scuds during the Gulf War?

(Image created by Alex Hollings using U.S. Army photos)

These investigations and the media’s depiction of their findings continue to define the Patriot system in the minds of many to this day, but like stories we’ve covered in the past about the F-35 or F-22 failing to live up to expectations, it’s important that we recognize the media value a story about touted American systems failing has in terms of viewers, readers, and clicks.

Painting a dire picture of the Patriot’s performance in Iraq is sure to drive much more engagement than one about the system’s mediocre performance. But, it’s also important to sift through the context-less hyperbole to acknowledge the very real limitations the Patriot system demonstrated throughout this conflict.

The House Government Operations Subcommittee report on the Patriot’s performance during the Gulf War ultimately concluded that evidence of successful intercepts of inbound Scud missiles was rather limited, though that report itself was subject to a great deal of internal debate resulting in only a draft written by one staffer finding its way to the media and no formal report ever manifesting.

But it was the GAO investigation that gave the Patriot’s critics their most damning talking point.

According to their findings, only about 9 percent of Scud intercepts by the Patriot system during the conflict “are supported by the strongest evidence that an engagement resulted in a warhead kill.”

This 9 percent figure seems really bad — even worse when compared to the Defense Department’s claims of 70% and 40% success rates in Saudi Arabia and Israel respectively. Raytheon, however, had a valid rebuttal that tends to be glossed over by critics of the system.

U.S. Army Patriot air defense system during a test fire (U.S. Army photo)

“The General Accounting Office (GAO) report did not state that Patriot had only a 9% success rate and did not dispute the U.S. Army’s overall 60% success rate,” Raytheon clarified. “The GAO report never voiced any disagreement with the Army’s overall assessment that Patriot was successful in over 70 percent of the SCUD engagements in Saudi Arabia and over 40 percent in Israel. In its assessment of Patriot performance, the Army analysis subdivided Patriot intercept successes into ‘warhead kills’ and ‘mission kills.’ It then further subdivided each of these categories into ‘confidence levels’ based upon how much supporting data was available.”

Put simply, within the GAO’s investigation, they sorted intercepts into multiple categories, with the “highest confidence” category reserved for “the strongest evidence that an engagement resulted in a warhead kill” — requiring either the recovery of Scud debris showing clear Patriot damage or a saved radar record that clearly showed Scud debris on radar following an intercept. Amid the fog of war, this sort of evidence is obviously difficult to come by, which is why the GAO didn’t claim only 9% of intercepts were successful, but rather that they were able to secure this sort of conclusive data from only 9% of attempts.

Related: How one F-16 dodged 6 surface-to-air missiles in an airstrike gone wrong

The truth about the Patriot system in Iraq is simple: A crappy beginning followed by a triumphant return

Patriot air defense system live-fire testing (U.S. Army photo)

Of course, if we’re willing to acknowledge the media’s preference for an exciting (if damning) story, we certainly need to consider Raytheon’s obvious bias when defending a multi-billion dollar system of their own creation. And while their rebuttal did poke holes in the media narrative surrounding the Patriot’s failure, it still painted a rosier picture of the system’s performance than was probably warranted.

To that end, we reached out to a popular TikTok content creator and U.S. Patriot Fire Control Enhanced Operator-Maintainer, who asked to simply be identified as Sergeant First Class (SFC) Long. Long is an active-duty subject matter expert tasked with the placement, operation, and maintenance of the Patriot Fire Control system.

“In the first Gulf War Patriot was right around 25%. It was doing something it wasn’t necessarily designed for. It was actually built for planes but they decided to throw it at missiles and it sometimes hit. Since then, we have vastly improved the system — like hundreds of upgrades.”

Long’s claim of a 25% success rate is in keeping with the Government Accounting Office’s own conclusions about the Gulf War. And his assertions about the system’s progress since are also substantiated in the data. While the Patriot system did struggle against Iraq’s “Al Hussein” model Scud-Bs during the Gulf War, things were quite different when the Patriot returned to Iraq a bit more than a decade later.

“In contrast with the experience of Desert Storm, Patriot interceptors defeated every ballistic missile they engaged during the 2003 Operation Iraqi Freedom. Since 2015, Patriot has successfully engaged scores of missiles and drones in the Yemen Missile War. Israel has likewise used it on a number of occasions to defeat drones, aircraft, and other threats.”

“Patriot to Ukraine: What Does It Mean?” by Mark Cancian and Tom Karako for the Center for Stratgic & International Studies, Dec. 16, 2022

And while CNN may have missed the mark in their 1991 coverage of what they believed to be the first Patriot intercept, another CNN crew found itself present for what really was a successful intercept in March of 2003… but they weren’t able to report on it.

“Had anyone reported this – had we reported it, or had it gotten out,” CNN national security analyst Ken Robinson later explained, “it would have enabled [Iraq] to know that they had the exact grid coordinate they needed” to target the headquarters of coalition ground forces. 

How governmental transparency affects perceptions of the Patriot air defense system, as well as its Russian peers

S-400 live fire testing (Russian Ministry of Defence)

When discussing the Patriot air defense system online, it’s impossible to avoid comparisons with its Soviet and Russian counterparts, systems like the S-300, S-400, and the latest S-500. Unlike the Patriot system, which tends to have a tarnished reputation in the minds of many, Russian systems are often highly touted as the best in the world. Of course, since the onset of fighting in Ukraine in February of 2022, Russia’s longstanding approach to conveying an unwarranted image of military prowess has finally become broadly recognized — and as we’ve discussed at length in our deep dive into the S-400, the air defense enterprise is no exception.

Russia’s air defense systems, like so many of the nation’s military endeavors, benefit from a very intentional perception-management campaign enacted by the Russian government and bolstered by countless Russian-state-backed media outlets operating all around the world. The myth of Russia’s impenetrable air defenses, it’s important to understand, is vital to Russia’s efforts to court foreign buyers for these systems, as the Russian military is reliant on foreign investment to fund its own advanced developmental weapons programs.

So why, then, is there such a disparity between popular perceptions of America’s Patriot air defense system and Russia’s S-400? A great deal of that comes down to something as simple as American transparency juxtaposed against Russian information operations, as well as the overall level of secrecy surrounding all air defense platforms regardless of national origin.

This point was made succinctly in a broader piece about the overall effectiveness of air defense systems published by the Nuclear Threat Initiative in September 2020:

“The United States is by far the most transparent of countries when it comes to missile defense tests, yet even reports from the United States provide only superficial details about most tests,” the report explains.

“The Global Missile Defense Race: Strong Test Records and Poor Operational Performance” by Shae Cotton and Jeffrey Lewis for the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Sept. 16, 2020

Americans are accustomed to a level of governmental transparency in which governmental bodies themselves will hold other governmental organizations accountable.

As the report states, American air defense systems of all kinds have consistently demonstrated a high degree of efficacy over time, despite some rocky starts. Between 1963 and 2020, the U.S. conducted a total of 121 disclosed test intercepts with various systems, with an overall success rate of a respectable 72 percent and generally high success rates once a program reaches maturity.

It goes on to compare American transparency to Israel and Japan, before questioning the transparency of Indian efforts, and finally highlighting Russia’s apparent tomfoolery. Americans, by and large, tend to assume all governments are similarly transparent about the successes and failures of their defense programs, but that’s far from the truth.

“Perhaps most questionable of all are Russian missile defense claims. Although it is not alone in so doing, Russia has made spectacular claims about the success of the S-400, yet there are few public reports about individual tests of the system.”

“The Global Missile Defense Race: Strong Test Records and Poor Operational Performance” by Shae Cotton and Jeffrey Lewis for the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Sept. 16, 2020

S-400 launchers (Russian Ministry of Defence)

According to NTI’s findings, Russia has only disclosed successful tests of the S-400 system, effectively suggesting that it required no development whatsoever and emerged fully formed and infallible. Russia has not disclosed the circumstances of the tests, the number of interceptors launched, the types of targets, or their level of capability… they’ve simply claimed 100% success rates and offered little more.

Of course, in real weapons development, that’s an extremely unlikely scenario — and following Russia’s performance in Ukraine, it seems even less likely.

“To date we have not been able to identify any reports of failed intercept tests involving the S-400. Like our hypothesis involving India, this suggests Russia is concealing most of its developmental tests or other failed intercepts. “

“The Global Missile Defense Race: Strong Test Records and Poor Operational Performance” by Shae Cotton and Jeffrey Lewis for the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Sept. 16, 2020

But while Russia’s claims of success with the S-400 (which have been clearly called into question by actual combat data) may not be trustworthy, it is nonetheless important to understand that the S-400, like most Russian air defenses, is likely a pretty capable system, as evidenced by the laundry list of foreign buyers.

The actual efficacy of the S-400 has been called into question many times, despite Russia’s claims of 100% success rates.

The plain fact of the matter is, however, no system is as good as Russia tells the world their systems are — but while many take their claims at face value, few recognize the disclosed progress made by the Patriot system since its rocky start.

“Now days, Patriot has right around a 95% hit ratio,” Long explained.

Related: The S-400 myth: Why Russia’s air defense prowess is exaggerated

The Patriot system isn’t meant to operate on its own (and neither is the S-400)

The U.S. Army’s “Defense in Depth” approach to air and missile defense (AMD). (U.S. Army)

Perhaps most important of all, directly comparing these systems is, in itself, a missed intercept. The Patriot air defense system, like Russia’s S-400, isn’t intended to serve as a stand-alone system. Both of these platforms are meant to play a role in a broader networked integrated air defense apparatus, and both can only see their best performance as a part of that larger network.

The United States, for example, leverages overlapping air defense systems of different sorts (an approach Long and the Army refer to as “defense in depth“). This approach means that as an inbound missile gets closer to your defended asset, it faces an increasing amount of defensive firepower.

In other words, directly comparing the Patriot system to the S-400 is sort of like comparing the transmissions in two different race cars. We can debate all day about which is better, and there is some value to that discussion, but what really matters is how well the whole car performs when assembled and in a race.

Today, the available data seems to suggest that America’s THAAD and Patriot air defense systems may be the most successful of any systems in actual combat environments — but importantly, that success is, in itself, relative.

Intercepting a wide variety of inbound missiles is an extremely difficult job, and the fact of the matter is, in a saturation attack, especially involving low-flying cruise missiles in contested airspace without AWACS support, just about any modern system is likely to fail.

Air defense intercepts are an unforgiving science, which lends itself to a lack of transparency even within more open governments like the United States. But it’s important to consider how America’s broader transparency can affect perceptions when juxtaposed against the objectively untrustworthy claims of the Russian government.

Alex Hollings is a writer, dad, and Marine veteran who specializes in foreign policy and defense technology analysis. He holds a master’s degree in Communications from Southern New Hampshire University, as well as a bachelor’s degree in Corporate and Organizational Communications from Framingham State University.

This article was first published by Sandboxx News.

Image: Shutterstock.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin telegraphed his plan to attack Ukraine long before the first shot was fired. So why was the West’s response so incremental and ineffective? More proactive preventive measures before Russia’s attack might have changed Putin’s calculus. By exercising unilateral constraint and making unforced concessions, the Biden administration invited Russia to test the boundaries of its bellicosity.

Washington’s initial response was shaped by its fear that Putin would use nuclear weapons. Paralyzed by the possibility of nuclear Armageddon, the Biden administration responded carefully with half-measures.

At the outset, Biden pledged that NATO troops would not fight in Ukraine. Taking the NATO option off the table was unnecessary. Ukraine was provided with weapons from former Warsaw Pact countries, rather than state-of-the-art NATO weaponry. It was enough to keep Russian forces at bay, but not enough to defeat them. Biden hoped that sanctions would deter Russia’s aggression. But sanctions were implemented so incrementally that Putin was able to cushion their impact on Russia’s economy; Russian oligarchs had time to transfer their assets to sanctuary countries like Turkey. Nord Stream 2, which transported gas to Germany, operated at full throttle until Russia attacked.

The root of today’s conflict can be traced to the final communique of the 2008 NATO Bucharest Summit, which affirmed that Ukraine would join NATO someday. The possibility set off alarm bells in Moscow. Concerns were exacerbated when U.S.-backed protests in Kyiv’s Maidan Square ousted pro-Russian Premier Viktor Yanukovych.

Russia’s invasion and occupation of Crimea followed in 2014. The West responded with ineffective sanctions. Tolerating Russian aggression had serious, long-term consequences for the Ukrainian people, European security, and the rules-based international order.

Allied leaders met at the Madrid Summit in June 2022 and offered security assistance to Ukraine, including secure communications, fuel, medical supplies, body armor, winter clothing, demining equipment, and measures to counter chemical and biological threats. NATO did not, however, accelerate its Partnership for Peace Program (PfP). NATO could have deepened security cooperation with Ukraine by supplying higher-quality weapons and establishing training facilities for Ukrainian forces in nearby NATO countries.

Washington adopted a policy to only transfer equipment it determined Ukraine actually needed and could maintain. Ten months into the war, the United States finally approved the transfer of M-2 Bradley Fighting Vehicles for use against dug-in Russian positions. Still, the Pentagon refuses to send Abrams tanks. It believes that Soviet T-72 tanks in Ukraine’s possession are adequate.

Ukraine’s foreign minister called for more lethal offensive weapons, affirming that “the time of weapons taboo has passed.” In response, the United States finally changed course and announced this week a $2.85 billion package of military hardware to Ukraine, supplying the sort of powerful offensive weapons that it had previously withheld as Ukraine plans a counteroffensive against Russia in the Spring.

In early 2022, the first tranche of security assistance was entirely defensive. NATO provided anti-tank javelins and anti-aircraft stinger missiles. As Russia intensified its assault, however, the United States scrambled to deliver the satellite-based HIMARS rocket launching system. HIMARS had a great effect on the battlefield but arrived too late to deter Russia’s aggression.  

NATO was wary from the outset. It could have deployed forces to frontline states like Romania. As a tripwire against Russian aggression, it would have demonstrated resolve and readiness. A preventive deployment is not unprecedented. The United States sent troops to Macedonia in the 1990s to prevent the Yugoslav war from spreading. It recently stationed 1,200 troops from the Army’s First Infantry Division in Poland and the Baltics. 

As Russia intensified its drone and missile strikes, NATO could have announced a no-fly-zone over Mariupol or other beleaguered cities. However, it decided against a no-fly zone, fearing it would bring NATO forces into direct conflict with Russia. 

The Pentagon decided that supplying Ukraine with F-16 and F-35 fighter aircraft would be escalatory. It preferred to supply aircraft already familiar to Ukrainian pilots, such as MiG-29 fighters and Su-25 ground attack aircraft. Plans to transfer these weapons systems hit a snag when Poland, which had MiGs immediately available, demanded that NATO replace their Soviet-era aircraft with state-of-the-art NATO warplanes.

NATO could have provided more drones to interdict supply lines and slow Russian troop movements. In addition to Turkey’s Bayraktar TB2 drone, Western nations could have arranged the delivery of Chinese-made drones, which Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Nigeria had acquired in lieu of armed Predator drones.

Regarding cyber warfare, NATO could have acted preemptively in concert with civilian hacking groups to crash the websites of Russian government agencies that produce military components and organizations that are known fronts for Russian cyber efforts.

The displacement of millions to Poland and other front-line states was predictable. Why didn’t the United States pre-position food, medicine, and other humanitarian assets anticipating their arrival? Prepositioning assets would have helped displaced and traumatized Ukrainians. It would also have sent a signal to Moscow that the West was serious about helping victims of its aggression.

War crimes were predictable. Why didn’t the United States and a coalition of the willing set up a war crimes tribunal for Ukraine? The tribunal could have identified Putin and Amy Chief of Staff Gerasimov as targets for investigation and prosecution. The prospect of accountability could have affected Putin’s calculus.

Russia’s attack on Ukraine’s agricultural infrastructure was also foreseeable. To prevent a global food crisis, NATO could have developed a plan and pathway for the export of Ukrainian grain overland and via secure routes in the Black Sea.

In hindsight, NATO had many options to deter Russia’s aggression or cushion its impact on Ukraine. Many of these measures were ultimately adopted, but they came too late to deter Russia’s decision to invade.

The Biden administration deserves huge credit for building a multinational coalition to defend Ukraine. If Putin wanted to weaken NATO, he failed. The Alliance emerged more unified and stronger in response to Russia’s actions.

The administration’s effort to foster bipartisan domestic support for security and financial assistance also deserves high praise. Countering Russia enjoys bipartisan support, though the new Congressional leadership may threaten this consensus.

The United States will conduct an after-action report highlighting the successes and failures of its response to Russia’s invasion. The after-action report will enumerate ways the U.S. response was strong, while highlighting lackluster prevention measures aimed at deterring Russia’s decision to attack.  

David L. Phillips is Director of the Program on Peacebuilding and Human Rights at Columbia University.  He served as a Senior Adviser and Foreign Affairs Expert at the State Department during the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations.

Image: Shutterstock.

“We’re surrounded. That simplifies our problem.” Colonel Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller uttered this famous quote after observing that First Marine Division had been completely surrounded by Chinese forces in the Chosin Reservoir in late November 1950. This quote captured the desperate circumstances in which Marines found themselves and remains prescient today as the institution continues to problem-frame its vast area of responsibility throughout the Indo-Pacific, all of which falls within China’s weapons engagement zone (WEZ). Not unlike the Marines of the Chosin Reservoir, today’s U.S. military will find itself “surrounded” by a host of conventional and unconventional weapons in any kinetic conflict with China in the South Pacific.

The Korean War, colloquially known as the “forgotten war,” never captured the attention or imagination of Americans in the way that World Wars I and II did. Still drunk off of victory against the Nazis and the Empire of Japan, Americans were not engaged in the conflict on the Korean Peninsula until reporters began publishing the First Marine Division’s impending doom at Chosin. While it remains a largely unspoken piece of history, Korea offers the United States critical lessons as they shift focus from the Global War on Terrorism to the littorals of the South Pacific. The successes and failures of the United Nations Command (UNC) in the early 1950s are capable of repeating—both the triumphs of bold action as well as the perils of complacency and hubris—in a similarly dynamic battlespace.

There are three lessons from Korea that should be taken and applied to the South Pacific. First, the Korean People’s Army (KPA) used speed and decisive force to surprise and route Republic of Korea (ROK) and U.S. forces from Seoul in the summer of 1950; the United States should reasonably expect China to attempt a similar strategy in order to achieve fait accompli over Taiwan and deter counterattack by coalition forces. Preparation and the distribution of stand-in forces throughout the region will be crucial to mitigate that risk upfront.

Second, throughout the war, UNC forces struggled with logistics issues and command and control (C2) during periods of constant, heavy combat with KPA and Chinese forces. This was further exacerbated by the extreme cold north of Pyongyang and at Chosin Reservoir, especially at Chosin Reservoir. Similarly, the South Pacific will present its own geographic and climatic challenges. The millions of square miles and tropical weather systems will place a premium on survivability, strain logistics networks, and demand innovative logistics planning. The Marines at Chosin turned to the air. U.S. forces today must look to the sea.

Finally, many historians cite the failures of the senior staff at the UNC and X Corps in particular for the friction and ultimate failure in the march toward the Yalu River. X Corps suffered from self-censorship, reporting delays, micromanagement, and ultimately myopic expectations. As a command staff, X Corps was reactionary and slow to adapt. Centralized, deliberative decision-making during a kinetic conflict in the Pacific will be impossible. American forces will have to rely on broad commander’s intent and permissive authorities down to the company level in order to achieve the flexibility and responsiveness required to compete with China in such an expansive theater of war. Micromanagement will lead to inaction and defeat, much like it did for much of the UNC in the fall of 1950.

Winston Churchill famously said that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. The Marines have led their sister services in force design and finding solutions to the problems in the Pacific. Military planners should continue to look to this unique period in history for insight and solutions to the Chinese threat.

Routing, Envelopment, and Isolation

From the outset of the war, ROK and UNC forces were on their heels. In the initial weeks of the war, they were unable to hold key positions in and around Seoul and suffered over 70,000 casualties, ultimately being pushed back to the Pusan Perimeter to wait for reinforcements. ROK forces were not properly trained or prepared to mount an effective defense and counterattacks were ineffective. It was not until Operation Chromite, the (roughly) simultaneous amphibious assault at Inchon Harbor and the breakout of UNC forces from Pusan that the KPA faced the prospect of defeat. On September 15, 1950, Marines executed their most famous amphibious landing and by early October, Inchon and Seoul were secured, which allowed Task Force Lynch and the remaining UNC and ROK forces to link up with the forces occupying the capital. As the KPA withdrew north of the 38th Parallel, the UNC pursued them along two lanes—Eighth Army in the West and X Corps in the East from Wonsan. The UNC looked to achieve General Douglas MacArthur’s pledge to reach the Yalu River and be home by Christmas.

The summer of 1950 may repeat itself if the situation with Taiwan becomes a hot war. China will likely fire multiple volleys of missiles at Taiwan and other islands across the region where prepositioned forces and strategic capabilities are located (e.g. Okinawa, Guam, or even mainland Japan). China has been building up these capabilities in its eastern province of Fujian and has since showcased them during multiple large-scale exercises in the Taiwan Strait. These likely actions in advance of an invasion operation will look to neutralize US forces preparing to defend Taiwan itself and prevent a meaningful counterattack during the main assault.

The US cannot afford to cede influence or position; a counterattack to liberate Taiwan would dwarf Operation Chromite, rendering it untenable. American forces in the region must be prepared to support Taiwan’s internal defenses long enough for reinforcements to arrive and occupy key positions. If this cannot happen, there will be no second chance like the UNC had in September 1950.

As UNC forces advanced toward the Yalu River in October and November 1950, they quickly found themselves gapped and largely isolated. The combination of poor command and control at the Tokyo headquarters as well as challenging terrain resulted in Eighth Army and X Corps being unable to support each other and significant breaks within their own lines. The push to the Yalu was discordant at best and enabled the Chinese forces to quietly envelop exposed and unsupported elements of the advancing forces without significant combat. The results were devastating. Eighth Army was all but destroyed during the Battle of Chongchon; what was left withdrew below the 38th Parallel by December 1950. X Corps suffered significant losses at Chosin Reservoir, particularly along its eastern flanks.

Major General Edward Almond was convinced that X Corps could make it to the Yalu River as General MacArthur ordered. He maintained this position even as Eighth Army faltered and failed and dismissed Major General Oliver P. Smith’s warnings and battlefield assessments as First Marine Division was being surrounded and isolated in real-time. At the western front, Fifth and Seventh Marines were cut off at Yudamn-ni except for one rifle company at Toktong Pass, which was responsible for defending the lone supply route from Hagaru-ri. To the north and east, the ROK I Corps and thousands of US Army soldiers were completely isolated and facing brutal assaults with thousands wounded and killed.

Rather than snow-covered mountains and abandoned villages, American forces will occupy island networks throughout the Pacific. China will look to isolate and envelop these forces, not with ground troops, but with asymmetrical capabilities such as cyber and electronic warfare to accompany its conventional missile capabilities. China will look to disrupt critical command and control systems and survivability operations, making communication and reinforcement difficult or impossible. American forces in North Korea did not know they were defeated until they were suddenly facing waves of Chinese forces across and within their lines. Similarly, isolated American forces on small islands throughout the Pacific may not know they are defeated until the missiles begin impacting their positions.

The First Marine Division was the lone success story; it was the raw courage of infantrymen and the adaptability of General Smith that saved the Marines and X Corps from annihilation. The US cannot rely on personality-driven outcomes. Success in the Pacific will come down to planning and figuring out how to shape the battlespace to avoid physical and metaphorical gaps in the lines by maintaining critical communications and logistics networks throughout the region. The survivability challenges in the Pacific are substantially greater both in terms of scale and the multiple domains of war in the twenty-first century.

Professionals Study Logistics ... and Airspace Planning

Survivability in the modern era demands flexible, responsive logistics systems supported by adaptable leadership and aviation. This was true for the Marines at Chosin Reservoir and is especially true today in the Pacific. General Smith faced acute and novel challenges: battling a larger force, coping with extreme weather, trying to provide ground and air resupply, bring in reinforcements, and evacuating wounded. He relied heavily on First Marine Aircraft Wing and flying squadrons from the Navy, both providing close air support, resupply, and troop transport in and out of Hagaru-ri. He also redeployed Puller’s First Marines at Kot’o-ri to defend supply routes and protect Task Force Drysdale’s attempt at reinforcing Hagaru-ri. Puller would later provide crucial cover along the southern portion of the convoy route when X Corps conducted its breakout. The weather further complicated these survivability operations—limiting aircraft availability, disrupting communications, causing weapons malfunctions, and producing cold injuries. General Smith was successful because he understood the battlespace and anticipated enemy behavior. He also trusted his staff and subordinate leaders implicitly and especially when he had no ability to communicate with them.

Fighting in the Pacific will present the same difficulties. Instead of freezing temperatures, forces will suffer sweltering heat, disease, and tropical storm systems. They will occupy islands that are hundreds or even thousands of miles away, which will strain communications networks and will demand decentralized command and control. Doctrinal thinking about mutual support will be severely tested, well beyond this country’s recent experience in ground combat environments.

The Navy-Marine Corps team is already looking for new methods of addressing these issues and has begun with the concept of sea-based logistics. However, sea-basing will require its own separate survivability component. Furthermore, any logistics system or network will depend on at least localized air and surface/subsurface superiority. To achieve this, planners will need to creatively map out the sea, air, and space considerations (e.g., combat air patrols, refueling, airborne command and control, surveillance, and naval patrols). Ultimately, for logistics systems to succeed, organic capabilities of each service component will need to be extended in order to provide the necessary early warning detection and defense capabilities. It will require anticipation by commanders and the permissive authority to adjust to changing conditions brought on by climate and attacks by Chinese regular forces or merchant militia. As was the case for General Smith, today’s leaders will need to develop and train these skills in order to sustain combat forces in the region.

The Marines in particular will also need to adapt to a new client: the Navy. Under its previous Marine Air Ground Task Force (MAGTF) model, the focus was on maneuver warfare in support of the ground combat element. However, now the MAGTF must shift to supporting the Navy’s combat operations. A critical question is whether Marines can scale their warfighting functions to provide meaningful support to the fleet. Force Design seeks to accomplish this while enhancing certain organic capabilities. For example, the Marine Air Command and Control System (MACCS) has tested and fielded the multifunction air operations center (MAOC) concept to consolidate aviation command and control and be prepared to deploy smaller units across a disaggregated force and support a broader set of air, land, and sea operations.

Ultimately, if the surface fleet fails, survivability of stand-in ground forces becomes impossible. Planners must shift focus from the ground to the sea and adapt to the changing circumstances with the same sense of urgency that face Marines in Chosin. In order to push beyond previous operational capabilities and ensure relevance in the Pacific, planners must continue to challenge prior assumptions and innovate in terms of force design and tactics.

Acting on the Five Percent – Heavily Decentralized Command & Control

General MacArthur once stated, “Expect only five percent of an intelligence report to be accurate.” He described the art of operating on limited information. Tokyo headquarters often failed to take decisive action or adapt to new information during the push to the Yalu. MacArthur’s lieutenants were nearsighted, hubristic, and driven by arbitrary deadlines and press releases rather than reporting and assessments from the field. Field commanders were wholly neglected in favor of the rosy projections. Major General Almond’s ambition and ego led him to ignore or downplay X Corps’ situation when briefing Tokyo. X Corps staff never had a complete operational picture and its delays in decision-making caused significant casualties.

The pitfalls of X Corps arose from competition within the UNC to impress General MacArthur and gain favor for higher ambitions. This is not uncommon of any military at any time. Strong opinions that are loosely held can foster productive and thorough discussion on many issues. However, a rigid, centralized command and control environment is fatal; planners must recognize this futility in an area as large as Pacific Command, which is the largest geographic combatant command, encompassing about half the earth’s physical surface, with over 30,000 islands and atolls and only 300,000 square miles of land mass. Decentralized command and control is imperative for success.

Units will be scattered across the Pacific, occupying tiny islands, tasked with supporting the larger force by securing and defending vital shipping lanes and reinforcing key positions. This will require units to operate independently hundreds or even thousands of miles from their parent commands, sometimes degraded or no communication. Subordinate commands and leaders must be empowered with clear, broad intent and permissive authorities to respond to changing circumstances at tactical and operational levels. The normal orders process can take days and such delay may result in tactical defeats, any number of which could cascade and become critical to the entire force. Marines are inherently prepared for this operating environment—well-trained to act confidently with limited information and the trust of their commands. The entire force must train to the standard and be prepared to act on the “five percent.”

There is No Breakout in the WEZ

Korea was the Marines’ first use of modern-era tactics; their experience and the larger experience of X Corps and the UNC are instructive as the US pivots to the Pacific. Revisiting those lessons learned and the critical decision points that those units faced throughout the war can help current planners innovate and prepare for combat operations in this region. To achieve the Commandant’s intent of deploying a force with the “virtues of mass without the vulnerabilities of concentration,” immense pressure is placed on logistics, aviation, and command and control. This is where the force must innovate the most and adapt training and preparations. Taiwan is the flashpoint; failing to prepare for its defense and for broader conflict in the region will be catastrophic. There will likely be no second opportunities in this kinetic conflict. Unlike Chromite and Chosin, there is no breakout in the WEZ.

Richard Protzmann is a recovering litigator and in-house counsel for an e-commerce company in California. He is also an executive officer and former company commander in the Marine Corps Reserve and frequently writes for publications such as Task & Purpose, The Marine Corps Gazette, Washington Times, Real Clear Policy/Defense/Energy, 19FortyFive, the Daily Caller, and The American Spectator. Follow him on Twitter @rw1699​.

Image: DVIDS.

On Monday, the British Ministry of Defence suggested that Russia’s Su-57 Felon, the country’s first stealth fighter, has been involved in combat operations related to Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. While this is far from the first time reports of the Su-57’s involvement in Ukraine have surfaced, all previous reports have come from Russian-owned state media outlets.

According to the intelligence update posted to Twitter, the British Ministry of Defence believes it’s likely the Su-57 has been participating in Ukraine operations since the summer.

“Since at least June 2022, Russian Aerospace Forces have almost certainly used Su-57 FELON to conduct missions against Ukraine. FELON is Russia’s most advanced fifth-generation supersonic combat jet, employing stealth technologies and highly advanced avionics.”

The evidence offered by the U.K. to substantiate the Su-57’s involvement in Ukraine appears awfully thin, as it seems largely based on the presence of these aircraft at Russia’s Akhtubinsk Air Base, where Su-57s are already known to operate from. But, however, it is likely that the ministry has intelligence sources it won’t publicly disclose. In other words, while the evidence presented is easy to poke holes in, it may be worth giving the U.K.’s statements the benefit of the doubt.

What does the UK say about the Su-57 in Ukraine?

According to the British Ministry of Defence’s posts on Twitter, five Su-57s can be seen parked at the Akhtubinsk Air Base that have likely participated in the war on Ukraine, though why the ministry drew that conclusion remains fuzzy.

As the Warzone has pointed out, Akhtubinsk is not the only known Su-57 base as the U.K. suggests, but more importantly, the fighter’s presence there isn’t necessarily indicative of its use in Ukraine. The 929th State Flight-Test Center at Akhtubinsk’s role in the Russian military is to test and evaluate new aircraft and systems, meaning it’s possible the fighters are there for more run-of-the-mill testing operations.

But just because the U.K. didn’t offer up more conclusive evidence doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t have any: instead, it may simply be choosing to keep those details, and their sources, close to the chest.

According to UK intelligence, the Su-57 is likely staying in Russian airspace and deploying long-range weapons

Despite the Su-57’s claimed stealth capabilities, U.K. intelligence suggests the Su-57s participating in the war in Ukraine are not actually entering Ukrainian airspace, and are instead being used to deploy long-range weapons at Ukrainian targets from within the protection of Russian airspace. This approach would be in keeping with similar reports about other expensive Russian aircraft, including the Su-35S and a number of Russian bombers.

This would give Russia the ability to claim that Su-57 participating in combat operations for the sake of pushing foreign sales, while not actually placing the aircraft at risk of being downed by the dated Soviet air defense systems operated by Ukrainian forces — or worse, by an American Patriot system once those are deployed.

“Russia is highly likely prioritising avoiding the reputational damage, reduced export prospects, and the compromise of sensitive technology which would come from any loss of FELON over Ukraine,” the British MoD wrote.

Can the Su-57 help Russia win this war?

The short answer is no. Despite Russia’s lofty claims about the Su-57, the aircraft itself exists in such small numbers that it offers very little in terms of added combat capability to Russia, especially when only being leveraged within Russian airspace to deploy long-range weapon systems.

However, if the Su-57’s sensor-fusing avionics suite is actually completely up and running, something the RAND Corporation has called into question following sanctions placed on Russia after its annexation of Crimea in 2014, it could potentially offer a valuable means of intelligence gathering and combat coordination over Ukrainian battlefields.

However, as it seems likely the Su-57’s avionics suite may be incomplete, or may only be complete in a small number of aircraft, in conjunction with Russia’s overall risk-averse approach to leveraging its relatively few expensive combat aircraft in this fight, it seems unlikely the Felon will see any serious use in Ukraine any time soon.

Instead, it seems likely that the Su-57’s use in Ukraine will be remembered similarly to the prototype Felons deployed to Syria in 2018, where they may have fired Kh-69 missiles for publicity footage before departing once again for safer pastures.

Russia’s Su-57 may be the least capable 5th generation fighter in service today, but it still may be a broadly capable platform. However, because it exists in so small numbers, it seems unlikely that Russia would risk the embarrassment or the financial burden of losing one — even as the war in Ukraine drags on toward its year mark.

Alex Hollings is a writer, dad, and Marine veteran who specializes in foreign policy and defense technology analysis. He holds a master’s degree in Communications from Southern New Hampshire University, as well as a bachelor’s degree in Corporate and Organizational Communications from Framingham State University.

This article was first published by Sandboxx News.

Image: Shutterstock.

The most significant and positive initiative by Congress to rein in any overstepping by government agencies involved in national security—including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Central Intelligence Agency, and National Security Agency—occurred in the mid-1970s. Investigations by special committees of each chamber, led by Senator Frank Church of Idaho and Representative Otis Pike of New York, did valuable work in uncovering operations that became widely recognized as unacceptable and pointed to the need for better mechanisms of oversight and control.

There is no question that genuine and significant abuses had occurred. These included, among others, the FBI’s COINTELPRO program of discrediting domestic advocacy organizations, the NSA’s monitoring of communications of certain prominent U.S. citizens, and various CIA covert operations whose connections to support of U.S. foreign policy objectives were questionable.

The congressional inquiries were scrupulously bipartisan. Senator Church received criticism from within his own party for what some Democrats considered to be excessive concessions to Republicans, but Church remained committed to sustaining bipartisanship to the end of the committee’s work, including approval of its public reports.

The investigations in the 1970s laid the groundwork for a legal framework and system of oversight, still in effect today, that precludes a recurrence of the kinds of abuses that the investigations uncovered. The system includes permanent select committees in both chambers of Congress to oversee intelligence. The committees have for the most part operated effectively in the tradition of their 1970’s precursors, although in more recent years they have been infected, especially on the House side, by some of the hyperpartisanship that has infected so much else on Capitol Hill. Legally required procedures, including notifications of Congress, were established for covert action. Also enacted in the 1970s was the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, imposing strict controls on any collection of communications intelligence that could affect U.S. persons.

Fast forward to today, and one of the first actions by the majority party in the newly convened House of Representatives was approval on a party-line vote of 221-211 of an investigation of “weaponization” of the security and law enforcement agencies. The investigation is to be led by staunch Donald Trump ally, election denier, and Republican flamethrower Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio.

A sure sign that raw partisanship is at work is when a party goes against what has traditionally been part of its platform and ideology. Republicans were consistent with their historical position when castigating the less thoughtful calls from some on the Left to “defund the police.” The GOP has long presented itself as a champion of law and order and a supporter of agencies that enforce criminal law, as well as a supporter of strong national security measures in foreign affairs. So it is quite a reversal for Republicans now to be attacking law enforcement, for “defund the FBI” to have become a slogan promoted by a prominent Republican member of Congress, and for the bureau to be a prime target of the Republican majority.

The motivation for the reversal is as obvious as the reversal is abrupt. Most of the highest profile FBI investigations of late have involved prominent Republicans and specifically Trump, who is still the closest thing the GOP has to a party leader. So, discrediting whatever the FBI and the Justice Department do regarding those investigations is an immediate goal. The initiative is also a counteroffensive for some of the members of Congress themselves, including Jordan, who was in deep with Trump’s efforts to prevent certification of the 2020 election result, and Scott Perry, a Republican from Pennsylvania whose involvement in Trump’s election-overturning efforts led the Department of Justice to seize his cell phone but who nonetheless refuses to recuse himself from any congressional investigation of the FBI and Justice.

Based on everything that so far has become public knowledge about the relevant FBI investigations, those investigations were amply warranted. Even just considering counterintelligence—one of several important areas of responsibility for the bureau—there was ample reason to look into things further, given such occurrences as Trump’s campaign chairman meeting repeatedly and sharing information with a Russian intelligence officer. The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s job is to investigate, which means not drawing final conclusions pre-emptively but instead following up leads and looking into smoke to see if there is any fire behind it.

Counterintelligence was one of the serious concerns behind the investigations in question but not the only one. There also was the insurrection of two years ago, with all the possible violations of the law of those who inspired it. And then there was the matter of boxloads of government documents kept in open defiance of federal law and with months of defiance and obstruction by Trump and his attorneys that left no alternative to the government than a search and seizure operation to retrieve the purloined material.

The show that Jordan is about to put on will no doubt allude to indications of some FBI officers holding unfavorable sentiments about Trump. Of course, FBI officers have personal opinions about American political leaders, as does most everyone else in the bureaucracy. But what matters is whether any such personal views shaped discharge of those officers’ official duties, and no evidence has emerged that they have.

The whole notion of the FBI being somehow biased against Republicans and the political Right has always been fanciful. This is the agency that J. Edgar Hoover led and nurtured for decades. No pollster has surveyed political opinions among the FBI work force, but the demographics of that work force make it look more like the pro-Trump part of the American population than like anti-Trumpers. The one public action by the FBI in recent years that was most likely to have had a political consequence was one that hurt Democrats, not Republicans: the announcement by then-Director James Comey just days before the 2016 presidential election that the bureau was reopening an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails.

There has been ample opportunity to find any evidence of political taint in the investigations of Trump if it were to exist. The inspector general of the Department of Justice looked into the matter and issued a report that, while criticizing the FBI for certain errors in its investigation, concluded that the investigation of Russian election interference was justified and not motivated by political bias. There also has been the investigation by special counsel John Durham, whose office, after more than three years of work and an expenditure of at least $6.5 million, also came up with a dry hole in searching for any politically motivated witch hunt. Durham’s own investigation could be considered a “weaponization” of Justice Department resources, given that his appointment was by an attorney general who was acting in large part like Trump’s personal lawyer and initiated this inquiry to try to discredit any regular investigation that would reflect unfavorably on the president.

Whether Durham had any material to work with ultimately had to be tested in a court of law, and the only cases he brought to trial—which were not even of government employees—resulted in acquittals. Whatever Jordan and company bring before cameras in a committee hearing room will not be subjected to any such formal judgment, or any other test of truth, logic, or reasonableness. The inevitable spinning and cherry-picking will almost certainly leave a mistaken impression with much of the public of the whole story of the FBI, Russia, and Trump.

A longer-term ill consequence of the show that is about to begin is the effect it may have on the FBI and other security agencies themselves. It might deter the bureau from vigorous enforcement of the law if officers fear that enforcement will collide with someone’s political narrative. Or it may push officers into bending their investigative efforts in whatever direction the political wind is blowing at the time. That would be even worse, and would mean the very politicization of security agencies that the House majority claims to be combatting.

The majority compares the establishment of its new subcommittee to the work of the Church committee. What they are doing is no such thing. To make such a comparison is an insult to the members of Congress who, five decades ago, acted out of patriotism rather than partisanship.

Paul Pillar retired in 2005 from a twenty-eight-year career in the U.S. intelligence community, in which his last position was National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia. Earlier he served in a variety of analytical and managerial positions, including as chief of analytic units at the CIA covering portions of the Near East, the Persian Gulf, and South Asia. Professor Pillar also served in the National Intelligence Council as one of the original members of its Analytic Group. He is also a Contributing Editor for this publication.

Image: Shutterstock.

On January 5, three NATO countries—the United States, Germany, and France—announced they would send Ukraine Western-style armored vehicles to support its defense against the Russian invasion. The White House announced its intention to send Ukraine fifty Bradley Fighting Vehicles. Likewise, Germany will send Marder Infantry Fighting Vehicles, and France will provide AMX-10 RC armored fighting vehicles to Ukraine. These vehicles are not the main battle tanks (MBT) that Kyiv continues to ask for, but they are nonetheless important additions to any arsenal. Indeed, these smaller, less-armored infantry and armored reconnaissance vehicles are designed for fighting in concert with MBTs. While these vehicles do not have the punch of an MBT, their weaponry is more than capable of destroying Russian tanks on the battlefield, just as American Bradleys did during the Gulf War.

The introduction of the Bradleys, Marders, and AMX-10s is a shift in how NATO members are arming Ukraine. Previously, NATO states have sent Ukraine Soviet-Era equipment from the reserves of former Warsaw Bloc countries, along with NATO missiles and artillery. The new vehicles will offer Ukrainian forces the ability to conduct some offensive operations in hopes of liberating parts of the country under Russian occupation. Although the switch to Western weapons systems will decrease Kyiv’s dependence on non-Western munitions suppliers, there are reasons to be concerned that the introduction of three similar yet different vehicles may strain the Ukrainian military’s logistical network. Even though NATO is the best in the world at developing and incorporating interoperability standards, no two weapons systems have the same logistics requirements, which may stress Ukraine’s logistical infrastructure and thus soften the positive impacts realized by the introduction of these weapons systems.

Providing soldiers with different web gear and rucksacks is one thing, but giving a military three different infantry combat vehicles with three different anti-tank missiles could cause operational trouble. The introduction of the three new fighting vehicles will require three different maintenance, repair, and overhaul supply chains, three different training processes for crews, the adoption of three different sets of operating procedures, and three different munitions supply chains. It is unlikely that the Ukrainian Army will mix the vehicles at the unit level (i.e., Bradleys and other vehicles in the same formation), but they might operate in the same area, which would increase sustainment and management costs above what is needed to employ one weapon system. From a logistics standpoint, it is usually a best practice to limit the differentiation of weapons systems or vehicles to the minimum level needed to satisfy mission requirements, maximizing logistics effectiveness and reducing opportunities for failure. From a military strategy standpoint, tracking differences in system capabilities and requirements across three platforms aimed toward achieving the same operational capability imbues undue cognitive and planning burdens on the warfighter.

On the other hand, it can be argued that the provision of three different weapons systems might increase some measures of resilience. For instance, if one NATO country decides it can no longer support or sustain its weapons systems, Ukraine will still have support from the other two countries. Also, the addition of three weapons systems plausibly opens up more opportunities for additional NATO allies to support the Ukrainian war effort. For instance, if a smaller ally can provide only limited manpower, training, supplies, or munitions, they may now have more options to choose from when considering what capabilities they can part from without reducing their wartime readiness. Furthermore, having high-quality vehicles will provide Ukrainian troops with extra protection and firepower. Russian commanders recognize the superiority of Western vehicles and might hesitate in taking on units equipped with these weapons. Western vehicles—as well as the signal of support they send—will be a morale booster for the Ukrainians. Pragmatically, Western armies can see how their weapons operate on a modern battlefield and test interoperable battle plans and operating procedures.

In the future, a crisis like the one in Ukraine will likely appear in global hotspots, and nations under attack will similarly ask for aid to repeal aggressors. If NATO is to serve as the arsenal of democracy, we should look to Ukraine for lessons learned. NATO countries should work together to provide vehicles and weapons systems that give the tactical edge needed to win the war, not tax the Ukrainian military’s logistics infrastructure with varying logistical and maintenance requirements. Providing military equipment, training, supplies, and support is commendable, but it’s important to strongly consider logistical problems and opportunities to maximize support with minimal expense.

Dr. Edward Salo is an associate professor of history and associate director of the Heritage Studies Ph.D. Program at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, Arkansas. Dr. Salo teaches military history and is currently researching the weaponization of heritage in irregular warfare.

Ben Hazen is a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Dayton and a retired US Air Force aircraft maintenance officer. His interests are in "tooth to tail" logistics and innovation management and is a founding co-editor (emeritus) of Journal of Defense Analytics and Logistics.

Image: DVIDS.

The year 1997 saw Bill Clinton begin his second term as president of the United States, DVDs come into existence as a video format, Titanic premiered on movie screens, and Princess Diana die in a car crash in Paris. It was also the year that America first designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization. That is six years before the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was formed to help prevent terrorist attacks in the United States, nearly two decades before Twitter was founded, and twenty-two years before Bitcoin was created. And now, twenty-six years later, many experts cite the United States as an exporter of terrorist ideology and tactics. The world is different now.

The Immigration and Nationality Act gives the secretary of state the authority to designate groups as foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs) if they can indeed determine that the group is foreign, that it engages in terrorist activity (or has the capability and intent to do so), and that the acts threaten the security of the United States. These criteria are fairly subjective and to date, sixty-eight groups have been given the FTO label. A significant majority of the groups designated are Islamist extremist organizations and over a quarter of the groups are Al Qaeda, ISIS, and their regional affiliates. Given all that has changed in the last thirty years, and given the breadth of what can seemingly be considered under the language in the Immigration and Nationality Act, perhaps now is the time for both Congress and the Executive Branch to reassess their approach to the challenge of designating terrorist organizations.

It is important to note at the outset that, thankfully, some work is being done on this topic. The Soufan Center in particular has undertaken some important work on comparing designation regimes in different countries and looking at how rising violent far-right movements are being affected by designations and prescriptions—or the lack thereof. Others have looked at discrete issues and made arguments about whether to designate a specific group or not (e.g., PMC Wagner, the Houthis, the Nordic Resistance Movement). And while discrete issues are important to debate, it highlights the changes noted above and underscores that the threats we face today outpace the world of terrorism envisioned in 1997.

But before jumping to anything else, it is important to account for the changes to the terrorism landscape to establish that we actually need a paradigm shift in how we think about designated terrorist groups—that we need something more than just incremental changes or adjustments. First, the internet is an obvious tool that must be acknowledged. Email and web browsers and the internet as a whole existed in 1997, but not in the form they do now. To compare the two would be like comparing a basketball player from 1940 to one playing today. They are playing the same sport but in completely different ways. The internet today exists in nearly everyone’s pocket, allows for money to be transferred instantly, can be used to attract new recruits completely outside of a terrorist’s social ecosystem, and allows for video and audio transmission in ways that could not have been imagined in 1997.

Additionally, terrorist groups are not necessarily the hierarchical, mafia-style organizations they were in the 1990s. Major groups like Al Qaeda or ISIS now have semi-autonomous affiliates or franchises. ISIS also puts out content online in an effort to radicalize people across the globe whom they cannot reach in person to inspire them to carry out attacks as unaffiliated assailants. Terrorist groups are also funding themselves in new ways. While most still use more traditional means like hawalas or criminal enterprises, some are starting to use bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies. Some are also using crowdfunding sites like GoFundMe or GiveSendGo. And weapons are changing too, with terrorists now able to use publicly available plans to build or assemble their own firearms via untraceable 3D printed parts that are easily available. None of these details are new revelations. Yet it seems that policymakers have not yet assembled all of the details into a complete picture to conclude that how we assess who or what is a terrorist organization needs to be updated along with the tools and policies we use to fight individual terrorists.

Let’s start with Congress. The current legislation leaves the entirety of the decision of whether to designate a group as an FTO to the secretary of state, and only in the last line of the legislation does it clarify that he or she can consult with the secretary of the treasury and the attorney general. This leaves the director of national intelligence, the director of the CIA, the director of the FBI, the secretary of homeland security, and director of the National Counterterrorism Center (three of those five positions were created after this legislation was written) out of the loop. And while the State Department surely consults them for intelligence support and other relevant input, legislation should require further consultation and cooperation.

Similarly, the legislation requires the State Department to notify Congressional leadership and certain committees in advance of making a designation, but the legislation has not been updated to include the relatively newly formed committees with jurisdiction over Homeland Security in the House and Senate, leaving a gap in oversight on this issue.

Congress surely recognizes that terrorism has changed in the past twenty-five years—even if there may not be agreement on many of the underlying details (fodder for another article or book or dissertation, to be sure). Congress needs to undertake the necessary work of thinking through what a new paradigm or designation regime ought to look like to account for all the changes.

This reassessment should not bleed over into the discussion of how to best address issues of domestic terrorism (DT). There is a robust debate ongoing in policy circles about whether the United States needs a DT charge or not but at issue here are foreign terrorist organizations. And while there is documented evidence of American violent extremists of various stripes communicating and coordinating with foreign extremists, the focus here is not domestic. Which is to say that the State Department should remain the lead agency for designating groups, but they need to push more openly for support from other parts of the U.S. Government. This includes gathering terrorism specialists from across the government to assess how the threat has changed and how the State Department needs to adjust its thinking about a designation regime. With the proliferation of groups, maybe the State Department needs more staff to make assessments? Maybe its staff needs a different type of expertise that could be augmented by support from other agencies?

Regardless, the State Department should not sit back and let Congress determine on its own what the future ought to be. The State Department has a number of foreign partners it can work with and listen to and determine best practices. There are no easy answers right now, but the nature of terrorism is changing, and the longer we wait to address the problems, the more complicated it will become to develop the tools and counter the terrorists’ changes.

Beyond the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security ought to have a more defined role in the process. The DHS is home to countless officials, both in operational and policy-making roles, tasked with preventing terrorist attacks in the United States, and it has a robust capacity to engage with international partners. DHS ought to push for a more visible, consultative, or cooperative role in the process, with an emphasis on the fact that they are only supporting the potential designation of foreign groups.

So many things are changing in our world right now that it can feel difficult to step back and look at the big, strategic shifts we need to make. It might feel more manageable and easier to tinker around the edges on discreet problems. As the terrorist threat landscape shifts, however, we cannot afford to simply look for tools or policies to stay one step ahead of the terrorists we know about. We need to look at how we label who is a terrorist and adjust accordingly. The technology that terrorists use, how they organize themselves, and how they communicate and recruit have all significantly changed since the United States created its terrorist designation regime. All parts of government need to do their part to upgrade our ability to name terrorists and keep them from establishing safe havens for planning attacks.

Matthew Wein is a former Professional Staff Member at the House Committee on Homeland Security's Subcommittee on Intelligence and Counterterrorism and a former policy adviser to the DHS Assistant Secretary for Policy on counterterrorism, international affairs, and law enforcement cooperation. He is a graduate of the University of Florida.

Image: Shutterstock.

President Joe Biden will hold his second democracy summit in March. Like the previous one, it will not be helpful as a tool of statecraft for the United States or other countries. But it will be right in its message that the surest path to prosperity is through greater freedom.

Biden got together 100 countries for his first democracy summit held in December 2021. The event seemed to be an attempt to unite democracies in support of the Biden Doctrine which argues that the defining issue of our time is the contest between democracies and autocracies.

The Biden Doctrine, however, is not stated precisely enough to be useful. As Biden himself makes clear on page 8 in his National Security Strategy, America’s main strategic challenge comes from powers that are both authoritarian and revisionist. Such powers, he continues, wage and prepare for wars of aggression, undermine other democracies, oppress their peoples, and use economic coercion against democracies. He adds, importantly, that “many non-democracies join the world’s democracies in forswearing these behaviors.”

What is clear in Biden’s National Security Strategy, but not in his other statements on his doctrine, is that not all autocracies are threats to the United States—only the revisionist ones. And that some autocracies are actually on the United States’ side in opposing revisionist autocracies like China and Russia.

The message of the Biden Doctrine has also been implicitly rejected by the Global South in its reaction to the second Russian invasion of Ukraine. A large number of developing countries have refused to condemn Russia the way Western democracies have. These countries, which some have identified as a new non-aligned movement, refuse to pick sides for ideological reasons and want to do business with democracies and autocracies alike.

Where Biden’s Democracy Summit is right is that “strong, rights-respecting democracies are more peaceful, prosperous, and stable.” 

A June 2022 report on the Atlantic Council’s freedom and prosperity indexes shows a high correlation relationship between the economic, political, and legal freedoms of countries and their prosperity level. All countries ranked in the top category of the Atlantic Council’s Freedom Index are also ranked in one of the two top categories of its Prosperity Index. And almost all of the countries in the bottom category of the Freedom Index are in one of the two bottom categories of the Prosperity Index.

The report also explores the causal relationship between freedom and prosperity by looking at the prosperity levels of divided countries with divergent freedom paths. It shows that free West Germany and South Korea became more prosperous than East Germany and North Korea.

A recent essay published by Aspen Institute Romania on freedom and prosperity in Eastern Europe reached the same conclusions. The essay described an analysis of a selected sample of formerly Communist countries with a similar lower-middle income level in 1996. The sample countries also had a similar freedom starting point in 1996: They had all just overcome half a century of Communism during which they had had no political, economic, or legal freedom.

The analysis then looks at the freedom and prosperity paths of these countries over the next three decades by looking at their scores in the 2021 Atlantic Council’s Freedom and Prosperity Indexes. It finds that countries like the Baltics and Romania that made a clean break with their Communist past and joined the European Union were more prosperous in 2021 than those countries that did not. Not surprisingly, the lowest rankings of the sample group in both freedom and prosperity were Russia and Belarus.

The Democracy Summit is also right when it implies that the authoritarian development model promoted by Communist China (not invited to the summit) is not the best formula for durable prosperity. Data from the Atlantic Council’s Freedom and Prosperity Indexes support this view. Communist China ranks 140 in the Freedom Index and 114 in its Prosperity Index. In contrast, just 100 miles off the coast of China and also with an ethnic Chinese population, democratic Taiwan is much freer and much more prosperous: it ranks 18 and 27, respectively.

Dan Negrea is the Senior Director of the Freedom and Prosperity Center of the Atlantic Council. Previously he served at the U.S. Department of State as a member of the Secretary’s Policy Planning Staff and as the Special Representative for Commercial and Business Affairs.

Joseph Lemoine is the Deputy Director of the Freedom and Prosperity Center of the Atlantic Council. Previously he worked at the World Bank as a private sector specialist and as an advisor to governments in developing countries.

Yomna Gaafar is the Assistant Director of the Freedom and Prosperity Center of the Atlantic Council. Previously she worked for the Egyptian Ministry of International Cooperation.

Image: Shutterstock.

Last month, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) rolled out the purple carpet for Chinese leader Xi Jinping as part of a series of meetings between Arab leaders and China. Xi’s visit reflects China’s growing ambitions in the Middle East and beyond—often to separate the United States from its historic partners to China’s benefit. The best response to Xi’s charm offensive in Riyadh is to double down on America’s relationship with the KSA.

President Joe Biden sought to repair U.S.-Saudi ties this summer after previously calling the kingdom a “pariah state.” Tensions grew higher when the Biden administration released an intelligence report implicating Saudi crown prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS) in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. 

Although Biden’s visit was helpful in defrosting relations with Riyadh, it was not met with the same pomp and circumstance that the Chinese visit garnered. But this is not the only sign of the growing Sino-Saudi relationship. 

Just this year, Huawei, a Chinese technology corporation heavily sanctioned by the United States, signed an agreement with a Saudi education center. Meanwhile, Saudi oil giant Aramco signed a cooperation deal with a Chinese energy company. The kingdom is also China’s top oil supplier, making up 18 percent of China’s total crude oil purchases. In November, just a few weeks before Xi’s visit, the KSA reportedly bought $4 billion worth of Chinese weapons. 

The momentum continued when Xi touched down in Riyadh. During Xi’s visit, he and MBS signed a strategic partnership between their respective nations, as well as facilitated a number of private sector deals between Saudi and Chinese companies in fields including information technology, genetics, mining, hydrogen energy, and manufacturing totaling more than $29 billion. Notably, Huawei signed a memorandum of understanding with a Saudi government ministry that enables the telecom conglomerate to build partnerships with local data centers. 

The two also agreed to make this a more regular dialogue, as they continue to find tangible ways to deepen their relationship where their interests align. For the Saudis, those interests include gaining access to massive investment from the world’s second-largest economy. 

The Saudis may also see ties with Beijing as a hedge against their biggest regional threat, Iran—the thought being that Iranian reliance on China might be a lever by which to moderate Tehran’s malign behavior in the region. Moves closer to China increased when the Biden administration announced its intention to revive the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a deal the kingdom has vehemently opposed. American promises and declarations about “longer and stronger” during negotiations did little to assuage Saudi concerns. 

But mass protests in Iran and the regime’s response have seemingly changed the calculus for the Biden administration, leading it to announce, perhaps unintentionally, that the Iran deal is dead. While this could ease some tension between Washington and Riyadh, America should officially commit to this position, both to dispel the fiction that such a return is feasible and to reassure our partners in the region.

More broadly, in order to salvage America’s fragile position in the Middle East, the White House needs to invite a Saudi delegation to Washington to outline why Saudi interests are better served when Riyadh partners with the United States over China, while also being frank about why it matters to America. 

First, the administration should reassure the KSA that the United States is better equipped and more likely to contain Iran. This starts with accepting that the window of opportunity for a nuclear deal has passed. Since JCPOA negotiations began, the KSA and others in the region have viewed Washington’s concessions as a sign of weakness, proof the United States was abandoning its allies. In order to counter this narrative, the United States should denounce Iran’s shifting demands and publicly call the time of death on the JCPOA.

Second, the United States should increase its Foreign Military Sales to the KSA. This would help arm them with cutting-edge products against Iran and the proxies it employs to destabilize the region. Iranian proxies also target longtime American ally, Israel, and that dynamic is unlikely to improve with a greater Chinese presence. When Xi met with Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas during his recent trip, he reiterated that China “always stands with the Palestinian people.” 

Third, Washington should work with corporate America to provide investment alternatives to Chinese products. Not only would closer economic ties advance American commercial interests, but they would also help ensure the KSA doesn’t become technologically dependent on China. Recent telecom deals may seem innocuous but Huawei and other Chinese companies have been banned from the United States and elsewhere due to their affiliation with the CCP and involvement in skirting sanctions and in enabling minority repression. Before the KSA goes all in on China, the United States should present alternatives to these blacklisted businesses.

Saudi Arabia has long been a leader in the Arab world and will likely continue to do so for years to come. To retain this strategic relationship, the United States needs to make it clear that its shared interests have not shifted. With China and Xi Jinping attempting to disrupt over seven decades of mutual understanding, the onus is on Washington to reassert its position as the indispensable ally.

Mariam Wahba is an Egyptian-American Middle East analyst. She is an Associate Director of Advocacy with the Philos Project and the co-host of the Americanish podcast.

Zane Zovak foreign policy analyst who writes about the U.S.-China rivalry. His work has been featured in publications such as Foreign Policy, The Diplomat, The National Interest, and Defense One.

Image: Shutterstock.

Last month’s U.S.-African Leaders Summit aimed to compete with China, Russia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and other nations for “influence” in Africa, a continent that is growing in prominence. According to the New York Times, China, which recently gave a whopping $60 billion in aid and loans to African nations, is leading the race for influence on the rising continent, with the United States falling behind in the giveaways. Really, that’s just fine.

After World War II, during the Cold War, and 150 years after the Constitutional Convention, the United States deviated from its traditional foreign policy of being a reluctant and late participant in overseas wars. President Harry Truman, in choosing to help the autocratic governments of Turkey and Greece fend off Communist influence in 1947, pledged the United States to compete for influence in a global Cold War with the Soviet Union. In that forty-two-year Cold War, the United States spent huge amounts of blood and treasure reflexively competing all over the world to contain, and in a few cases roll back, Communism. This established a muscle memory for gaining ever more ethereal “influence” in far reaches of the planet. When the East Bloc and Soviet Union suddenly collapsed and the United States was perceived to have “won” the Cold War, such uncharacteristic American interventionism appeared to have validation. (In reality, the Soviet Empire collapsed because its creaking economy could no longer support its overextended empire. If the United States had not contested the then-basket cases of South Korea, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia and instead let the Soviets bear the cost of conquering and administering them, perhaps the Soviet Union would have collapsed faster than it did.)

Now that China is rising, U.S. media and foreign policy circles are wringing their hands about the United States losing out to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which garners influence by state-driven lending to developing countries to build boondoggle infrastructure projects that they cannot afford, thereby accumulating dangerously high debt for their economies to bear. Africa has been one of the prime targets of the BRI influence project.

As China got involved on the continent, other actors, such as Russia, Japan, the European Union, Turkey, and the UAE, wanted to get in on the action as well. For example, Turkey and the UAE have built infrastructure projects on the continent, and the Russians and Emiratis have sold weapons to a number of African nations. Many nations are after Africa’s earth minerals for electric cars and see Africa’s expanding population—which will double by 2050 to account for 25 percent of the world’s population—as a huge market for their exports.

The Trump administration, with its chaotic self-interested foreign policy, didn’t join the party in Africa. But the Biden administration, with a president who well remembers the Cold War competition, wants to catch up with the rest of the herd. Biden held a U.S.-African Leaders Summit at the White House in December to distribute some goodies of his own. To start, Biden will join the wooing of African leaders by supporting the African Union’s representation at G-20 summits, in organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, and more. Also, Biden has pledged $55 billion in new spending for Africa, including initiatives on computer coding education, cybersecurity, and rare earth minerals, which will be mined to build electric vehicle batteries.

Giving African nations and organizations more representation in international forums is fine, but should the U.S. government join the crowd of nations by slathering more government largesse on the continent? American companies competing for a growing African market will help both Africa and the United States. In contrast, any U.S. government infrastructure or subsidy programs would likely be counterproductive for both sides, as the record of the BRI has already shown.

On the security side, the United States should let the Europeans do more to provide security on the continent if requested. More generally, the United States needs to emphasize African self-reliance in the security realm. The United States must finally accept the reality that the multipolar world is already here by pushing for the expansion of the UN Security Council, adding not only the African Union but also India, Japan, Germany, and Brazil as permanent members. Each of these great powers could manage exclusively their own sphere of influence in the world, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt originally envisioned in his “Four Policemen” vision for post-World War II security. The new permanent members of the Security Council could handle any boundary conflicts or trans-sphere issues—for example, climate change—that arose in their sphere.

Such a framework would allow U.S economic rejuvenation by permitting the United States to substantially cut security spending, thus retiring some of its monstrous $30 trillion in national debt and reducing U.S. imperial overextension caused by the economic burden of policing the entire world for other wealthy nations, which allows free-riders to divert resources toward attaining a competitive edge in commercial markets. The United States now only accounts for 13.6 percent of global GDP but a whopping 38 percent of the world’s defense spending, which has created a competitive drag on the U.S. economy that must be reduced. Washington can do so by refusing to serve as the unilateral global policeman or pursue a zero-sum competition with China for military, political, and economic dominance.

Ivan Eland is a senior fellow with the Independent Institute and author of War and the Rogue Presidency.

Image: Flickr/U.S. Department of State.

During his visit to Saudi Arabia in early December, Chinese president Xi Jinping attended the inaugural China-Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) summit. The summit focused on improving China-GCC relations and forming security ties between the parties. In his speech at the summit, Xi called on the two sides to be “natural partners” for cooperation and proposed five major areas for cooperation: energy, finance and investment, innovation and new technologies, aerospace, and language and cultures. Nevertheless, a glance at the engagement shows where the focal point of each partnership lies: energy, technology, and trade. For the Gulf monarchies, trade ties with China will diversify their economies away from the oil that provides most of their national income. More importantly, in the context of global competition, the summit delivered no concrete commitments to deepen the China-GCC strategic partnership, and nothing new was announced in the realm of security.

The China-GCC Strategic Partnership

In the Gulf—where the United States has been the predominant external actor for decades—China has sought to forge close political ties with emerging powers to secure access to vital energy resources, expand its commercial reach, and enhance its strategic influence. While China believes U.S. hegemony in the Gulf is in decline, its approach to achieving great power status and influence has been cautious and hesitant. Fomenting instability does not benefit China, which has neither the will nor the capacity to fill the regional security role held by the United States. Instead, China has developed strategic partnerships with key GCC countries whose support can bolster its great power status and allow it to project its influence into new arenas.

This suggests that China is determined to avoid confrontation with the United States and does not want to be sucked into the region’s multiple conflicts. Beijing prefers to take a position of non-interference, allowing it to remain neutral in most inter-regional disputes and take advantage of strategic and economic opportunities. As a result, Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects in the Gulf are primarily a means to strengthen Beijing’s great power status in the region. This non-interference policy is essential for guaranteeing the success of the BRI framework by maintaining neutrality and alienating no one. At the same time, the Gulf monarchies see China as an exemplary trading partner that does not interfere in domestic affairs and as a great power with significant political influence in the international arena.

China carries out its relations with the Gulf monarchies through partnership diplomacy rather than alliance politics (these relationships are not alliances, as Beijing has typically shied away from forming alliances). China has signed strategic partnership agreements with the GCC states detailing significant economic investment and trade within the BRI framework, including comprehensive strategic partnerships with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia, two of the region’s most powerful and resource-rich countries, and strategic partnerships with Kuwait, Oman, and Qatar. It is important to note that China’s partnership diplomacy in the Gulf hinges on deepening bilateral relations and partnerships with existing U.S. allies to expand its influence and access to energy while simultaneously avoiding confrontation with Washington.

Nevertheless, the relative decline of U.S. hegemony and influence in the Persian Gulf, which is taking place alongside China’s growing role, affects the region’s balance of power. While maintaining their strategic partnerships with the United States, some GCC states—Saudi Arabia and the UAE, for instance—are also seeking to hedge against threats and the rapidly shifting balance of power by establishing ties with other powers. This hedging policy aims to use China as an additional source of political, economic, and even military support, as well as to use ties with Beijing to pressure Washington to adjust its policy.

Great Power Competition

Great power competition between the United States and China has reached new heights, becoming the most important dynamic on the world stage, and shaping the international order as it unfolds. Between an increasingly alarmed Washington and an emergent, assertive Beijing, the GCC states find themselves in a choice between their major strategic ally and an important economic partner. Nevertheless, the China-GCC partnership’s future will not be determined by what the great powers desire to gain from the Gulf monarchies but by what the Gulf states expect to earn from the great power rivalry. This expectation highlights the strange, complex China-GCC relationship.

Although the China-GCC summit emphasized intra-GCC unity, the Gulf states do not have a unified, coherent vision for a regional approach to great power rivalry. The Gulf monarchies share a common skepticism of Washington’s future commitment to the region, but their attitudes vis-à-vis China and great power rivalry differ significantly. These varying views can be divided into three groups. The first group, the “hedging states,” includes Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Both are openly hedging against Washington’s withdrawal from the Gulf. Thus, they have incorporated a comprehensive strategic partnership element into their engagement with China. Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are actively looking to diversify their supply of weapons, with China now considered a top alternative for essential military equipment that the United States refuses to sell to them.

The second group is the “balancing states,” Qatar and Oman. Both cultivated closer ties with China by opening up their national infrastructure and digital networks to Chinese investment. However, they have been more cautious regarding great power rivalry and maintaining their close military ties with Washington. Qatar deepened its relationship with the U.S. military—recently upgraded to the status of a major non-NATO ally—through its vital role in the evacuation from Afghanistan in 2021. Oman has been careful not to buy Chinese military equipment—unlike Qatar, which purchased ballistic missiles from Beijing—and signed a new strategic framework agreement with Washington in 2019 that gave the U.S. Navy access to the Port of Duqm.

The third group is the “cautious states,” including Kuwait and Bahrain. Both nations have opened up their countries to Chinese investment and construction projects but refrained from turning commercial ties into strategic ties. Kuwait and Bahrain have the most limited military capabilities among the GCC states and see U.S. protection as vital for their security. Indeed, approximately 13,500 U.S. forces are based in Kuwait; only Germany, Japan, and South Korea host more U.S. forces. Bahrain hosts the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet and U.S. Naval Forces Central Command and participates in U.S.-led military coalitions. Both states have far more to lose from engagement with China than their neighbors.

While great power competition has revealed the various strategies pursued by each of the GCC states regarding China, their different approaches make it difficult to predict the future of GCC-China ties.

Amid great power competition, the war in Ukraine, and the struggle for technological-economic dominance, the GCC states have been forced to prudently navigate between the United States, their great strategic ally, and China, their significant economic partner. The various strategies pursued by each state regarding the U.S.-China rivalry will eventually test the region’s security and stability, possibly dividing the GCC. The Gulf states must develop a diplomatic framework to address their foreign policy differences and prevent the region from becoming an arena for the struggle between Washington and Beijing. If the Gulf states fail to do so, competition among neighboring states may emerge, with unpredictable consequences for the region.

Dr. Mordechai Chaziza holds a Ph.D. from Bar-Ilan University and is a senior lecturer at the Department of Politics and Governance and the division of Multidisciplinary Studies in Social Science, at Ashkelon Academic College (Israel). Dr. Chaziza is the author of China and the Persian Gulf: The New Silk Road Strategy and Emerging Partnerships (2019), China’s Middle East Diplomacy: The Belt and Road Strategic Partnership (2020), and The New Silk Road Grand Strategy and the Maghreb: China and North Africa.

Image: Shutterstock.

Modern unmanned aerial vehicles, widely known as drones, have been an indispensable part of warfare for the past two decades. America's use of Predator drones for reconnaissance missions in the Kosovo War against Serbian forces is known as the first time drones officially entered into the equation. At that time, hardly anyone noticed the capacity of these vehicles to change warfare. By the early 2000s, the United States began to use drones not only for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions but also for precision strikes, starting in Afghanistan.

For some time, the United States, followed by Israel, monopolized not only drone military operations but also the drone market. While these two states took advantage of the military edge provided by drones, it was impossible for other states to develop military drones with the capabilities of Predator, Reaper, or Heron drones. But this is no longer the case.

The success and effectiveness of drones on the battlefield pushed other states to follow suit. Turkey, among a few other states, was successful in developing its own indigenous, technologically advanced drones. This has resulted in what can be called the second drone age, an age where drone technology is no longer monopolized.

As drones started to be used extensively, new operational concepts started to evolve, radically transforming armed conflict. This is especially visible in the Russo-Ukrainian War, where drone usage dominates most of the highlights of the conflict.  

Both Ukrainian and Russian forces have used drones for ISR and strike missions. Among these drones are the MALE Class Turkish Bayraktar TB2 and the Iranian Mohajer 6, which can fire precision-guided munitions, but also loitering munitions (or kamikaze drones), such as American Switchblade and Iranian Shahed 136 and Shahed 131 drones.

It didn’t take long for drones to become one of the most important instruments in the war in Ukraine. In the initial phase of Russian aggression, Ukrainian forces demonstrated adept use of Bayraktar TB2 drones, which effectively neutralized several advancing Russian forces, including tanks, artillery, helicopters, and missile defenses, as well as important maritime targets. Most notably, a Bayraktar drone contributed to the sinking of the Moskva, the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

Some have claimed that Ukrainian drones have gradually lost their effectiveness due to Russia’s increased effort to counter them by better organizing its logistics and air defenses, including its missile defense systems and electronic warfare capabilities. However, this has not stopped Russia from launching its own drone warfare campaign. Russia has begun launching hundreds of Iranian-made drones to attack Ukrainian targets or conduct ISR missions.

Drone warfare in Ukraine reached a new level when Russia began acquiring and using Iranian drones, although Iran initially denied any involvement. Russia has used Mohajer and several variants of Shahed drones to strike not only Ukrainian military components but also critical infrastructure, particularly the country’s energy infrastructure ahead of winter. Ukrainian officials say that Russia has been carrying out such strikes since mid-September. This is likely a result of Russia’s waning long-range precision strike capabilities, which intelligence reports suggest is due to Russia’s depleted stock of precision-guided missiles. Drones can compensate for this shortfall.

On the other hand, the Ukrainian battlefield also demonstrated that one needs a huge inventory of drones if the expected armed conflict will be lengthy and intense. The lessons learned from this can be seen in the rapid, increased interest from decisionmakers worldwide to focus on national production capabilities or, when that is not possible, to sign military agreements with the states that already have the necessary capabilities. The increasing number of states who have requested to buy Turkey’s Bayraktar TB2 is just an example of this proliferation trend of the second drone age.

However, the proliferation of military drone usage is not the only feature that we are witnessing. While the use of military drones has greatly impacted warfare, new elements witnessed in the Ukraine conflict raise a troublesome question: is a third drone age underway?

One of these elements is the use of civilian drones for military purposes. While this has been a common practice among violent nonstate actors, this is a new practice for states with novel military implications. For instance, Ukrainian officials said that they aim to build a fleet of drones and called upon citizens to donate their own commercial drones to the army. This approach has been concisely defined as “dronations.” Additionally, Ukraine has incorporated into its operations not only commercial drones, but civilians themselves are playing a crucial role. Described as the “democratization of military power,” this new trend is exemplified by Ukrainian citizens using cheap and simple technology to win on the battlefield. In one well-known example, a fifteen-year-old Ukrainian boy used a commercial drone to direct Ukrainian forces against Russian forces. It is exactly these sorts of practices that will lead to even more changes in how states conduct war, and as a result, affect change in the very character of war.

In this context, it is very likely that the trends witnessed in the Ukrainian conflict will propel other nations to follow the same lead by incorporating smaller, less expensive, and easy-to-produce drones into their inventory. Notably, we are seeing these drones being used more and more. One of the latest examples was the case of North Korea, which earlier this month launched five tiny drones on an ISR mission toward South Korean territory for the first time since 2017. The South Korean military failed to intercept the drones, leading Seoul to announce plans to build its own drone unit.

The Russo-Ukrainian War has demonstrated that, via technological advancements, the character of warfare is changing radically. Military and commercial drones have offered more to the war effort than expensive fighter aircraft or other military systems could in terms of cost-effectiveness and procurement opportunities. However, in this new drone age, the incorporation of commercial drones has brought with it the inclusion of civilian power into the equation. This has led to innovative operational concepts, which have demonstrated the power of simple, cheap, and easy-to-use technologies against the existing expensive and difficult-to-develop military mainstream.

Gloria Shkurti Özdemir is a Researcher at SETA Foundation and PhD Candidate at Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University.

Rıfat Öncel is a Defense researcher at SETA Foundation and PhD Candidate in International Relations Department at Middle East Technical University.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

Three years after the death of Qasem Soleimani, the notorious commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards-Quds Force (IRGC-QF), the Islamic Republic continues to invoke his “martyrdom” for its malign and self-serving purposes. Six months after ongoing plots against U.S. officials became public, President Ebrahim Raisi reiterated the call on January 3, 2023, for vengeance on the anniversary of his death. The broader veneration of the departed general includes an array of titles: as “the commander of hearts,” “incorruptible,” and “national hero” who “fought and destroyed the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)”—all designed to reinforce the regime while playing fast and loose with the truth.

The facts speak of an entirely different man. Soleimani didn’t fight ISIS so much as he presented his Shiite militias as saviors of both Iraq and Iran. In truth, the violence he unleashed helped create the terror group. Nor is he a hero. Indeed, many in the country view him as a tool of the repressive state and even despise him for his participation in crackdowns against protesters over many years. Soleimani was not incorruptible either, but rather a corrupt military figure who oversaw a mafia network and wasted national resources either for personal gain or for benefit of a kleptocratic regime.

Soleimani’s role in the emergence of ISIS is part of the tangled story of his mission in Iraq, which took off with the U.S. invasion in 2003. When U.S.-led coalition forces occupied Iraq, the Islamic Republic moved swiftly to create several Shiite insurgent groups in the country to force Americans out in hopes of adding Baghdad to its regional “Shiite empire.”

Soleimani was put in charge of overseeing the mission. As a secondary effort, Soleimani took special vengeance on Iraqi Sunnis, particularly former political and military figures of Saddam Hussein’s regime, as a reprisal for the Sunnis’ participation in the eight-year Iran-Iraq War. The anti-Sunni death squads, which Soleimani created, killed and kidnapped hundreds of former senior Sunni political and military officials, among them 182 Iraqi pilots.

The Shiite militia under his command also waged a bloody war against ordinary Sunni citizens, tortured, kidnapped, and killed them, burned their homes, and, in an early version of ethnic cleansing, stopped many of them from returning to their towns. Each month, hundreds of Iraqi Sunnis were executed or tortured to death by Soleimani agents.

Soleimani’s extreme brutality against Sunnis resulted in sectarian mayhem, provoking large protests in Sunni towns where the populations harbored sharp grievances against the Shiites. It was in these extreme circumstances that Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), the predecessor of ISIS, emerged and turned the sectarian strife into a virtual civil war. US forces managed to destroy AQI, but the mistreatment of Sunnis did not end. ISIS rose from AQI’s ashes with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as its leader. It eventually took the US-led coalition 13,331 strikes to defeat the group in Iraq in a campaign called “Operation Inherent Resolve.”

If the making of ISIS in Iraq was the by-product of Soleimani’s stirring the sectarian pot, creating the terror group in Syria was by design. When in 2011, the Bashar al-Assad regime used considerable violence against peaceful Syrian protesters, Assad’s tactic backfired and triggered an armed rebellion, which turned into a civil war. This was an unfortunate outcome for Iranians, who regarded Syria as the “Golden Ring” of the “Axis of Resistance.”

With so much at stake, the IRGC-QF increased its presence in Syria to save the Assad regime. However, the extensive use of violence by Assad’s forces, Hezbollah fighters, and Soleimani’s forces resulted in international outrage, causing Western countries to push for regime change in Syria. Soleimani, concerned about the “Golden Ring” and the danger it faced, proposed to create the so-called “binary option” approach, a strategy to fight Assad’s bad international publicity. The strategy entailed creating a radical jihadist group that would make the Syrian dictator look like a lesser evil in the eyes of his people and the West.

On the advice of Soleimani, the Assad regime promptly released hundreds of prominent radical Islamist prisoners, including Amr ‘Abu Atheer’ al-Absi, Ali Musa al-Shawakh, aka Abu Luqman, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, Zahran Alloush, Hassan Abboud and his brother Abu Shadi, and Ahmed Abu Issa housed in Sednaya prison. Many of these jihadists went on to lead the Islamic State in the Syrian Civil War.

During the war, even when ISIS forces occupied northern Syria and proclaimed Raqqa to be the capital of its caliphate, the Assad regime, Soleimani’s forces, and Russian troops refrained from attacking them. Although Soleimani created a narrative of fighting ISIS, his forces and the Russian air force targeted mostly non-ISIS groups. A report by the U.S. State Department demonstrated that most Russian aerial bombing and IRGC ground attacks in Syria targeted moderate anti-Assad forces, not ISIS. As in Iraq, the terror group in Syria was eventually defeated by the U.S.-led coalition, not by Soleimani’s proxy forces, Russia, or the Assad regime.

The regime’s claim that the nation considered Soleimani a “hero” and “the commander of hearts” (Sardar-e Delha) should, similarly, not be taken at face value. In fact, Soleimani’s name is linked to “criminal activities” and the “murder” of Iranian protesters. For instance, in Kurdistan, Soleimani is known for his cruelty in massacring Kurds during the early years of the Islamic Revolution. When in 1979, the Kurdish rebellion erupted against the new regime, and Ayatollah Khomeini declared a jihad to crush unrest in Kurdistan, Soleimani was one of the commanders of the IRGC that participated in murderous campaigns against Kurds. More than 10,000 Kurds were killed (including 1,200 political prisoners, among them children as young as thirteen) during the clashes, which lasted until 1983.

Many—perhaps most—Iranians also despise Soleimani because of his opposition to reform and political openness in Iran. He participated in the IRGC’s brutal campaign against democracy-seeking movements and played a significant role in crackdowns on Iran protesters in 1999, 2009, 2017, and 2019, which he called “sedition.” General Mohammad-Ali Jafari, the former commander of IRGC, disclosed that “Soleimani was present at Tharallah Division [of the IRGC] and on the streets to fight the anti-revolutionaries and took measures to control the unrest.” This shouldn’t be a surprise because protesters chanted against Soleimani’s foreign adventurism.

During the 1999 demonstrations, several students were killed by the IRGC forces, hundreds were injured, dozens of students disappeared, and more than a thousand were arrested. In 2009, the IRGC and its Basij militia force killed over 200 protesters (unofficial reports indicate 700 protesters), 830 people got spinal cord injuries, and thousands were imprisoned, tortured, raped, and disappeared. In 2019, the IRGC forces killed 1,500 protesters, including seventeen teenagers and 400 women, during two weeks of unrest. Suppressing all of these social unrests was directed from the fearsome Tharallah Division, where Soleimani oversaw the brutal operations.

Moreover, Soleimani was among the twenty-four IRGC commanders who, in 1999, wrote an open letter to President Khatami and threatened him with action if he continued with his political reform, which in their view, threatened the “stability and peace in the country.”

Soleimani’s sobriquet, the “incorruptible,” was as much of a fabrication as the rest of his public persona. Soleimani was involved in massive financial corruption cases, such as the $3 billion embezzlement case of Yas Holding, and he used public resources for his benefit by using his political and military influences. Soleimani oversaw a mafia network comprised of embezzlers, smugglers, and money launderers and plundered billions of dollars of national resources. Soleimani’s wife was also involved in twelve cases of financial corruption and transferred the ownership of several companies. Tehran City Council had notified the judiciary to investigate the corruption case, but the judiciary closed the case out of fear of reprisal from Soleimani.

The Iranian regime’s effort to sustain and mobilize the myth of Qassem Soleimani, as seen last week in renewed calls for vengeance, is a transparent attempt to manipulate the Iranian population. It’s but the latest instance in a long history of the Islamic Republic crafting narratives, often seizing on Shia valorization of martyrdom, which have been so harmful to Iran and its long-suffering people. The myth of Soleimani, like so many myths, combines useful embellishment and cynical fabrication toward a purpose—here the perpetuation of the theocratic kleptocracy of the Islamic Republic. But Iran is changing. Today, regime-driven narratives about who should be venerated are being replaced by stories of young men and women on the streets of Iran, of no renown at all, who are putting their lives on the line to protest the regime’s repression. Theirs is a story of true heroism.

Farhad Rezaei is a senior research fellow at Philos Project.

Image: Shutterstock.