Ron@cognitivewarriorproject.com

Russian Commandos, Hezbollah, Railguns, Terrorism in a Pandemic and other Bullets

Russian Commandos, Hezbollah, Railguns, Terrorism in a Pandemic and other Bullets

My back-yard training area is officially shut down.  For those of you that know me, I was an environmental major when I got my bachelor’s degree. In that, I took ornithology, the study of birds. Ever since, birds have always been a side interest of mine and today on the feeder, I believe I saw a Red Cockaded Woodpecker. For those of you that have conducted field problems on the East Coast you know what I am talking about.

Again, I think I might try something new, bringing you the Article of the Day and the Most Thought Provoking. The Article of the Day will be the first linked article and the Most Thought Provoking will be the last.

A task force of Russian special operators and paratroopers recently conducted an unprecedented high-altitude airborne training exercise in the Arctic, with some personnel jumping from Il-76 Candid transport aircraft flying at close to 33,000 feet. This is is yet another high-profile demonstration of Russia’s steadily growing capabilities in this ever-more strategic region and showed off its ability to quickly send special operations forces there or anywhere else.

There is so much good stuff in this article, from strategy to capability Trevithick has you covered. I have one question; how do you stay warm doing that? That would have to be absolutely freezing up there. There are about three other articles over there that you should also check out. Hopefully, I can get to them tomorrow.

On the evening of April 20, Hezbollah operatives in southern Lebanon severed sections of the security fence that separates Lebanon and Israel’s border. After the IDF detected the sabotage, flares were launched over the Lebanese town of Meiss al Jabal, which is near one of the areas where the fence was cut. After an IDF investigation, it was found that three sections of the fence between the Israeli towns of Avivim and Metula were cut in an orchestrated effort.

Admittedly, I have not tracked Hezbollah involvement in Syria very closely, so I may be a bit behind the eight ball. But the most important part of the story is the belief that Iran is trying to smuggle precision weapons to Hezbollah via Syria. I guess it’s plausible but I just don’t know.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross joins hosts Bill Roggio and Tom Joscelyn to discuss how jihadists are adapting to the coronavirus pandemic. The three colleagues discuss their years working in the counterterrorism field and how some erroneous ideas just won’t die. They also offer some advice for new analysts entering the field. 

There was a “disturbing increase in violence” in Afghanistan following the signing of a withdrawal agreement between the U.S. and Taliban on Feb. 29, according to a new report by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

Overall, the number of civilian casualties was 29 per cent lower during the first quarter of 2020, as compared to the same timeframe last year. But this dip in casualties, caused in part by a brief “reduction in violence” before the U.S.-Taliban withdrawal accord was signed in Doha in late February, didn’t hold throughout March. The fighting intensified in the weeks that followed the deal.

UNAMA found that “[m]ore than 500 civilians, including more than 150 children, were killed due to the fighting in Afghanistan during the first quarter of 2020.” This is the lowest figure for the first quarter of any year since 2012.

The headline seems a bit misleading when you dig into the weeds of the article but Joscelyn basically contends that the Taliban held back their attacks until the after the peace deal was signed and now, we are seeing an uptick in violence. Would all out civil war break out if we just left? Regardless the Taliban disagreed with the numbers…an interesting side note from the article is the number of civilian deaths caused by the Afghan Government, ““for 32 per cent of all civilian casualties during the first quarter of 2020, causing 412 civilian casualties (198 killed and 214 injured).”” I wonder what the popular support is via Taliban vs. Afghan government?

President Donald Trump has pushed his military and national security advisers in recent days to pull all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan amid concerns about a major coronavirus outbreak in the war-torn country, according to two current and one former senior U.S. officials.

Trump complains almost daily that U.S. troops are still in Afghanistan and are now vulnerable to the pandemic, the officials said. His renewed push to withdraw all of them has been spurred by the convergence of his concern that coronavirus poses a force protection issue for thousands of U.S. troops in Afghanistan and his impatience with the halting progress of his peace deal with the Taliban, the officials said.

The article details how bad the coronavirus out could be in Afghanistan and the potential risks to all sides if such a move was under taken.

 …an initiative examining the national security risks of the United States’ diminishing pool of eligible military recruits. In a series of briefing papers, CNAS researchers will outline the inherent structural trends contributing to the shrinking pool of eligible recruits and assess what policy changes at the federal, state, and local level could ameliorate these issues.

Since the end of the military draft in 1973 and the transition to the All-Volunteer Force (AVF), the U.S. military has significantly professionalized and increased the quality of its service members. However, despite the overall quality and strength of the military, the AVF has displayed significant fragility when it comes to recruitment. The Department of Defense requires specific age, education, physical, mental, and moral standards for joining the armed forces

MVS will release a five-part series of briefs covering the major disqualifiers of obesity, education, criminal justice, health, and lack of interest in service. Briefs will address the scope of each problem, what federal and state/local policy and legislative changes could address the first four of these trends, as well as how the military could address these issues either through modifying standards or other options. The final brief will consider how to increase interest in military service.

I am really looking forward to this and will definitely keep an eye out and discuss it when they are published. This could be a huge problem…if you have kids, get them running.

I say that and am reminded of this article in the New York Times that I read several months ago about Who Signs Up to Fight.” It is really good and concerning. To me it makes sense. Looking back at the path I was on; I think the military was the best thing that ever happened to me. Admittedly, I have been very lucky, but I would never discourage one of my four children from joining.

“China Standards 2035” is set to be released this year after two years of planning. Experts said it is widely seen as the next step, following the “Made In China 2025″ global manufacturing plan — but this time, with a much larger focus on technologies that are seen as defining the next decade…

Chinese firm Huawei, one of the leading players in 5G networking equipment, has also been a key player in standards setting. It has the highest number of patents related to 5G, and is ahead of its closest European rivals Nokia and Ericsson, according to intellectual property analysis firm IPlytics.

This is a very wide-ranging article that touches on so many things that will have an impact in the future. The most concerning to me is the push by China to set the standards. In a Global Market, the ability to communicate is key and if they hold the keys to setting the standards, they hold the keys to security. In my opinion, it is a national security threat if China is allowed to set the international standards for next generation technology and artificial intelligence.

The coronavirus lockdown is offering an agonizing dilemma to Asadullah Haidery and his family, as it does to so many Afghans: get sick or go hungry. 

The US intelligence community evidently has nothing useful to say to the nation about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, its current spread or anticipated development, its likely impact on other security challenges, its effect on regional conflicts, or its long-term implications for global health.

These are all topics perfectly suited to open source intelligence collection and analysis. But the intelligence community disabled its open source portal last year. And the general public was barred even from that.

 I cannot say that I disagree with Aftergood on this one. Unless there is something that is so shocking that it could foment a world war then I don’t understand. Besides, if it is that shocking, we should probably know anyway.

The U.S. Navy’s $500 million electromagnetic railgun—capable of slinging projectiles at hypersonic speeds—lacks funding and has no coherent plan to deploy on warships. The Navy is instead pursuing an offshoot of the railgun, a hypervelocity projectile it can fire from existing gun systems.

The article discusses how an offshoot of the railgun, the hypervelocity projectiles that show more promise. Overall it is pretty interesting given the relative open secret development of the railgun. I wonder how much money is spent on weapons that never reach the battlefield?

The U.S. Navy has officially published three videos that show UFOs are genuine, several years after the notorious clips first leaked online and properly ushered in the UFO renaissance. Last year, the Navy confirmed the three videos, taken by Navy pilots, indeed show “unexplained aerial phenomena,” but the service also said the footage should have never been released to the public in the first place.

To borrow a phrase, “The truth is out there.” I wonder how much is actually there and what they really know. I will probably never hold a clearance that allow me such access.

To understand the potential threat that terrorists pose, and how that threat has changed since the onset of the pandemic, we must consider a balance of information. Analysis of the threat needs to consider derogatory information suggesting an increase in the threat level, as well as exculpatory information that may point to decreasing danger posed by terrorists. We need to consider not only how terrorists may use the virus, but also how the virus may reduce terrorists’ ability (and willingness) to act. The virus could even be playing a role in mitigating the terrorist threat in the short term, an element that media reports (and undoubtedly some classified threat assessments) largely fail to mention. I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts on that last one.

The reason that this ends up being the most thought provoking is because it is so contrary to what we would typically read in the Intelligence and Military field. (At least it is not where I typically go for news and insights). In a world where threats are of often inflated, you can’t be too safe, right? We typically do not get this point of view. I will definitely be interested to hear your thoughts on this one!

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