FRIDAY PDB – Things are getting hotter in Asia. Top US special ops units held a major exercise off Alaska, 45 miles from Russia. Polar Dagger brought several top special ops units from the Army, Air Force and Navy to a small Alaskan island closer to Russia than the U.S. mainland.
18th Airborne at center of major Pacific exercise for the first time. The Army kicked off a massive, simulated war-fighting exercise Thursday that, for the first time, uses the Army’s premier quick-response division in a scenario focused on the Pacific region.
RIMPAC ends summer-long run that featured sinking of 2 former US warships. The biennial, multinational ‘Rim of the Pacific’ maritime exercise ended its six-week run Thursday in Hawaii.
WATCH – Check out this massive international armada of warships in the Pacific for RIMPAC 2024.
Fifth-generation, multinational fighters fly mock dogfights over the Australian Outback. F-22 Raptors and F-35 Lightning II stealth fighters took turns flying as red air — the opposing force — during multinational airpower drills Down Under, mimicking the threat the U.S. and allies might face in a conflict with China or Russia.
FOR YOUR EYES ONLY – Here’s a roundup of today’s other top defense stories from conservative national security expert PAUL CRESPO.
Not the President’s Daily Brief, but almost as good – PAUL’S DAILY BRIEFING – the PDB:
US-RUSSIA PRISONER SWAP
Marine Corps veteran Paul Whelan freed in US-Russia prisoner swap. In their biggest prisoner swap in post-Soviet history on Thursday, Moscow released American journalist Evan Gershkovich and Marine vet Paul Whelan, along with dissidents including Vladimir Kara-Murza, in a multinational deal that set two dozen people free.
Paul Whelan, a former Marine, showed defiance throughout his detention. He was serving a 16-year sentence after an espionage conviction that the U.S. government called a farce.
Inside the secret negotiations to free Evan Gershkovich. The effort to bring home The Wall Street Journal reporter and others unfolded on three continents, involving spy agencies, billionaires, political power players and his fiercest advocate—his mother.
Putin’s narrative on the prisoner exchange? Don’t believe a word of it. Russia will try to create a false equivalency around the exchange.
NATIONAL SECURITY
DOD ‘exploring’ options for nuclear buildup as part of strategic review. While current nuke modernization plans — estimated by the Government Accountability Office last October to cost at least $350 billion over the next two decades — are “necessary,” they “may well be insufficient” to meet current and future threats.
HOMELAND SECURITY – LAW ENFORCEMENT
The cybersecurity plan for what to do when adversaries breach the network. Defending defense networks from cyberattack has often meant erecting firewalls — the digital version of what militaries have done forever by building and defending border barriers. Those walls, however, are invariably breached, in the same way that adversaries have and continue to infiltrate data networks to steal data and disrupt command, control, and communications.
POLITICS
Senate Appropriations Committee passes $852B defense bill, adding $21B and teeing up budget fight. This boosts funds $21 billion beyond the Fiscal Responsibility Act limits and sets up a fight with the House, which held fast to the budget caps in its defense bills.
ISRAEL’S WAR AGAINST TERROR
RETIRED US GENERAL: On the ground in Gaza: What I saw of Israel’s military operations. Departing from the border crossing at Kerem Shalom, the intersection of Israel, Egypt, and Gaza, this past week, I traveled through this ancient city’s suburbs to the shores of the Mediterranean and back—the first U.S. general officer (active or retired) to travel across Gaza during this war.
Hezbollah chief signals ‘new phase’ of war with Israel. What happens next is unclear. “We’re all basically waiting to see how the ball bounces back, and that will determine the next decision,” said Jonathan Lord of CNAS. “It’s not a place anyone wants to be.”
Iran and its terror allies mourn terrorist leaders, vow revenge against Israel. Mourners in Iran and Lebanon commemorated slain militant leaders Thursday, as they vowed retribution.
Israel moves to strengthen defense production amid boycott calls. It has reached an agreement with Elbit Systems on an NIS 815 million — approximately $215 million in U.S. currency — contract to supply the country’s military with 120mm “Iron Sting” mortars.
CHINA THREAT
Canadian frigate makes Taiwan Strait transit as China forces monitor. HMCS Montreal (FFH-336) conducted a Taiwan Strait transit Wednesday, drawing the ire of China.
RUSSIA THREAT – UKRAINE WAR
Japan to replenish US Patriot air-defense missiles sent to Ukraine. It will begin selling domestically produced missiles to the U.S. in a bid to bolster U.S. weapon supplies in the region.
NORTH KOREA THREAT
‘We need to show unity’: Germany joins UN Command to enforce Korean War armistice. Germany on Friday joined United Nations Command, now 18 countries upholding the 71-year-old armistice agreement between North and South Korea.
INTERNATIONAL SECURITY
US says opposition candidate won Venezuela election as anti-Maduro figurehead says she’s in hiding in fear for her life. “It is clear” that President Nicolas Maduro lost the popular vote in Venezuela’s election last week.
US MILITARY
New tech will make tomorrow’s wars more dangerous to troops. The Army may need to rethink its traditional emphasis on maneuver warfare in the face of new weapons and other technology that will make tomorrow’s wars “increasingly lethal,” the service’s Training and Doctrine Command says in a new report.
Air Force risks defeat by neglecting information warfare: Think tank. Information warfare is an emerging domain that is fundamental to air operations, according to a new report by the RAND Corporation.
WATCH – What happens when a Warthog gets angry? Witness the destructive power of the A-10 Thunderbolt II.
‘No fail’: Air Force officials spotlight cost jumps, delays for B-52 bomber modernization. The price tag to put new engines on the decades-old bomber has jumped from $12.5 billion to $15 billion, while an effort to integrate a new radar has climbed to $3.3 billion from an original forecast of $2.3 billion.
Air Force faces pressure to cut back KC-46 tanker fleet; that’s a bad idea. A reliable and affordable air refueling capability is fundamental to accomplishing the U.S. Air Force’s critical role in defending the nation and its interests around the world.
Gear cracks, pilot decision led to Japan Osprey crash, Air Force says. A deadly Osprey aircraft crash last November off Japan was caused by cracks in a metal gear and the pilot’s decision to keep flying, instead of heeding multiple warnings that he should land.
Army researchers explore electrical pulses to improve soldiers’ sleep. Doctors at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research are studying the use of low-intensity electrical pulses to stimulate restorative brain waves that occur during sleep.
END of PDB
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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Mr. Crespo breaking Marines down into small units to interdict shipping and warships is the stupidest idea I have ever heard of, it could only have been thought up by someone who wants to destroy the Corps. Did it ever occur to anybody that the first thing China would do is to target any such area and saturate it with missile’s. This is the kind of thinking you get when you make a wing wiper Commandant. Why don’t you report the fact that the only reason the Corps got rid of it’s tanks is because the Navy doesn’t want to commit the resources needed to transport them. The Navy has hated the idea of transporting Marines for ages, I would be willing to bet that any APA’s in use today are probably the same ones in use when I rode them back in the sixty’s.
Re: Pacific exercise, all should look at our history during the 20th century alone. QWW1 we fielded an army that was poorly trained and equipped. It had 3 things going for it. The 1903 Springfield rifle, the 1911 Colt and a bunch of country boys who knew how to use them. Democrat Administration. WW2 we flat got caught with our pants down and were completely unprepared even though we knew Japan was going to attack. Democrat Administration. Korea we knew North Korea was going to attack. U.S. troops weren’t in place and were poorly equipped with obsolete equipment. Democrat Administration. We all knew what a fiasco Viet Nam was. Democrat Administration. First Gulf War. The President Gave the order to attack, stood aside and let the military run military operations. Republican Administration. That time we were prepared. Then, Democrats got into office again and managed to screw everything up. Look at the mess in Afghanistan. It wasn’t a withdrawal or even a retreat. It was a ROUTE! Democrat Administration. Doesn’t that tell us all something?