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Today’s PDB includes a variety of critical, global national security issues.
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READ TODAY’S PDB BELOW:
NATIONAL SECURITY
NICELY DONE – US Congress revives WWII-era weapons program for Ukraine. The US House of Representatives overwhelmingly backed the “Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act of 2022” on Thursday by a vote of 417 to 10, sending the bill to President Joe Biden for his signature. The bill had sailed through the Senate with unanimous support.
CHINA THREAT
DANGEROUS COLLABORATION – China’s aggressive efforts to bring back fugitives grow more brazen. Within the European Union, some fear that states like Cyprus, one of 10 members that have signed extradition treaties with Beijing, are at risk of being complicit in the international expansion of controversial Chinese policing practices that often ignore human rights safeguards.
TOTAL NONSENSE – Solomon Islands PM says won’t accept militarization of Pacific. The Solomon Islands signed a security pact with China because a similar deal with Australia was inadequate, Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare said, adding his country knew the cost of war and would not be part of any militarization of the Pacific.
RUSSIA THREAT
Ukraine says Russian offensive in east gathering momentum. Russia’s offensive in eastern Ukraine gathered momentum Thursday as the United Nations’ chief surveyed the destruction in towns outside Kyiv that experienced some of the worst horrors of the first onslaught of the war.
SENDING MESSAGE – Russian submarine strikes Ukraine with cruise missiles – defense ministry. Russia used a diesel submarine in the Black Sea to strike Ukrainian military targets with Kalibr cruise missiles, the first time Moscow has announced the use of its submarine fleet to hit its former Soviet neighbor.
MORE DISINFORMATION – Russian spy chief says US, Poland plotting division of Ukraine. Sergei Naryshkin, the chief of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), cited unpublished intelligence that he said showed the United States and Poland, NATO allies, were plotting to restore Polish control over part of western Ukraine.
INTERESTING – Ukraine weapon ‘switcheroos’ are flushing Soviet arms out of Europe. The transactions, many of which go unpublicized, add a new dynamic to an already volatile military procurement pattern in Europe that clashes with the bloc’s lengthy plans for collectively developed weapons.
8,000 British troops will join allied exercises in Europe, officials say. The British troops will be serving in the Joint Expeditionary Force, a British-led multinational group created in 2014 in response to Russia’s seizure of Crimea from Ukraine.
NORTH KOREA THREAT
TESTING BIDEN – North Korea’s Kim calls for stronger military as nuclear test work ‘well underway.’ North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called on the country’s military to “bolster up their strength in every way to annihilate the enemy”, state media reported on Friday, as new satellite imagery showed increased preparations for a possible nuclear test.
INTERNATIONAL SECURITY
AFRICA’S PRIVATE ARMIES – ‘White hands’: The rise of private armies in African conflicts. Mercenaries have become increasingly influential as states across Africa find their armies unable to limit the widening reach of armed groups.
IRANIAN ARMS – NAVCENT head on why a new Red Sea task force was needed. In 2021, the US seized “three times the amount of weapons interdicted in 2020,” NAVCENT head Vice. Adm. Brad Cooper told Breaking Defense.
BIDEN’S AFGHAN DISASTER
IT’S ONLY $7 BILLION – Biden Pentagon downplays $7B in US military equipment left in Afghanistan. The fall of the U.S.-backed government in Afghanistan gave Taliban fighters access to more than $7 billion worth of American military equipment, according to data in a report submitted this week to U.S. lawmakers and confirmed by the Pentagon.
US MILITARY AND SPACE
STARVING THE A-10 FLEET – A-10 official issues warning over US Air Force’s ‘devastated’ Warthog fleet. A U.S. Air Force official managing the A-10 Thunderbolt aircraft says the service is “hollowing” its Warthog fleet by starving it of resources amid a push to retire the aging attack plane — but still continuing to heavily fly it.
MAYBE – Troops allege military’s COVID vaccine mandate is a ‘religious purge.’ Three active-duty service members appeared in a segment aired Thursday on a podcast hosted by Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Florida, accusing the Defense Department of using the COVID-19 vaccine mandate to “intentionally purge” religious service members.
A BIG DEAL – The Marine Corps’ intellectual civil war. It is almost unheard of for retired Marine Corps general officers to criticize the policies of the sitting commandant, but three have recently done so.
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.
Paul Crespo is the Managing Editor of American Liberty Defense News. As a Marine Corps officer, he led Marines, served aboard ships in the Pacific and jumped from helicopters and airplanes. He was also a military attaché with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) at U.S. embassies worldwide. He later ran for state and federal office, taught political science, wrote for the editorial board of a major newspaper and had his own radio show. A graduate of Georgetown, London and Cambridge universities, he brings decades of experience and insight to the issues that most threaten our American liberty – at home and from abroad. To read more go to: paulcrespo.com.
Defending Democracy in the Ukraine?!
LOL
Our Western politicians and world oligarchs/Globalists are the true enemy in this, “war”/cover-up.
NOT Russia!
Please don’t destroy the evidence as you drain the swamp!