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Get Your Best Daily Defense and Foreign Affairs Intelligence Here in One Brief. Read the summaries or dive deeper via the linked articles.
PENTAGON WOKE WATCH
SO STOP THE AGGRESSIVE WOKE AGENDA – Political fights over military make US look weak to China and Russia, experts tell senators. Political bickering over the military makes the United States appear weak to adversaries such as China and Russia and contributes to dropping public trust in the uniformed services, experts told senators on Wednesday.
DEFENSE SPENDING
For better defense spending, split the Pentagon’s budget into two. In the pursuit of “life, liberty and happiness,” safety precedes the others. Therefore it makes sense that the federal government’s mandatory, exclusive and primary job is to provide for the common defense. What is curious, however, is that funding for this core responsibility is considered discretionary.
NATIONAL SECURITY
Biden plans to deliver his most extensive remarks yet about the aerial objects the military shot down. Biden will explain how the administration is forming rules to deal with other objects in the future.
FBI searched University of Delaware for Biden documents, source says. The FBI has conducted two searches at the University of Delaware in connection with the investigation into President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents, a source said.
Pentagon technology chief seeks low-cost deterrence concepts. The Pentagon’s chief technology officer is looking for low-cost options for deterring, and, if necessary, intervening in, overseas regional conflicts that involve U.S. allies.
The risks of de-escalation. At the wrong time and place, it can do more harm than good—as its Mideast track record shows.
HOMELAND DEFENSE
How China’s spy balloon spurred a rapid shift in US sky patrol. The Defense Department said that after the Chinese spy balloon flew over much of the U.S. earlier this month before being shot down, the military began paying closer attention to lower-altitude flying objects.
PODCAST: Senators call out gaps in domestic defenses after UFO incidents. Lawmakers are riled up over objects that were shot down in North American airspace after spending billions on homeland protections.
CHINA THREAT
Despite inflation’s bite, China set record for defense spending in 2022. While most of the world lost ground in defense spending in 2022—mainly due to inflation—both China and many nations in Europe achieved real growth, and China’s spending level set a record, according to analysis by the independent, London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Coast Guard moving cutter to Pacific as regional missions expand. Driven by greater demand for its partnerships and presence in the Indo-Pacific region, the U.S. Coast Guard is growing its operational presence in the vast region that’s unsettled by continuing incursions from China’s naval militia and fishing fleet, the Pacific Area commander told an audience today.
China threatens US entities over downing of balloon. China says it will enact measures against U.S. entities related to the downing of a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the American East Coast.
China imposes sanctions on Lockheed Martin, Raytheon over Taiwan arms sales. China’s commerce ministry on Thursday said it put Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) and Raytheon Technologies Corp (RTX.N) onto an “unreliable entities list” over arms sales to Taiwan, its latest sanctions against the two U.S. defense contractors.
RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR
Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 358. Russia has launched missile attacks across Ukraine on Thursday, Ukrainian officials said, after Western allies pledged to ramp up military aid to the Ukrainian armed forces to support a planned counteroffensive.
Russian air force ‘has lot of capability left’ one year on from Ukraine invasion. The fighting in Ukraine has been dominated by artillery exchanges, and neither side has been able to establish air superiority.
Moscow’s military capabilities are in question after disastrous battle. Russia’s failed attack on Vuhledar, viewed as the beginning of an expected offensive, renewed doubts of its ability to sustain a large-scale ground assault.
Ukraine claims Russian balloons shot down over Kyiv. Six Russian balloons were spotted over the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, with most shot down by the city’s air defenses, according to Kyiv’s military administration.
A year of Russia’s war in Ukraine: Your simple guide. Almost a year has passed since Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine for a full-scale invasion that several world leaders had warned of. The February 24 anniversary will bring a sense of mourning for Ukrainians. Many are grieving their relatives and all will remember the devastation that has rocked their country, as they reflect on what lies ahead.
NORTH KOREA THREAT
South Korea defense paper calls North ‘enemy’, estimates plutonium stockpile at 70 kg. South Korea released its latest defense white paper on Thursday, describing North Korea as its “enemy” for the first time in six years and reporting an increase in Pyongyang’s stockpile of weapons-grade plutonium.
INTERNATIONAL SECURITY – NATO, MIDDLE EAST, AFRICA, ASIA, LATIN AMERICA
AS TRUMP KEPT PUSHING FOR – NATO summit defense spending pledges may exceed 2% target, Austin says. NATO countries will agree to a new pledge this summer to increase defense spending above their previous target, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Wednesday at NATO headquarters in Brussels.
US military downs Iranian-made drone in Syria. U.S. forces shot down an Iranian-made drone flying over a base housing American troops in northeastern Syria.
US Congress members seek halt to $1 billion Nigeria weapons deal. Two members of the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday called on President Joe Biden to rescind a nearly $1 billion arms sale to Nigeria following Reuters reports on an illegal abortion program and the targeted killing of children carried out by the Nigerian military.
US Army delivers tents, hygiene products to earthquake-devastated Turkey. The U.S. military continues to send aid to earthquake-devastated Turkey, with 40,000 pounds of supplies arriving on two Army CH-47F Chinook helicopters in Elbistan and Pazarcik on Tuesday.
We didn’t have the ships to send ‘best option’ to help earthquake victims, commandant says. Incident comes a year after ship maintenance issues delayed the 22nd MEU’s deployment to Europe.
SPACE THREAT
Pentagon working with Congress on unclassified space strategy. Congress directed DoD and the director of national intelligence to “make publicly available a strategy regarding defending and protecting on-orbit satellites.”
Keys to space resilience: It’s more than orbits, says DoD’s Plumb. The Space Force made resilience its No. 1 priority in 2022, with proliferated constellations of satellites a focus of this program to ensure systems remain operable even if some elements are lost.
Soyuz leaks could keep astronauts on the space station for a year. The launch of a replacement spacecraft to retrieve a NASA astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts from the International Space Station after their ship suffered a massive coolant leak late last year “is under review,” NASA said in a statement Wednesday evening as engineers work to figure out the cause of a leak affecting a second Russian spacecraft.
US MILITARY, ROBOTICS AND AI
Navy’s Secretive Project Overmatch boss pushing hard for international synergy. U.S. Navy networking specialists shepherding the service’s secretive Project Overmatch are invested in international cooperation and connectivity, as Washington and its allies foresee a greater need to collaborate on the battlefields of the future.
Navy eyeing Littoral Combat Ships as ‘mothership’ for unmanned platforms, SecNav tells lawmakers. A letter obtained by Breaking Defense states the “current phase” of a Navy study will wrap up this year.
PUTS THINGS IN PERSPECTIVE – Military services competing over the same recruiting pool of less than 500,000. The Marine Corps and other service branches are competing to attract the same 412,000 eligible Americans between the ages of 17 to 24, a Marine recruiting commander said Tuesday.
Fentanyl deaths among troops more than doubled from 2017 to 2021. Fentanyl, a drug that has gained widespread national attention in recent years for its role in the U.S. opioid epidemic, was involved in 174 overdoses, or about 52% of overdose cases, in the military between 2017 and 2021, according to Defense Department data.
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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China threats could be answered by cutting off about 20% of their exports to the United States and all of it’s allies. This would get their attention.