GOP House Demands Answers From Biden on Afghan Disaster – Navy Desperate to Appear Less Woke

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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

STOP BEING WOKE IS BEST SOLUTION TO RECRUITING CRISIS – Navy swats ‘wokeness' claims in bid to reach older Americans who could influence recruiting. As Navy leaders left another conference behind, one thing that emerged from the Surface Navy Association panels and discussions this week was an emphasis on the strength and capability of sailors — a shift that seems part of an effort to boost recruiting and push back against a growing political narrative.

Pentagon mulls back pay for troops kicked out over Covid vaccine mandate. More than 8,400 service members were discharged for refusing the shot.

DEFENSE BUDGET

Republicans eye Pentagon savings after McCarthy spending agreement. House Republican leaders say they won't cut tens of billions of dollars from future defense budgets as part of plans to constrain government spending. But that doesn't mean all military budget trims are off the table.

NATIONAL SECURITY

IT'S FAR WORSE THAN THIS REPORT – Here's what we know about the classified documents found at Biden's home and office. President Biden is facing a Department of Justice investigation after his lawyers found classified documents at his Delaware residence and an office in Washington, D.C.

HOMELAND SECURITY

OR NOT – DC should be able to deploy its own National Guard. One evening during the 2020 protests that followed the death of George Floyd, D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) was getting out of her car and preparing to enter her home when she got a call from then-Police Chief Peter Newsham: The Trump White House was planning on taking over the D.C. police department.

American who sought to join ISIS pleads guilty to terrorism charge. An American man faces up to 20 years in federal prison for trying to travel overseas to fight for the Islamic State group in the Middle East, the Justice Department said.

US Coast Guard in Florida intercepts hundreds fleeing Cuba and Haiti by sea. The Coast Guard returned another 177 Cuban migrants who were caught at sea off Florida to the island on Thursday, while a group of about two dozen Haitians swam ashore in Miami.

CHINA THREAT

House China committee's mission: Military imbalance is foremost among many challenges. The House of Representatives finally has a Select Committee on China, a sorely-needed instrument to drive China policy debate in Congress and, if its agenda is set properly, prompt the White House to consider its approach to Beijing in a clearer light.

Chinese navy holds ‘confrontational drills' in South China Sea. Drills came as the US Nimitz aircraft carrier group also conducted ‘maritime strike training' in the contested waterway.

Indonesia deploys warship to monitor China coast guard vessel. A warship, maritime patrol plane and drone have been deployed to monitor the Chinese vessel in the North Natuna Sea.

RUSSIA THREAT – UKRAINE WAR

Expanded US training for Ukraine forces begins in Germany. The U.S. military's new, expanded combat training of Ukrainian forces began in Germany on Sunday, with a goal of getting a battalion of about 500 troops back on the battlefield to fight the Russians in the next five to eight weeks, said Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. 

Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 328. The death toll from a Russian missile attack in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro rose to 40, with dozens more missing, making it the deadliest civilian incident of Moscow's three-month campaign of firing missiles at cities far from the front lines.

Ukraine building suffers deadliest civilian attack in months. Rescue workers in Ukraine are scrambling to pull survivors from an apartment building hit by a Russian missile in the southeastern city of Dnipro.

Putin rips deputy trade minister for ‘fooling around' with military equipment. Russian President Vladimir Putin harshly scolded one of his deputy prime ministers on Wednesday, accusing him of failing to keep up with orders for military equipment amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

IAEA plans “continuous presence” at all Ukraine nuclear power plants “to help prevent a nuclear accident” amid Russia's war. The head of the United Nations atomic energy agency, the IAEA, is scheduled to visit Ukraine next week as a follow-up to his commitment last month to enlarge the watchdog agency's oversight of Ukraine's nuclear power plants, which have been shelled during Russia's nearly 11-month war on the country.

NORTH KOREA THREAT

How South Korea plans to buoy its counter-drone capabilities. In the early hours of Dec. 26, five North Korean drones entered South Korean airspace, with one traveling as far as the capital Seoul.

IRAN THREAT

Iran executes British citizen on spying charges despite Western pressure. Iran executed Alireza Akbari, a dual British citizen who previously served as a senior defense official in Tehran, in what British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak described as “a callous and cowardly act, carried out by a barbaric regime with no respect for the human rights of their own people.”

INTERNATIONAL SECURITY – NATO, MIDDLE EAST, ASIA, AFRICA

Will the Ukraine war slow Russia's Arctic push? Unmanned technologies could offer the West an opening to catch up with Russia, bogged down in Ukraine, in establishing a foothold in the warming Arctic, according to issue experts.

Ukraine war leaves British Army ‘very uncomfortable' with Future Soldier capabilities. A British defense committee meeting heard about concerns brought on by the war in Ukraine, the state of British tanks (some Ukraine-bound) and a potential recovery for the Ajax recon vehicle program.

Germany's defense minister resigns amid Ukraine criticism. Germany's much-criticized defense minister announced her resignation Monday, as her department steers the massive project of modernizing the country's military and oversees expanding weapons deliveries to Ukraine.

The Navy is using solar-powered drone boats as scouts in the Persian Gulf. They just need wind and sun to get things done.

NATO spy planes heading to Romania to monitor Russian activity. NATO said Friday it plans to deploy three surveillance planes to Romania next week to perform reconnaissance missions and to “monitor Russian military activity” within the 30-nation military alliance's territory.

Marines in the Baltics would bring the power of US deterrence. Earlier this week, the United States and Sweden announced they have begun negotiations to complete a Defense Cooperation Agreement that would be what the Swedish defense ministry termed a “natural development of Sweden's and the USA's long-term cooperation in the area of security and defense.”

BIDEN AFGHAN DISASTER

House GOP demands State Dept turn over thousands of Afghanistan memos. House Republicans are launching their oversight into the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan two years ago with a demand for thousands of documents related to State Department discussions about operations and planning there.

SPACE

Ukraine spotlights ‘criticality' of space in conflict: Saltzman. Learning from Russia's failures in Ukraine, Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman said a key focus going forward is “making sure that not only do we have the systems to do the mission, but that our operators have the training experience, and we have validated tactics that actually enable those capabilities.”

SpaceX Falcon Heavy launches two Space Force satellites in spectacular fashion. With a thundering roar, SpaceX launched a triple-core Falcon Heavy rocket for the U.S. Space Force on Sunday, boosting a military communications satellite into space along with a maneuverable payload carrier hosting five classified technology demonstration packages.

EU inaugurates first mainland satellite launch port. The European Union wants to bolster its capacity to launch small satellites into space with a new launchpad in Arctic Sweden.

US MILITARY

New sonar for Navy frigates could turn any ship into submarine hunter, maker says. Thales says its Advanced Acoustic Concepts towed sensors can be installed in just two days.

Army soldiers and students develop portable Bradley vehicle decoys. The enemy can't kill what it can't see. But as the war in Ukraine has laid bare, little goes unseen on the modern battlefield.

The Army Rangers want an automatic mortar system for better ‘shoot and scoot.' Here comes the boom!

TO FACE CHINA – Marine Corps activates Hawaii-based C-130 refueling squadron as part of force redesign. The Marine Corps has activated a cargo plane squadron in Hawaii that is one part of the service's move to design a force capable of outmaneuvering any adversary.

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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