That sounds a bit arcane, and it likely is; the president, as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, should take the word of the Constitution first and foremost. But, yes, everything is (tiresomely at times) subject to legal interpretation. What's interesting here is that Durbin is asking the DOJ to rescind opinions that he evidently agreed with while Joe Biden was president.
Did you hear that scraping sound? That's the sound of goalposts being moved. //
anon-gkyt
25 minutes ago
Hey, Durbin. What part of Commander-in-Chief don’t you get?? As for use of the military domestically, General Winfield Scott, the senior army commander, stated in 1861 a self-evident fact. The military is to deal with threats foreign and domestic. Ever heard of Lincoln using the US military domestically? If that was not “domestic”, the invasion of the Confederacy was simply an act of aggression by the US government.
China’s military buildup and cognitive strategies are clear indications of intent to defeat the U.S. and its allies by any means necessary. //
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is undertaking an unprecedented military buildup aimed at challenging America and its allies, particularly in the Indo-Pacific. And, like Nazi Germany’s buildup in the 1930s, the militarization program ordered by the Chinese Communist Party isn’t simply a great power buildup — it’s a weapon in service of a deadly ideology.
Analyst Chuck DeVore, chief national initiatives officer at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, penned an essay for The Federalist Friday and also appeared on "Fox & Friends Weekend" to warn that China is conducting a massive military buildup the likes of which we haven’t seen since the days of the Third Reich.
His conclusions are concerning:
"Now the big difference there, is that he really focused on land power, which frankly is pretty easy to build up pretty quickly," he added. "Navies are much more difficult to build up. And we are way behind. And not only do we need to catch up, but we also need to modernize our nuclear weapons, and we need to put a lot of effort into missile defense." //
DeVore also argues that Donald Trump is right to be concerned about the Panama Canal because while we’re busy woke-ifying our military, China is staying occupied with different concerns: //
DeVore continues, arguing that we need budget reform and we need to wake up to the fact that “China’s military buildup and cognitive warfare strategy are clear indications of its intent to defeat the U.S. and its allies by any means necessary.” //
Dr. Dealgood
2 minutes ago
tinfoil hat time: China bought Biden, who then weakened us monetarily and militarily thru useless sh*t like Ukraine.
This strategy also depleted and exposed Russia's weakness.
Two enemies, one big bribe. China gains Russian oil and possibly Siberia. The US gains squat from Ukraine, except hacking and making its corrupt gov't wealthy. //
Minister of War
12 hours ago edited
Regardless of whether or not this is just a headfake by the Communist Chinese, China is going to dominate the future development of military equipment & technologies unless we get our shit together soon. And there are three primary reasons for that:
1) There are far more Chinese students focusing their university studies on math, science, engineering and technology than American students. With so many American students focusing their university studies on social sciences & other mostly pointless & BS majors, even American universities are training far more students from China & India in key STEM subjects than they are training Americans. American children today dream of being the next big star of Communist China's TikTok app far more often than they dream of actually building or inventing something. How can we expect to keep up with the Communist Chinese when China is training so many more of their young people than we are in these key fields?
2) The espionage program of the Communist Chinese has become vastly superior to ours. This problem is heavily related to DEI & wokeness in our intelligence services when Communist China doesn't have to worry about that at all. If the best American spy happens to be a white guy, this wouldn't be much help in Communist China because he'll stick out like a sore thumb. But if the Communist Chinese send Chinese nationals to do spy work in the US for them, Americans are forbidden from noticing that the Chinese national looks a lot like a Chinese person & might require additional vetting before being granted a top secret security clearance. The same garbage in America that required that a grandma from Kansas goes through the same TSA vetting process as a single male who appears to be of Middle Eastern descent also requires that we waste a ton of time & money that should be focused on more likely targets when it comes to Communist Chinese spying. The Communist Chinese Ministry of State Security has basically decimated our human intelligence gathering operations in China while we appear to be clueless about the great majority of Communist China's operations in the US or around the world until it is too late in the best case scenario. There is no surprise that at least one of the Chinese Gen 6 fighters bears so much resemblance to our own F-35 since Communist Chinese spying resulted in all specs for the F-35 being stolen by them. Imagine they same white guy American spy being able to steal such info from the Communist Chinese. It ain't gonna happen.
3) We continue to be our own worst enemies since we are the ones paying for Communist China's military buildup & military technology development programs. And this goes far beyond direct payments to develop their next weapons, as was the case with the Communist Chinese asset Anthony Fauci & his use of direct American taxpayer financial assistance to develop the Communist Chinese Military's Wuhan Bioweapon that killed millions, made hundreds of millions more very sick & brought the economies of the world to their knees. Our indirect funding of the Communist Chinese massive military buildup & weapons development programs comes through our enormous international trade imbalance. A not insignificant portion of any of the trade profits going to Chinese companies also goes to fund what has been the most massive "peacetime" military buildup & development program in human history. If we don't begin a serious initiative to completely decouple our economy from the economy of the Communist Chinese Party, then we will continue to be the ones digging our own graves.
China has unveiled two new so-called sixth-generation fighter aircraft designed to demonstrate technological prowess and overawe its potential adversaries, but which could be much less. //
China's two major military aircraft manufacturers rolling out prototypes of what is alleged to be the first flyable models of a new-generation fighter aircraft certainly screams "public relations gimmick." At this stage, no one has had a chance to examine the aircraft, so everything we read about it is speculative. Are they real, or are they supposed to create an aura of technological superiority?
We've seen one version of this picture before. The Soviet MiG-25 first appeared at the 50th October Revolution Airshow on July 9, 1967 at Domodedovo airport. It was unexpected, and it was the star.
US intelligence panicked and our defense industry set about designing an aircraft that could overmatch the MiG-25.
Fast-forward to September 6, 1976, when Lieutenant Viktor Belenko defected to the West by landing his MiG-25 fighter at Hakodate Airport in Hokkaido, Japan. When Western engineers examined the airplane, they discovered it was crudely made and designed for high speeds.
The tear-down revealed that the braggart was a toothless phony, too heavy to be maneuverable at low altitudes, limited in what it could accomplish up high, and with little range and no midair refueling capability. When later compared to the U.S. teen-series fighters, the F-15, -16 and -18, it was powerless, particularly because the Foxbat had a max-G rating of 4.5, and just 2.2 with full fuel. Excess Gs would rip its half-ton air-to-air missiles from their underwing hardpoints, since the airplane was intended to go fast but in a straight line. //
Glenn Diesen @Glenn_Diesen
·
China is building a drone army in preparation for America's "Pivot to Asia" and "Global NATO"
- Yes, this swarm technology also has civilisation application, although it will also be part of its military
Last edited
7:40 AM · Nov 24, 2024
Elon Musk @elonmusk
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Meanwhile, some idiots are still building manned fighter jets like the F-35 🗑️ 🫠
1:41 AM · Nov 24, 2024. //
You have to ask yourself why China, the owner of the above "drone swarm," is sinking billions of dollars into developing a manned fighter if they believe the drone is the future of warfare. You also have to ask why a continental power like China is investing in a heavy stealth fighter "with long endurance and comparatively massive internal volume to accommodate a very large fuel load, as well as weapons and sensors" for a future battlefield that we are told will be dominated by drones and hypersonic missiles — unless the new fighters are a head fake designed to catch our attention and divert resources to countering them.
At this point, these aircraft are what the late Don Rumsfeld would call "known unknowns." We know these planes exist, but we have no idea what they mean. What we can count on is defense contractors trying to divert as many Pentagon resources as possible into developing an aircraft that can overmatch these two Chinese planes without having any idea of their capability. //
anon-vwl5
7 hours ago
A long range fighter and a drone swarm are answers to two different tactical problems. //
RedLegADC(M)
16 hours ago
Usually we are tracking, but I'll take some small exception to your conclusion. First of all, the F-15 was not developed simply as a response to the Mig-25 - I suspect you actually know that as well as I do. Secondly, while it is always a cheap but wildly applauded diversion to criticize the greedy defense industry, I would hope you are not saying it was a mistake to develop and deploy the F-15, or that the defense industry and services should ignore emerging threats. //
Random US Citizen
16 hours ago edited
Meh. Call me back when China starts doing air operations from carriers at night, or launching nuclear-powered submarines that don’t sink while docked. I’m not saying their military is a paper tiger in the way that Russia’s obviously is, because quantity has a quality all its own. We know that from the human-wave attacks in Korea.
But we also know that China is on its way over a demographic cliff, that their economy is wallpaper covering up the cracks in the wallpaper covering cracks in the wallpaper, and that their culture of “face” means QC is, at very best, a distant afterthought.
China is an adversary with a zillion-man army, which is a threat to its near neighbors, but there’s no reason to freak out over plywood prototypes shaped as if they were stealthy.
They call it "dramatic," I call it pathetically inadequate and long overdue.
I've covered this story previously; see Four-Star General Suspended and Under IG Investigation for Tampering With Command Selection Board and Go Big or Go Home: Army General Blasts 'Racist' Promotion System as Reason He Meddled to Help a Favorite. //
As a note, the panel members are supposed to be anonymous to prevent this kind of tomfoolery, but someone leaked the names and phone numbers of the panel members to Hamilton so he could lobby them. //
But now we have more information.
General Randy George, the Army Chief of Staff, knew what Hamilton was doing and abetted it. George was Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin's senior military assistant before his meteoric rise to the Army's chief of staff.
The officer Hamilton pushed onto the command list was in the bottom 1% of the 811 officers considered for battalion command.
This officer's second shot at command selection was the first time anyone had been given a second shot.
General George inserted this officer on the command list despite her having been twice declared unqualified.
Hamilton was banging the officer he was trying to get promoted.
It seemed pretty obvious. As I said in a previous post, "A male general breaking all known rules on behalf of a female subordinate looks like more was going on here than fighting racism unless that's what the kids are calling it this week." //
If that [unjustly earned] award was dated after April 2022, his date of promotion to lieutenant general, he should be retired at the lowest grade at which he performed satisfactorily, which would be a major general. If the behavior began before that date, he could be retired as a one-star. Was Hamilton retired as a two-star, as the tweet suggests, and the dates changed to avoid additional embarrassment? Or was he retired as a two-star, and that decision overturned by someone higher than Wormuth? //
It doesn't really matter. When the man at the top of the Army is so utterly corrupt, the system has to act. It can either toss him out in a very public way, “pour encourager les autres," as Voltaire would have said, or it can embrace the corruption. Right now, it looks like corruption is winning. //
Ace jtt888
9 hours ago
In WW Two we had 2,000 flag officers for 12 million troops. We now have 1,000 flag officers for way less than 2 million troops. More than half need to be retired and not replaced.
Another line of criticism focuses on Hegseth’s personal life. To be sure, Hegseth wouldn’t meet the qualifications to serve as an elder or pastor in a church, and he has admitted to poor decisions in the past. But this raises a broader cultural question: When did Americans stop celebrating redemption stories? Today, Hegseth is happily married, active in his church, and a devoted father who embraces classical homeschooling. He served his country in combat and earned the respect and loyalty of those who worked with him in both military and civilian life.
Redemption is a deeply American ideal, but it often seems selectively applied. I recall reading about convicted bank robber Shon Hopwood, who, after release, earned a law degree and went on to teach at the Georgetown University Law Center—a story presented as an inspiring tale of growth and perseverance. But do the same people who applauded that story extend the same grace to Hegseth, a man who has overcome personal failings to achieve admirable success? If we value growth and change, shouldn’t we apply this principle consistently?
Evaluating someone’s past for predictions of future behavior is fair, but the recent past matters just as much as the distant past. //
Ultimately, the debate over Hegseth’s nomination reflects deeper societal tensions: between forgiveness and accountability, between ideological loyalty and open-mindedness, and between traditional and unconventional leadership. Whether or not one believes Hegseth to be the right person to serve as the next secretary of defense, this debate forces us to confront how we choose leaders and what values we prioritize in doing so.
As for me in this moment, I echo what Abraham Lincoln said of Ulysses S. Grant. “I can’t spare this man, he fights!” The bureaucrats had their turn. We would do well to have a warrior like Pete Hegseth leading the military as soon as possible.
DaveM
2 hours ago
"An incorrect statement involving Hegseth’s admission to the U.S. Military Academy was released by an employee on Dec. 10, 2024.”"
Given that the release of that information was itself a violation of the law- what is the status of this employee? //
Sojourner
2 hours ago edited
There are no adults in charge of the DoD writ large, the Army in general, and the USMA specifically.
The obvious question should be, "Who's getting fired for this?" We should ALL want to see some accountability here and not get any more of this "nameless employee" CYA BS.
On a separate note, "Go Army, beat Navy." //
David62
2 hours ago edited
It's not worth trying to prove they intentionally deceived. It would be difficult to prove and it helps Hegseth anyway. Regarding the release of personal info though - They still should not be allowed to get away with releasing his personal information. Federal employees and military all receive repeated training in privacy act, classification processes, and penalties. They know the rules. Do not let that part drop. Nobody in the position to be able to speak with reporters or inquirers of any kind, is ignorant of the rules.
In addition to the airstrikes throughout the depths of Syria, Israel has also reoccupied the Syrian portion of the Golan Heights that it relinquished to UN supervision in 1974 (Netanyahu Abrogates 1974 Peace Deal With Syria and Orders IDF Into Buffer Zone). Possession of Mount Hermon, the highest location of Israel, Jordan, and Syria, increases the early warning Israel will have of missile and drone attacks. It also provides continuous surveillance of the routes used by Iran and Hezbollah to move weapons into Lebanon. This move opens a secure and unimpeded air corridor from Israel to Iran. In the past, Israeli aircraft had to avoid Syrian interceptors and surface-to-air missiles, while Syrian radar provided invaluable information to Iran.
The major accomplishment of these strikes is the disarmament of Syria, and any future regime will have to start from scratch. //
The demolition of Syria's military capability has bought Israel several years of enhanced security and makes any direct action by Iran a decidedly high-risk affair.
‘[I]f they have specialties that we can use, especially if we want to maintain an all-volunteer force, we want to bring that talent into our services.’. //
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, previously endorsed allowing trans-identifying individuals to serve in the U.S. military, a position military specialists and reports have warned hampers the force’s overall readiness.
I’ve been through a lot: combat tours, job changes, divorces and family challenges. (Yes, I love my mom very much, and she loves me.) I have always led with honesty, integrity and passion. Tragically, many veterans never find the purpose for their next chapter and succumb to the bottle, depression or, worst of all, suicide. I understand what they are facing—because I’ve lived it. But by the grace of God, I took another path. My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has renewed and restored my life. I am saved by his grace.
In 1941, the United States suddenly found itself in a war that would span a third of the Earth's surface - the Pacific Ocean. They faced an implacable enemy with imperial ambitions, and the Pacific Fleet - or at least, what wasn't on the muddy bottom of Pearl Harbor - was built in part on Great War relics.
Four years later, the United States Pacific Fleet had more modern combat ships than all the other navies of the world combined. The United States, as Admiral Yamamoto warned, had fired up its enormous industrial base to a war footing faster than anyone thought possible, and we drowned the Empire of Japan in steel - and atomic flame.
Today there is another Asian power with Pacific Ocean ambitions, and we have some problems that didn't exist in 1941. //
The primary problem, according to Eaglen, is that China may well win dominance in the Pacific without firing a shot. And, as is always the case, the problem has a lot to do with logistics.
“If they know if this ever got beyond competition to something with the use of violence, we don’t have that capacity to rapidly repair and resupply forward in Asia, and it’s a really long way home to sail and fly things. You see how Beijing’s starting to win without fighting,” she concluded. //
America does have some advantages in the Pacific. Our undersea fleet is the most advanced in the world, and as the Germans learned as early as the Great War, submarines are a great force multiplier.
Currently, the Navy has more admirals than ships.
John Ʌ Konrad V
@johnkonrad
·
Follow
The U.S. Navy has more Admirals than ships, yet it can’t keep the Red Sea open or deliver new ships on time.
So, how do Navy Admirals spend their time? World travel to 4-star hotels!
Here's their Nov conference list
P.S. The list for Army & Air Force Generals is even longer.
8:08 AM · Nov 8, 2024. //
It's a good thing that he is not a creature of the Navy hierarchy and is not beholden to the military-industrial complex for his next gig. I can't be convinced that either of those groups cares much about winning wars and protecting America. //
NavyVet
7 hours ago
There is a clear pattern in President-elect Trump's cabinet picks: they have proven successful in competitive real-world endeavors, based on merit.
This is a sharp contrast to the last four years, where power was given for pure political reasons, with nary a real success among them.
Because these are not isolated producers swimming in a sea of political incompetence, they will be a force to be reckoned with. //
NavyVet DukeUSA
7 hours ago
My point has nothing to do with the Navy per se, what I am observing is the overall theme of his cabinet picks: proven winners, willing to approach government like a business, rather than corrupt political wrangling. //
Douglas Proudfoot
8 hours ago
There is no accountability for failure in the flag officer ranks of the US Military. The British famously executed failed Admiral John Byng in 1757, to, as Voltaire put it in "Candide," encourage the other admirals. Britania ruled the waves for about 180 years after the execution. In the US, a flag officer's failure on the battlefield or in weapons procurement should, at the very least, lead to retirement after a reduction in grade, at the lower grade. The president should see this done as Commander in Chief. If not, the Senate can refuse to confirm retirement as a 3 or 4 star flag officer. Right now, morale is low. Nobody respects senior leadership, because they take no responsibility even for obvious failure. This has to change. Rewarding failure means we'll get a lot more of it.
Me=USAF Systems Analyst Officer 1972-1976, Meritorious Service Medal 1976. //
anon-x1lc
7 hours ago
Congress's lack of a proper budget since Pres Bush have done great harm to the Navy. Continuing resolutions screw everything up. Can't budget for 5 and 10 years out for repair and refit. Plus the DEI cluster fark didn't help. FOcus on social engineering instead of competent leadership also screws things up. Cpt allowing a Starlink Sat antenna on her ship tels me the leadership is FUBAR and incompetent. If the command doesn't notice an extra antenna bolted on the side of the superstructure, they are complete idiots.
The curtains are beginning to close for the A-10 Thunderbolt II (aka Warthog). The United States Air Force is set to retire 56 in fiscal year 2025 (around 20% of the remaining inventory), reducing the number of A-10s in active service to around 200. Meanwhile, the US Air Force has stated it is about to retire the last of its Warthogs based in South Korea, and these will be replaced by F-16 Fighting Falcons (upgraded with fifth-generation-like software).
Jesse Kelly
@JesseKellyDC
·
Follow
There’s nothing in the world that would help the morale of the men than to see a flag officer face real punishment the same way the guys on the ground have.
You officers have no idea how much resentment your little club has created in the troops.
Barry R McCaffrey
@mccaffreyr3
Trump plans to recall retired officers to active duty to court martial them for Afghan withdrawal will be a disaster for military morale and a political bomb for him. The Uniform Code of Military Justice is a codified Congressional statute and operates under Federal law…. not…
3:57 PM · Nov 19, 2024 //
You're dang right it's politically-motivated. The general class is infested with left-wing partisans who put politics above the rank-and-file, sometimes with deadly consequences. The purge is coming, and no amount of crybagging from the press is going to stop it. Buckle up.
That virus is the implementation of DEI and gender theory in our service academies. This is damaging to the intent of those academies. It's dangerous. It's harmful. And it could cause us to lose a major war. Pete Hegseth obviously understands this. //
Pete Hegseth has been there. He has led men in a war zone. He has smelled the smoke, and knows what it is like to be in a foreign place, to be in danger, to face possible death or maiming - and to have his men look at him and say "Sir, what do we do now?" Making a decision and acting under those conditions is like nothing else in any other field of endeavor. The wrong decision may get the officer and all his men killed, and he may have only seconds to make that decision. Pete Hegseth knows what that is like.
In its Tuesday night hit piece on Hegseth, authors Joe Gould, Robbie Gramer, Paul McLeary, Connor O’Brien, and Jack Detsch published critical remarks from an anonymous defense lobbyist, who gave the game away by lamenting how the Trump nominee isn’t embedded in D.C.’s military-industrial complex.
“Who the f-ck is this guy?” the source reportedly said. The lobbyist wanted “someone who actually has an extensive background in defense. That would be a good start.”
The authors went on to fearmonger that Hegseth’s nomination “will do little to quell fears inside the Pentagon” that the former president will select a defense secretary who agrees with his agenda — something presidents have been doing for centuries. They also noted, “Trump’s campaign trail rhetoric has primed fears that his second term could see a swift and divisive overhaul at the Pentagon.”
Got that? The left’s problem with Hegseth isn’t that he’s a Fox News commentator. It’s that he’s someone from outside the incestuous government-defense contractor system who actually cares about the men and women in uniform. //
For all of their unhinged outrage about his nomination, Hegseth understands the biggest problems plaguing the military better than the Democrats and media hacks calling him “unqualified.”
During his recent interview with fellow veteran Shawn Ryan, the Army veteran eloquently explained how the sole purpose of the military should be winning wars — not conducting left-wing social experiments. He further chastised the Pentagon bureaucracy for its ineptitude and detailed the ongoing threat that Red China poses to the United States and the global security environment. //
For the left, Hegseth’s biggest crime is his willingness to buck the corrupt system that’s been allowed to fester in D.C. for decades. Unlike many of his predecessors, he understands that the men and women who wear the uniform are devoted human beings and not pawns in a geopolitical chess match that can be cast aside to fulfill the wants of the Pentagon blob that’s shepherded Washington’s failed foreign policy for decades.
His outsider status makes him a threat to the bureaucratic rot infecting the highest levels of the military. And that’s the reason he’s the perfect man for the job.
Early in his third presidential campaign, Donald Trump vowed to establish a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” to “declassify and publish all documents on Deep State spying, censorship, and abuses of power.” The phrase “Truth and Reconciliation” recalls bodies established to investigate abuses by toppled Communist regimes such as East Germany’s, or the former apartheid government of South Africa. The framing suggests that Trump views the entire past decade, from “Russiagate” to the “lawfare” cases entangling himself and his advisers, as the fruits of an illegitimate regime that threw the rule of law out the window.
This interpretation of recent history, surely viewed as partisan by Trump’s opponents, will be tested by the facts, once they become better known and documented. But the president-elect’s suggestion that the workings of the U.S. government must be more transparent is long overdue. //
It is high time for a serious overhaul of classification procedures, with the appointment of a presidential “task force” of the kind suggested in the Classification Reform for Transparency Act (which still awaits passage). President Obama’s Executive Order 13526 of 2009 limited classification times for ordinary records to 10 years and established a cap of 25 years for more sensitive files. But the nine telltale “exemptions” were left in place, allowing security agencies to continue stonewalling — while adding massively to the vault of our nation’s secrets.
If we streamline exemptions to a few simple categories such as “sources at risk,” private data of living citizens, and military-technological and trade secrets and shorten classification to a single presidential term of four years (e.g., to prevent an opposition party from mining recent presidential files for use in election campaigns), we could exponentially reduce the expense of classification going forward and restore public trust in Washington, D.C. — not least by putting a healthy fear into our public servants that they cannot abuse their powers and get away with it.
Meanwhile, why not declassify all U.S. government files more than 25 years old? If a strict exemption threshold is met, government agencies could still redact personal data or trade or military secrets — but the files themselves should be opened. Rather than require citizens and historians to pry information out of Washington via FOIA applications, the burden of classification should be placed where it belongs — on the government.
Files should be open to the public unless otherwise specified, not secret by default. We the people have a right to know what our government does in our name, and to know our own history.
“For all you stupid f*cks out there that still believe military service will be voluntary. Remember Germany 1936.” //
Selective Service @SSS_gov
·
Yesterday an inappropriate X post related to a mandatory draft was reposted on the Selective Service Agency’s X account. We are investigating this incident to determine how this happened and are proactively taking steps to prevent this from happening in the future. The reposted… Show more
10:25 AM · Nov 7, 2024. //
DaveGinOly in reply to inspectorudy. | November 7, 2024 at 4:17 pm
A POTUS’ authority to conduct the business of the United States (executive authority) is delegated down the chain of command. A POTUS can rescind that authority from any non-compliant agency, agency office, agency official, or employee. Those so divested of authority to act in the stead of the POTUS would no longer be able to access government networks or classified documents, authorize spending/purchasing, nor to conduct any government business. They will still be employed, they will still be paid. But they will only be able to twiddle their thumbs. Congress will have no say in this. An attempt to meddle with the POTUS’ authority to grant/rescind delegations of executive authority would be a violation of the separation of powers. //
CommoChief in reply to inspectorudy. | November 7, 2024 at 4:44 pm
Yep. Reassigned to Ice Station Zebra in the Arctic Circle to help count snowflakes as part of an ‘interagency TF’. They can always resign instead….
Based on recent IAEA reports, one nuclear watchdog group concludes that Iran has completed all the steps needed for full nuclear weapons breakout and — whenever it makes the decision to go nuclear — could produce up to nine nuclear warheads in a month, and 15 in five months. Moreover, it was discovered last year that Iran has built a new nuclear facility under a mountain near Natanz that is so deep underground that it might be beyond the reach of conventional weapons. With this facility, it will be able to make nuclear warheads even faster.
Whatever the scope of Iran’s secret nuclear activities, it almost certainly has not been producing nuclear weapons. Rather, what Iran has been trying to do in secret is get ready to produce nuclear weapons. In order to engage in serial production of nuclear weapons, Iran will need the far-flung facilities that it has developed under the guise of a civilian program. All it has to do is to stop cooperating with the IAEA and withdraw from the NPT (whether formally or de facto) so that it can pull a veil of secrecy over the entire program.
From that point forward, we will have to assume that Iran is a nuclear weapon state. North Korea didn’t conduct its first test of a nuclear device until 2006, but by then the U.S. had long since been forced to accept the high probability that it was a nuclear weapons state.
Iran’s withdrawal from the NPT will result in a cascade of disastrous consequences. Saudi Arabia has said that if Iran gets the bomb, it will get one, too. Turkey and Egypt are then likely to join the club. And consider how desperate Israel’s position will become. It will have to assume not just that any ballistic or cruise missile launched from Iran could be nuclear-tipped, justifying the use of its own nuclear deterrent, but that Iran could smuggle a nuclear device into Tel Aviv with plausible deniability that it had done so. //
As practiced by Iran and its proxies, on the other hand, missile terrorism is an entirely different kind of threat, as the July War itself had shown. The 100+ rockets that Hezbollah fired at northern Israel every day for a month caused few casualties. But they scared a third of Israel’s population into bomb shelters for weeks. Many Israelis started leaving for the United States, in many cases indefinitely.
Hence, missile terrorism poses a threat to the existence of Israel that is far beyond the potential casualty figures: A state that cannot make its people feel safe going about their daily lives, that can’t even keep its airports open because of terrorism, is in danger of failing. Whereas Palestinian terrorism targets Jews for the sheer satisfaction of murdering them, Iranian terrorism targets Israelis’ faith in the state of Israel. Iran has realized what too many Israeli leaders have not: that missile terrorism is an existential threat. Missile defenses such as Iron Dome have lulled too many Israelis into thinking that the threat is manageable. It isn’t.
So here is the question. After holding back from helping Hamas in its confrontations with Israel for nearly 20 years, why did Iran decide to join the fight this time? Perhaps Iran sensed a unique opportunity to combine the missile terrorism of all its proxies and the mayhem that antisemites and wannabe terrorists could cause in Western cities and universities to deliver a fatal blow to the morale of Israel.
Maybe. But alas, Iran’s decision to fight Israel now was likely part of a much more dangerous plan. //
The NPT allows states to withdraw with 90 days’ notice. When North Korea withdrew from the NPT in 1993, it waited to see what America’s reaction would be. When it seemed that Clinton might be prepared to use force, North Korea went down to the wire and “suspended” its withdrawal from the NPT a few days before the 90 days were up. North Korea then bluffed its way to nuclear weapons by threatening to unleash war on the Korean peninsula, a real bluff considering North Korea’s dictatorship could not have survived three days of such a war.
We should expect similar gamesmanship from Iran. We are at “the River” in Texas Hold’em. All the community cards have been revealed. Iran has a weaker hand than its enemies but is willing to risk far more. Israel is keeping its cards close to the vest, American surveillance and leaks notwithstanding, but its one ace — nuclear weapons — is worthless now. America has by far the strongest hand in the round, but it has become risk-averse to the point of torpor: its increasingly besotted national security establishment equates deterrence with provocation, which is the strategic equivalent of unilateral disarmament. Iran likes its chances.
Obama Undermined the Diplomatic Option to Stop Iran’s Nuclear Program.
When Iran’s nuclear program was first discovered in 2003, the U.S. could have nipped it in the bud with a single airstrike. The argument against that move at the time (and against military action since) was that Iran would quickly reconstitute the program.
If that was the right answer, it was the wrong question. The military option on Iran’s nuclear program has to be assessed in terms of what Thomas Schelling would call a “tacit negotiation” between the U.S. and Iran: Properly conceived, the destruction of Iran’s nuclear program would be an important but incidental benefit of military force; the right goal — as with sanctions — would be to convince Iran to abandon the program.
And for that strategic objective, the target list is much broader and includes everything the regime needs to survive in the short term. That means oil refineries, power plants, ports, and military command-and-control, up to and including Iran’s Ministry of Defense and the offices of the Atomic Organization of Iran. Targeting any of those early on could have fatally undermined the internal influence of Iran’s nuclear hawks.
Solving problems before they become crises is always a good idea. In international relations, the time to stop a dangerous deterioration in the status quo is at the start, before it has run its course. That is the single most important lesson of the chain of events that led to World War II, and it is particularly true in the case of a rogue nuclear program. It would have been much easier to convince Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions when it had just one pilot facility that it half-expected somebody to bomb at any moment.
Now the nuclear weapons program is the crown jewel of the Islamic Revolution, to which the mullahs have subordinated all other priorities. As Henry Kissinger wrote, in order to avoid the use of force, it is sometimes necessary to threaten its use. Because we have not done that, we are now playing defense at the one-yard line and may have no other option.
Though its chances of success were never very high, there was a diplomatic option for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program — until President Barack Obama cashiered it in his Joint Comprehensive Plan Action (JCPOA), one of the most consequential examples of aiding and abetting terrorism in world history.
During the administration of George W. Bush, the U.S. was able to orchestrate a powerful Iran sanctions regime, backed by the U.N. Security Council with the support of Russia and China. That was a remarkable feat considering that Iran is an important client of Russia and China is more dependent on Iranian oil than any other major economy. Obama, to his credit, built on those sanctions, which soon brought Iran’s economy to the brink of collapse. In 2014, Iran’s currency lost more than half its value.
But just in the nick of time, Obama came to the mullahs’ rescue with the JCPOA, which dismantled the sanctions regime and provided Iran with a massive infusion of cash, just to secure Iran’s forbearance to go nuclear for a few more years. Needless to say, Iran took the money and ran.
Under President Donald Trump, the U.S. moved quickly to abandon the JCPOA. But alas, its benefits for Iran had already largely accrued. Obama’s cash infusion (which his dunce Secretary of State John Kerry had promised would not be used for terrorism) allowed Iran to lavishly fund the IRGC and Hezbollah. Even worse, the international sanctions regime could not be resurrected. The U.S. imposed “maximum pressure” through sanctions of its own, but while those exacted a heavy price, the reality was that Obama had fatally undermined the diplomatic option for stopping Iran’s nuclear program.
In the supposed interest of peace and stability, the U.S. has waited until its most virulent enemy is in a position to turn the world upside down. The moment that the mullahs have been waiting so patiently for, suffering through decades of sanctions and privations, is finally here. They have a nuclear weapon within their grasp. They need but seize it, knowing that the odds of America’s folding are in their favor, and overwhelmingly so, as long as Joe Biden or Kamala Harris is in power.
All Iran needs to do now is withdraw from the NPT, and it will be a brave new world.