HG S2 (Intel Bot)

John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein (editors), Naval Institute Press, (2022). Reviewed by Charles C. Kolb, Ph.D. The editors are well-published senior scholars, well-equipped to undertake the organization and editing of this volume which focuses on the interwar years of two global conflicts. Professor John H. Maurer is the Alfred Thayer Mahan Professor of Sea Power and Grand Strategy and served as the Chair of the Strategy and Policy Department at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. Erik Goldstein serves as Professor of International Relations and History Boston University; his research interests include diplomacy, formulation of national diplomatic strategies, the origins and resolution of armed conflict, and negotiation. The Road to Pearl Harbor offers a timely examination of conflicts in the Pacific prior to the attacks on Pearl Harbor and provides lessons applicable to understanding contemporary Great Power flash points between Asia and the West. In this book, the editors bring together renowned historians and analysts of grand strategy to illustrate the fateful decisions that culminated in war. The seven contributors take a pragmatic view of the policy and strategy options, as well as the decisions made by the leaders of the great powers. This important history underscores that the choices made by political, military, and naval leaders mattered in determining questions of war and peace. Highlighting Japan’s war against China and the protracted resistance of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist regime, The Road to Pearl Harbor provides historical context for understanding the political and economic struggles in Asia and decisions for war. The volume provides an important contribution to interwar naval history by examining the views of the Japanese navy’s leaders, who wanted to build up their navy to defeat Britain and the United States at sea. This interwar history is relevant, as the concluding chapter demonstrates in a revealing examination of the current views held by Chinese naval officers about fighting a future war in the Pacific. The volume has an “Introduction,” seven chapters, and a single conflated Bibliography and a valuable Index. “Introduction: Great Power War in Asia: Why Pearl Harbor?” by John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein. The editors discuss the period between the two world wars and examine the struggle for mastery of Asia that cost the lives of millions by reviewing the decisions made by leaders who directed the actions of the great powers. These key individuals were David Lloyd George of Britain, the uniformed leadership of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN), Chiang Kai-shek of China and the Sino-Japanese Wars, Winston Churchill of Great Britain, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) of the United States, and the background of the U.S.-Japanese War beginning with the attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, quickly followed by declarations of war on Great Britain and the British Commonwealth, and the Netherlands. Maurer and Goldstein provide a brief characterization of the initial eleven months of “The World in 1941” and events in French Indochina, China from 1937 to 1941 and her military and politics, the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and Stalin’s strategic moves, the Japanese advance into southern Indochina and the reactions by America and Britain by issuing embargoes on oil and metals, as well as perspectives from Tokyo, Japanese movements into Manchuria, and American-Japanese diplomatic negotiations. The editors also make a vital point that the connections between Hitler’s attack on the Soviet Union and the vital role of China by preventing the Japanese from attacking the Soviet Union was generally unrecognized during the early years of World War II. Chapter 1: “Constructing a Liberal International Order: David Lloyd George, and Peacemaking” by Erik Goldstein. This essay begins with a characterization of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, the League of Nations, and the Anglo-Japanese Alliance beginning in 1902 as precursors to the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-22 where Britain was a true global power and Lloyd George was the only Big Four leader still in office after the World War. He proposed a new international framework which involved a huge British imperial footprint in Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia in an attempt to avoid the specter of an arms race with the United States. We are reminded that the IJN was modeled on the Royal Navy (RN) and that this partnership gave Britain important trade benefits in East Asia including British technology and materiel, notably in military equipment and training. Although the United States had rejected Woodrow Wilson’s concept of the League of Nations, she still wished to participate in international cooperation under “friendly” President Harding. Britain relied on the RN for essential protection and desired armaments control. Other attendees at the Conference also sought armaments control and reduction but American Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes outmaneuvered the British in proposing the “ratio scheme” to the Four Powers which gave the British and Americans advantages over France, Japan, and other nations. The 1930 London Naval Conference saw aggressive challenges to the ratios from the Japanese and Anglo-American opposition to the Japanese. The Japanese abrogated the 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1922 and the Lloyd-George government fell with the subsequent government — in order to diminish military expenditures — failing to follow through on British naval base construction at Singapore and not deploying a fleet there. The Japanese would withdraw from participation in the naval armaments conferences, moved militarily forward in Manchuria, and began a new program of naval armaments during the 1930s. Chapter 2: “Return to Great Power Competition: Imperial Japan’s Rejection of the Washington System” By Peter Mauch. Senior lecturer in modern history in the School of Humanities at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Mauch begins with a review of the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-22 and the First and Second London Conferences of 1930 and 1935. In September 1933, Japanese Naval Minister Ōsumi Mineo told journalists that the naval arms limitations were never meant to remain “in perpetuity” and that the Japanese were dissatisfied with the 5:5:3 U.S.-British and Japan ratios and demanded change to 5:5:5 at the Second London Naval Conference in 1935 but came away “empty handed.” France and Italy were at rations of 1.75 but the tonnage ratios for cruisers and submarines were diminished as well. The author continues with a detailed examination of the situation as detailed by Stephen Peltz in Race to Pearl Harbor (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974) and Sadao Asaso in From Mahan to Pearl Harbor (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2005), and notes that the Japanese had also translated Hector Bywater’s The Great Pacific War (London: Constable, 1926) into Japanese and that it was read widely by IJN officers. Both the right and left wings of Japanese political parties also expressed hostile views to the Western powers and a Japanese Army plot near Mukden, Manchuria sabotaged Japanese railroad track and blamed Chinese soldiers. Propaganda booklets blamed the United States for the deterioration of trans-Pacific affairs and there were major domestic and international public relations effort aimed at revising the current naval arms limitations and proposals that best road for peace was to have Japan lead in Asia, the United States in the Western Hemisphere, and Britain in Europe. An example of Japanese views was published in Foreign Affairs magazine in 1934 written by Admiral Nomura Kichisaburō. Mauch concludes that the public relations campaign waged from 1921 through 1933 rejecting the Washington system was highly successful. Chapter 3: “Tasting Gall: Chiang Kai-shek and China’s War with Japan” by Grant F. Rhode who is a Senior lecturer at Boston University, adjunct professor at the Naval War College and associate in research at the Fairbanks Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. The Three Powers leaders (Chiang, Roosevelt, and Churchill) at the Cairo Conference of November 1943 laid out a post-war settlement that would restore China to a position of wealth and power and was a highlight of the legacy of Chiang (b. 1887) who was to have great failure and great success. Rhode reviews the First Sino-Japanese War (1895) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), and Chiang’s military training in China and Japan and Chiang being influenced by Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Four chronological periods are detailed: 1) Versailles to Manchukuo 1919-31: Topics include the Locarno Pact of 1915, Washington Naval Conference 1921-22, Chinese Communist Party first meeting 1921, First Congress of the Nationalist Party 1924, the 1926 Northern Expedition, and Chiang’s early military career and his ability to unify major parts of China. 2) Manchukuo to Pearl Harbor 1931-41: The issue of the beginning of the Second Sino-Japan War starting in 1937 or in 1937 is covered, including the Japanese seizure of Manchuria in 1931, the creation of the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932, the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of 1937, and the Long March are detailed. The Battle of Shanghai from August to November 1937 displaced 30 million refugees, and the following Nanjing Campaign (or Rape of Nanking) displacing up to 300,000 persons. The Soviet Red Army defeated the Japanese at Nomonhon in 1939 and a Japan-Soviet non-aggression pact followed in April 1941 just after the Tripartite Pact was concluded between Japan, Germany, and Italy which meant that China now allies (the United States and Britain) against Japan for the first time. 3) Pearl Harbor to the Japanese Surrender 1941-45: This was an unparalleled opportunity for China and Chiang as the Pearl Harbor attack was followed by the Doolittle Raid on Japan in April 1941 and General Stillwell’s ability to increase military actions against the Japanese in Southeast Asia beyond the Flying Tigers’ air war in China under General Chenault, and Stillwell’s desire for a land war using Chinese troops and the building of the Ledo (Burma) Road beginning in 1943. Japan launched a major counteroffensive in China to disrupt the land road and destroy Allied air bases in eastern China. The Cairo Conference of 1943 may have been Chiang’s finest hour since the following Tehran Conference (Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin) diminished Chiang’s role in the war. Stillwell was promoted to full general by FDR over both American and Chinese troops (a blow to Chiang) while Japanese failed in their objectives as Nationalist Chinese troops bore the brunt of the action and while Stalinist Mao Zedong’s Communist troops gained strength from 40,000 to over one million troops and prepared for the Civil War of 1945-49. 4) Japanese Surrender to the Death of Chiang 1945-75: The Nationalist armies were depleted by the Japanese and were defeated by the Communists who would establish the Communist Peoples’ Republics of China in April 1949 while the Nationalist were driven to Taiwan. Chiang felt betrayed by FDR and declared martial law in Taiwan and prior to his death in 1975, transfer power to his son Ching-kuo. Mao would die in 1976 but the political die had been cast. In assessing Chiang Kai-shek versus Mao, Rhode believes that very little attention has been paid by Western historians to the backstory and notes the overlap of China’s war with Japan and the Nationalist versus Communist clash which continues in the post-World War II era, and Communist China’s current goals to surpass Japanese leadership in Asia and that China must remain a global power and eschew a second-tier position. Rhode makes a compelling argument and has assembled persuasive evidence. Chapter 4: “Winston Churchill and the Gathering Storm in Asia” by John H. Maurer. In 1939 the British Empire controlled a vast territory in Asia from New Zealand and Australia to Southeast and South Asia to India, and the Middle East with 25% of the world’s population and rich resources. Britain was a superpower in the 20th century in competition with German, Japanese, and United States industry and naval power. In 1941, British weaknesses in Asia were exposed as territories were seized or threatened, and Winston Churchill’s views on international strategy were evolving as Japan’s policies and strategic options changed with December 1941 and early 1942. Maurer provides background on Britain and the emerging threat citing the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-05) when most of Japan’s warships were British built in Britain. The alliance of Britain and Japan 1902-22 was a period of technology transfer and know-how from Britain to Japan of naval and aviation equipment. As a cruel twist of fate “the student surpassed the teacher.” In World War I and the beginning of II, Britain could concentrate on Germany since Japan was allied (Japanese warships escorted ANZAC troops to the Middle East and conducted operations in the Mediterranean against the Central Powers). In the 1930s, Japan’s military leadership and army and navy grew in strength while the British economy was sluggish during the interwar years and its military and naval budgets were diminished. Churchill downplayed the dangers posed by Japan, as did the isolationist United States, and began to arm “too little and too late.” Germany’s rearmament under Hitler, the Tripartite Pact, the defeat of France, and Lend Lease spurred the hawkish FDR and Churchill to issue the Atlantic Charter, while Germany turned its attention to the invasion of the Soviet Union, which had been successful in battles with the Japanese in 1938-39. Churchill had envisioned four possible scenarios in confronting the Japanese (p. 112-113) so that the attack on Pearl Harbor and Hitler’s declaration against the United States was a relief to Churchill. Maurer outlines Churchill’s four revised priorities for the war in Europe (p. 115) and comments on Churchill’s misjudgment of Japan regarding the unexpected attacks which destroyed four British ships in Southeast Asia: HMS Prince of Wales and cruiser Repulse near Singapore in 10 December 1941, and the cruisers HMS Cornwall and Dorsetshire four months later. Chapter 5: “FDR and America’s Road to War in the Pacific” by Walter A. McDougall. Professor of history, Alloy-Ansin Professor of International Relations, University of Pennsylvania. McDougall reminds readers of Hector Bywater’s 1921 and 1925 books which predicted events in the Pacific including the sneak attack: Sea-power in the Pacific: A Study of the American-Japanese Naval Problem (London: Constable, 1921) and The Great Pacific War: A History of the American-Japanese Campaign of 1931-33 (London: Constable, 1925). FDR dismissed these forecasts and initially contended that Japan should be trusted. The period between the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) through various meetings and the Washington Naval Conference are recounted, and America’s hypocrisy and the Japanese move to a defensive position are reported. FDR’s isolationist policies of the interwar period continued into the New Deal Congress of 1935-37 and passage of neutrality acts and the expansion of the U.S. fleet while Britain and France did nothing to hinder Hitler’s rise to power and rearmament. The Japanese joined Nazi Germany in the Anti-Cominturn Pact of 1936 and Marco Polo Bridge Incident in July 1937 were viewed as “undeclared war” as FDR shifted to a position of interventionalist because of the “new order” being established in Europe and Asia. Nazi expansion into Austria and Czechoslovakia followed by the Wehrmacht’s invasion into Poland and then the Soviet Union, plus the ability of the United States to read the Japanese diplomatic code (“Purple”) and FDR’s meeting with Churchill resulting in the Atlantic Charter, reshaped Roosevelt’s position from reserved to forceful by July 1941. These events led to Lend Lease and American troops sent to Greenland and Iceland, with other actions at the beginning of the Battle of the Atlantic, none of which provoked Hitler. General MacArthur was sent to the Philippines at the time that General Tojo became the Japanese Prime Minister in October and Admiral Yamamoto was ordered to assemble the Japanese combined fleet for military action that would be at Pearl Harbor. Eleventh hour negotiations were seen as a “waste of time” by both sides as the American Navy lost track of the Japanese carrier forces. Of interest was how a top-secret copy of Rainbow 5 (a 350-page plan detailing American’s strategy for World War II which assumed that the United States was allied with Britain and France and provided for offensive operations by American forces in Europe and Africa) became public. On December 4, 1941, the Chicago Tribune, with the headline “F.D.R.’s War Plans!”, along with The Times Herald of Washington, D.C., published the Rainbow 5 plan; the “leak” was never resolved. These events led to Pearl Harbor and America’s entry into a global war. Chapter 6: “Igniting the U.S.-Japan War, 1941” by Richard B. Frank. A recognized authority on the Asia-Pacific War, Frank discusses the “inexplicable disaster” at Pearl Harbor and the issue that FDR or Churchill, or both, knew in advance of the attack and reviews books published by Anthony Flynn (1945), Charles Beard (1948), Rear Admiral Robert Theobald (1954), and Robert Stennet (1999). This chapter focuses on material derived from Frank’s own Tower of Skulls: A History of the Asia Pacific War July 1937-May 1941 (New York: Norton, 2020) the first volume of a trilogy. He states that the Japanese victory at Pearl was not just an American defeat – both tactical and operational – but also a Japanese strategical defeat coupled with American misjudgment and failed communication. He initially sketches to state of the world in 1941 focusing on China and French Indochina with 40-80 million refugees and 7.5 million dead (80% non-combatants) which tied down massive numbers of Japanese troops: 22 divisions in China, 13 in Manchuria, and 2 in Korea. Overall, Japan had 51 divisions and ten were selected for “Southern Operations.” The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor grew from the need to keep the Soviet Union in the war against Hitler and necessitated that the United States not abandon China. He reviews the German deep penetrations into the Soviet Union and their logistical miscalculations and notes that that Stalin ordered Mao Zedong only to provide diversionary attacks against the Japanese to keep China in the war and build up the Communist Chinese Army. Meanwhile the Japanese advanced into Southern Indochina, seized Dutch East Indies petroleum sources and sought ways to extract themselves from the “Chinese quagmire” and determined that they would enter the war against the Soviets only if Germany was able to crush the Soviets on the western front. The American-Japanese negotiations in 1941 pivoted around the China question and that the Japanese desired that the Americans abandoned China and that Japan would withdraw from southern Indochina if the United States restored the flow of petroleum to Japan. Frank contends that historians neglect the link between Hitler and the Soviet’s war and the vital role of China preventing the Japanese from attacking the Soviet Union. Chapter 7: “Chinese Views of Future Warfare in the Indo-Pacific: First Strike and U.S. Forward Bases in Japan” by Toshi Yoshihara. A Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic Budgetary Assessments, Washington, DC., the author examines the prospects of war between United States and China from viewpoints of scale, underlying causes, and opening moves utilizing a variety of sources including published Chinese documents and books. The PLA (People’s Liberation Army) is predisposed to deliver the first blow: large-scale strategic raids and long-range strikes. The PLA’s views of U.S. forward bases in Asia (including naval) includes 80 bases in Japan, the Philippines, and Thailand. One key base is Yokosuka’s command and control and logistics centers, shipyards, and repair facilities for aircraft carriers, and fuel storage. The PLA’s view on logistics and modern warfare includes the vulnerability of logistic systems, supply concentrations, and lack of stockpiles. Yoshihara notes that China has a holistic view of modern warfare including systematic attacks on enemy systems and command hubs, logistical support systems, and information systems and joint firepower strikes vs. CAISR systems. Six types of surprise attacks include: rapid raids, ambush sneak attacks, long-range raids, sabotage raids, harassment attacks, combinations of “frontal assaults,” and decisive blows and/or multiplier effects. For offensive campaigns the PLA possesses three types of missiles: 1) Land attack medium-range (MRMB), 2) nuclear weapon land attacks and anti-shipping (DF-21C 1588 km range), and 3) land attack cruise missiles (CSS-5 Mod 4 and CH-55C-9 (CJ-10) LAGM l), and attack cruise missiles, CGLCM ground launched cruise missiles, and DF-26 IRBM intermediate missiles. Yoshihara provides a critical assessment of PLA’s threats to American naval bases in Japan, commenting this it is one element of a larger campaign and that retaliation against mainland China would draw in Japan, hence, China is weighing the risks and benefits of a first strike. New technologies and capabilities include hypersonic weapons and artificial intelligence. He observes that there is a shrinking battlefield in terms of time and precision. This diverse but cohesive group of papers provides a wider and more detailed context on Pacific and global backgrounds of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor which is often characterized as Japan’s motivation driven by its national self-interests, its scarcity of key economic resources, and America’s embargo policy. The authors clearly show that the political, military, and naval decisions made by the leaders of the great powers were often faulty and ill advised. They show that events other than the American perceptions other members of the Washington Naval Treaty, and of 1930s Japanese leaders, notably the Japanese invasion of China and the actions of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist versus Mao Zedong’s Communist armies during the Civil War, helps cause foreign policy dilemmas, and create fluctuating decisions made by Churchill and Roosevelt. The seven papers were not given at a conference or symposium, but it would have been interesting if there was a debate among the contributors. The volume is, indeed, a significant contribution to our understanding of the attack on Pearl Harbor illustrating interrelated issues and problems including Hitler’s attack of the Soviet Union and Chinese perspectives on this and other issues. Dr. Kolb is a United States Naval Institute Golden Life Member John H. Maurer, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, serves as the Alfred Thayer Mahan Distinguished Professor of Sea Power and Grand Strategy at the Naval War College.   Erik Goldstein is professor of International Relations and History, Boston University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. The Road to Pearl Harbor: Great Power War in Asia and the Pacific. By John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein (editors) (Naval Institute Press: 2022) The post The Road to Pearl Harbor: Great Power War in Asia and the Pacific first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein (editors), Naval Institute Press, (2022). Reviewed by Charles C. Kolb, Ph.D. The editors are well-published senior scholars, well-equipped to undertake the organization and editing of this volume which focuses on the interwar years of two global conflicts. Professor John H. Maurer is the Alfred Thayer Mahan Professor of Sea Power and Grand Strategy and served as the Chair of the Strategy and Policy Department at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. Erik Goldstein serves as Professor of International Relations and History Boston University; his research interests include diplomacy, formulation of national diplomatic strategies, the origins and resolution of armed conflict, and negotiation. The Road to Pearl Harbor offers a timely examination of conflicts in the Pacific prior to the attacks on Pearl Harbor and provides lessons applicable to understanding contemporary Great Power flash points between Asia and the West. In this book, the editors bring together renowned historians and analysts of grand strategy to illustrate the fateful decisions that culminated in war. The seven contributors take a pragmatic view of the policy and strategy options, as well as the decisions made by the leaders of the great powers. This important history underscores that the choices made by political, military, and naval leaders mattered in determining questions of war and peace. Highlighting Japan’s war against China and the protracted resistance of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist regime, The Road to Pearl Harbor provides historical context for understanding the political and economic struggles in Asia and decisions for war. The volume provides an important contribution to interwar naval history by examining the views of the Japanese navy’s leaders, who wanted to build up their navy to defeat Britain and the United States at sea. This interwar history is relevant, as the concluding chapter demonstrates in a revealing examination of the current views held by Chinese naval officers about fighting a future war in the Pacific. The volume has an “Introduction,” seven chapters, and a single conflated Bibliography and a valuable Index. “Introduction: Great Power War in Asia: Why Pearl Harbor?” by John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein. The editors discuss the period between the two world wars and examine the struggle for mastery of Asia that cost the lives of millions by reviewing the decisions made by leaders who directed the actions of the great powers. These key individuals were David Lloyd George of Britain, the uniformed leadership of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN), Chiang Kai-shek of China and the Sino-Japanese Wars, Winston Churchill of Great Britain, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) of the United States, and the background of the U.S.-Japanese War beginning with the attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, quickly followed by declarations of war on Great Britain and the British Commonwealth, and the Netherlands. Maurer and Goldstein provide a brief characterization of the initial eleven months of “The World in 1941” and events in French Indochina, China from 1937 to 1941 and her military and politics, the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and Stalin’s strategic moves, the Japanese advance into southern Indochina and the reactions by America and Britain by issuing embargoes on oil and metals, as well as perspectives from Tokyo, Japanese movements into Manchuria, and American-Japanese diplomatic negotiations. The editors also make a vital point that the connections between Hitler’s attack on the Soviet Union and the vital role of China by preventing the Japanese from attacking the Soviet Union was generally unrecognized during the early years of World War II. Chapter 1: “Constructing a Liberal International Order: David Lloyd George, and Peacemaking” by Erik Goldstein. This essay begins with a characterization of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, the League of Nations, and the Anglo-Japanese Alliance beginning in 1902 as precursors to the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-22 where Britain was a true global power and Lloyd George was the only Big Four leader still in office after the World War. He proposed a new international framework which involved a huge British imperial footprint in Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia in an attempt to avoid the specter of an arms race with the United States. We are reminded that the IJN was modeled on the Royal Navy (RN) and that this partnership gave Britain important trade benefits in East Asia including British technology and materiel, notably in military equipment and training. Although the United States had rejected Woodrow Wilson’s concept of the League of Nations, she still wished to participate in international cooperation under “friendly” President Harding. Britain relied on the RN for essential protection and desired armaments control. Other attendees at the Conference also sought armaments control and reduction but American Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes outmaneuvered the British in proposing the “ratio scheme” to the Four Powers which gave the British and Americans advantages over France, Japan, and other nations. The 1930 London Naval Conference saw aggressive challenges to the ratios from the Japanese and Anglo-American opposition to the Japanese. The Japanese abrogated the 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1922 and the Lloyd-George government fell with the subsequent government — in order to diminish military expenditures — failing to follow through on British naval base construction at Singapore and not deploying a fleet there. The Japanese would withdraw from participation in the naval armaments conferences, moved militarily forward in Manchuria, and began a new program of naval armaments during the 1930s. Chapter 2: “Return to Great Power Competition: Imperial Japan’s Rejection of the Washington System” By Peter Mauch. Senior lecturer in modern history in the School of Humanities at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Mauch begins with a review of the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-22 and the First and Second London Conferences of 1930 and 1935. In September 1933, Japanese Naval Minister Ōsumi Mineo told journalists that the naval arms limitations were never meant to remain “in perpetuity” and that the Japanese were dissatisfied with the 5:5:3 U.S.-British and Japan ratios and demanded change to 5:5:5 at the Second London Naval Conference in 1935 but came away “empty handed.” France and Italy were at rations of 1.75 but the tonnage ratios for cruisers and submarines were diminished as well. The author continues with a detailed examination of the situation as detailed by Stephen Peltz in Race to Pearl Harbor (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974) and Sadao Asaso in From Mahan to Pearl Harbor (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2005), and notes that the Japanese had also translated Hector Bywater’s The Great Pacific War (London: Constable, 1926) into Japanese and that it was read widely by IJN officers. Both the right and left wings of Japanese political parties also expressed hostile views to the Western powers and a Japanese Army plot near Mukden, Manchuria sabotaged Japanese railroad track and blamed Chinese soldiers. Propaganda booklets blamed the United States for the deterioration of trans-Pacific affairs and there were major domestic and international public relations effort aimed at revising the current naval arms limitations and proposals that best road for peace was to have Japan lead in Asia, the United States in the Western Hemisphere, and Britain in Europe. An example of Japanese views was published in Foreign Affairs magazine in 1934 written by Admiral Nomura Kichisaburō. Mauch concludes that the public relations campaign waged from 1921 through 1933 rejecting the Washington system was highly successful. Chapter 3: “Tasting Gall: Chiang Kai-shek and China’s War with Japan” by Grant F. Rhode who is a Senior lecturer at Boston University, adjunct professor at the Naval War College and associate in research at the Fairbanks Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. The Three Powers leaders (Chiang, Roosevelt, and Churchill) at the Cairo Conference of November 1943 laid out a post-war settlement that would restore China to a position of wealth and power and was a highlight of the legacy of Chiang (b. 1887) who was to have great failure and great success. Rhode reviews the First Sino-Japanese War (1895) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), and Chiang’s military training in China and Japan and Chiang being influenced by Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Four chronological periods are detailed: 1) Versailles to Manchukuo 1919-31: Topics include the Locarno Pact of 1915, Washington Naval Conference 1921-22, Chinese Communist Party first meeting 1921, First Congress of the Nationalist Party 1924, the 1926 Northern Expedition, and Chiang’s early military career and his ability to unify major parts of China. 2) Manchukuo to Pearl Harbor 1931-41: The issue of the beginning of the Second Sino-Japan War starting in 1937 or in 1937 is covered, including the Japanese seizure of Manchuria in 1931, the creation of the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932, the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of 1937, and the Long March are detailed. The Battle of Shanghai from August to November 1937 displaced 30 million refugees, and the following Nanjing Campaign (or Rape of Nanking) displacing up to 300,000 persons. The Soviet Red Army defeated the Japanese at Nomonhon in 1939 and a Japan-Soviet non-aggression pact followed in April 1941 just after the Tripartite Pact was concluded between Japan, Germany, and Italy which meant that China now allies (the United States and Britain) against Japan for the first time. 3) Pearl Harbor to the Japanese Surrender 1941-45: This was an unparalleled opportunity for China and Chiang as the Pearl Harbor attack was followed by the Doolittle Raid on Japan in April 1941 and General Stillwell’s ability to increase military actions against the Japanese in Southeast Asia beyond the Flying Tigers’ air war in China under General Chenault, and Stillwell’s desire for a land war using Chinese troops and the building of the Ledo (Burma) Road beginning in 1943. Japan launched a major counteroffensive in China to disrupt the land road and destroy Allied air bases in eastern China. The Cairo Conference of 1943 may have been Chiang’s finest hour since the following Tehran Conference (Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin) diminished Chiang’s role in the war. Stillwell was promoted to full general by FDR over both American and Chinese troops (a blow to Chiang) while Japanese failed in their objectives as Nationalist Chinese troops bore the brunt of the action and while Stalinist Mao Zedong’s Communist troops gained strength from 40,000 to over one million troops and prepared for the Civil War of 1945-49. 4) Japanese Surrender to the Death of Chiang 1945-75: The Nationalist armies were depleted by the Japanese and were defeated by the Communists who would establish the Communist Peoples’ Republics of China in April 1949 while the Nationalist were driven to Taiwan. Chiang felt betrayed by FDR and declared martial law in Taiwan and prior to his death in 1975, transfer power to his son Ching-kuo. Mao would die in 1976 but the political die had been cast. In assessing Chiang Kai-shek versus Mao, Rhode believes that very little attention has been paid by Western historians to the backstory and notes the overlap of China’s war with Japan and the Nationalist versus Communist clash which continues in the post-World War II era, and Communist China’s current goals to surpass Japanese leadership in Asia and that China must remain a global power and eschew a second-tier position. Rhode makes a compelling argument and has assembled persuasive evidence. Chapter 4: “Winston Churchill and the Gathering Storm in Asia” by John H. Maurer. In 1939 the British Empire controlled a vast territory in Asia from New Zealand and Australia to Southeast and South Asia to India, and the Middle East with 25% of the world’s population and rich resources. Britain was a superpower in the 20th century in competition with German, Japanese, and United States industry and naval power. In 1941, British weaknesses in Asia were exposed as territories were seized or threatened, and Winston Churchill’s views on international strategy were evolving as Japan’s policies and strategic options changed with December 1941 and early 1942. Maurer provides background on Britain and the emerging threat citing the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-05) when most of Japan’s warships were British built in Britain. The alliance of Britain and Japan 1902-22 was a period of technology transfer and know-how from Britain to Japan of naval and aviation equipment. As a cruel twist of fate “the student surpassed the teacher.” In World War I and the beginning of II, Britain could concentrate on Germany since Japan was allied (Japanese warships escorted ANZAC troops to the Middle East and conducted operations in the Mediterranean against the Central Powers). In the 1930s, Japan’s military leadership and army and navy grew in strength while the British economy was sluggish during the interwar years and its military and naval budgets were diminished. Churchill downplayed the dangers posed by Japan, as did the isolationist United States, and began to arm “too little and too late.” Germany’s rearmament under Hitler, the Tripartite Pact, the defeat of France, and Lend Lease spurred the hawkish FDR and Churchill to issue the Atlantic Charter, while Germany turned its attention to the invasion of the Soviet Union, which had been successful in battles with the Japanese in 1938-39. Churchill had envisioned four possible scenarios in confronting the Japanese (p. 112-113) so that the attack on Pearl Harbor and Hitler’s declaration against the United States was a relief to Churchill. Maurer outlines Churchill’s four revised priorities for the war in Europe (p. 115) and comments on Churchill’s misjudgment of Japan regarding the unexpected attacks which destroyed four British ships in Southeast Asia: HMS Prince of Wales and cruiser Repulse near Singapore in 10 December 1941, and the cruisers HMS Cornwall and Dorsetshire four months later. Chapter 5: “FDR and America’s Road to War in the Pacific” by Walter A. McDougall. Professor of history, Alloy-Ansin Professor of International Relations, University of Pennsylvania. McDougall reminds readers of Hector Bywater’s 1921 and 1925 books which predicted events in the Pacific including the sneak attack: Sea-power in the Pacific: A Study of the American-Japanese Naval Problem (London: Constable, 1921) and The Great Pacific War: A History of the American-Japanese Campaign of 1931-33 (London: Constable, 1925). FDR dismissed these forecasts and initially contended that Japan should be trusted. The period between the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) through various meetings and the Washington Naval Conference are recounted, and America’s hypocrisy and the Japanese move to a defensive position are reported. FDR’s isolationist policies of the interwar period continued into the New Deal Congress of 1935-37 and passage of neutrality acts and the expansion of the U.S. fleet while Britain and France did nothing to hinder Hitler’s rise to power and rearmament. The Japanese joined Nazi Germany in the Anti-Cominturn Pact of 1936 and Marco Polo Bridge Incident in July 1937 were viewed as “undeclared war” as FDR shifted to a position of interventionalist because of the “new order” being established in Europe and Asia. Nazi expansion into Austria and Czechoslovakia followed by the Wehrmacht’s invasion into Poland and then the Soviet Union, plus the ability of the United States to read the Japanese diplomatic code (“Purple”) and FDR’s meeting with Churchill resulting in the Atlantic Charter, reshaped Roosevelt’s position from reserved to forceful by July 1941. These events led to Lend Lease and American troops sent to Greenland and Iceland, with other actions at the beginning of the Battle of the Atlantic, none of which provoked Hitler. General MacArthur was sent to the Philippines at the time that General Tojo became the Japanese Prime Minister in October and Admiral Yamamoto was ordered to assemble the Japanese combined fleet for military action that would be at Pearl Harbor. Eleventh hour negotiations were seen as a “waste of time” by both sides as the American Navy lost track of the Japanese carrier forces. Of interest was how a top-secret copy of Rainbow 5 (a 350-page plan detailing American’s strategy for World War II which assumed that the United States was allied with Britain and France and provided for offensive operations by American forces in Europe and Africa) became public. On December 4, 1941, the Chicago Tribune, with the headline “F.D.R.’s War Plans!”, along with The Times Herald of Washington, D.C., published the Rainbow 5 plan; the “leak” was never resolved. These events led to Pearl Harbor and America’s entry into a global war. Chapter 6: “Igniting the U.S.-Japan War, 1941” by Richard B. Frank. A recognized authority on the Asia-Pacific War, Frank discusses the “inexplicable disaster” at Pearl Harbor and the issue that FDR or Churchill, or both, knew in advance of the attack and reviews books published by Anthony Flynn (1945), Charles Beard (1948), Rear Admiral Robert Theobald (1954), and Robert Stennet (1999). This chapter focuses on material derived from Frank’s own Tower of Skulls: A History of the Asia Pacific War July 1937-May 1941 (New York: Norton, 2020) the first volume of a trilogy. He states that the Japanese victory at Pearl was not just an American defeat – both tactical and operational – but also a Japanese strategical defeat coupled with American misjudgment and failed communication. He initially sketches to state of the world in 1941 focusing on China and French Indochina with 40-80 million refugees and 7.5 million dead (80% non-combatants) which tied down massive numbers of Japanese troops: 22 divisions in China, 13 in Manchuria, and 2 in Korea. Overall, Japan had 51 divisions and ten were selected for “Southern Operations.” The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor grew from the need to keep the Soviet Union in the war against Hitler and necessitated that the United States not abandon China. He reviews the German deep penetrations into the Soviet Union and their logistical miscalculations and notes that that Stalin ordered Mao Zedong only to provide diversionary attacks against the Japanese to keep China in the war and build up the Communist Chinese Army. Meanwhile the Japanese advanced into Southern Indochina, seized Dutch East Indies petroleum sources and sought ways to extract themselves from the “Chinese quagmire” and determined that they would enter the war against the Soviets only if Germany was able to crush the Soviets on the western front. The American-Japanese negotiations in 1941 pivoted around the China question and that the Japanese desired that the Americans abandoned China and that Japan would withdraw from southern Indochina if the United States restored the flow of petroleum to Japan. Frank contends that historians neglect the link between Hitler and the Soviet’s war and the vital role of China preventing the Japanese from attacking the Soviet Union. Chapter 7: “Chinese Views of Future Warfare in the Indo-Pacific: First Strike and U.S. Forward Bases in Japan” by Toshi Yoshihara. A Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic Budgetary Assessments, Washington, DC., the author examines the prospects of war between United States and China from viewpoints of scale, underlying causes, and opening moves utilizing a variety of sources including published Chinese documents and books. The PLA (People’s Liberation Army) is predisposed to deliver the first blow: large-scale strategic raids and long-range strikes. The PLA’s views of U.S. forward bases in Asia (including naval) includes 80 bases in Japan, the Philippines, and Thailand. One key base is Yokosuka’s command and control and logistics centers, shipyards, and repair facilities for aircraft carriers, and fuel storage. The PLA’s view on logistics and modern warfare includes the vulnerability of logistic systems, supply concentrations, and lack of stockpiles. Yoshihara notes that China has a holistic view of modern warfare including systematic attacks on enemy systems and command hubs, logistical support systems, and information systems and joint firepower strikes vs. CAISR systems. Six types of surprise attacks include: rapid raids, ambush sneak attacks, long-range raids, sabotage raids, harassment attacks, combinations of “frontal assaults,” and decisive blows and/or multiplier effects. For offensive campaigns the PLA possesses three types of missiles: 1) Land attack medium-range (MRMB), 2) nuclear weapon land attacks and anti-shipping (DF-21C 1588 km range), and 3) land attack cruise missiles (CSS-5 Mod 4 and CH-55C-9 (CJ-10) LAGM l), and attack cruise missiles, CGLCM ground launched cruise missiles, and DF-26 IRBM intermediate missiles. Yoshihara provides a critical assessment of PLA’s threats to American naval bases in Japan, commenting this it is one element of a larger campaign and that retaliation against mainland China would draw in Japan, hence, China is weighing the risks and benefits of a first strike. New technologies and capabilities include hypersonic weapons and artificial intelligence. He observes that there is a shrinking battlefield in terms of time and precision. This diverse but cohesive group of papers provides a wider and more detailed context on Pacific and global backgrounds of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor which is often characterized as Japan’s motivation driven by its national self-interests, its scarcity of key economic resources, and America’s embargo policy. The authors clearly show that the political, military, and naval decisions made by the leaders of the great powers were often faulty and ill advised. They show that events other than the American perceptions other members of the Washington Naval Treaty, and of 1930s Japanese leaders, notably the Japanese invasion of China and the actions of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist versus Mao Zedong’s Communist armies during the Civil War, helps cause foreign policy dilemmas, and create fluctuating decisions made by Churchill and Roosevelt. The seven papers were not given at a conference or symposium, but it would have been interesting if there was a debate among the contributors. The volume is, indeed, a significant contribution to our understanding of the attack on Pearl Harbor illustrating interrelated issues and problems including Hitler’s attack of the Soviet Union and Chinese perspectives on this and other issues. Dr. Kolb is a United States Naval Institute Golden Life Member John H. Maurer, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, serves as the Alfred Thayer Mahan Distinguished Professor of Sea Power and Grand Strategy at the Naval War College.   Erik Goldstein is professor of International Relations and History, Boston University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. The Road to Pearl Harbor: Great Power War in Asia and the Pacific. By John H. Maurer and Erik Goldstein (editors) (Naval Institute Press: 2022) The post The Road to Pearl Harbor: Great Power War in Asia and the Pacific first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

We started doing the "Long Game" series about the rise of the People's Republic of China to challenge American's place in the world. At the end of that first post in the series in July of 2004, I wrote; Say what you want about the Chinese, they are very focused on their long term strategic needs. They will continue to study the way we do business at sea, and they will make sure they are ready when the call comes. Are we? A lot of folks hear rustling in the woods behind us. There were a lot of us, but few were listening. 18.4 years later, they are now. That is part of the reason it has been since May of this year since I did a Long Game post. I've written a fair bit about the PRC since then, but did not use the "Long Game" tag. Why? Simple, we are here. Over 18 years is a "long time." All but the most compromised see the threat from the PRC and the game is afoot. It is military, economic, and academic - and it is in our face. I still think the tag is helpful in that while the PRC is now ready to call our bluff west of Wake, they are the nation with thousands of years of history, and they have a plan ... we just need to keep an open eye and mind to see it. If you want to get the view from the official organs of the US government towards the PRC, a good place to look would be the recently published review of military and security development in the PRC by the USA's Department of Defense. There is one paragraph early on that I think is the most important; Sensitive, dual-use, or military-grade equipment that the PRC have attempted to acquire include radiation hardened integrated circuits, monolithic microwave integrated circuits, accelerometers, gyroscopes, naval and marine technologies, syntactic foam trade secrets, space communications, military communication jamming equipment, dynamic random access memory, aviation technologies, and antisubmarine warfare (ASW) capabilities. How will they acquire all this dual use technology? If you are thinking it is Spy-vs-Spy old school espionage, you are only looking at a very small portion of what is going on. You need to look at the very sober fact that they are getting that technology the most efficient way - they are convincing us to give it to them. It starts at our universities and pipelines right in to industry. First of all, let's look at some charts from Statista. Even with the COVID effect, the numbers are staggering. Here's the number of college and university students from China in the United States from academic year 2010/11 to 2020/21 : Note the decline to the USA is not the same as the decline globally. Here's the number of students from China going abroad for study from 2010 to 2020; The numbers here are hard to come by and I would consider the above to be on the high side. SCMP puts the number at 290,086. A 2020 study from Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service have about half those numbers, but the commentary to the study is sound; The results speak to ongoing policy conversations about the risks and benefits of Chinese students enrolled in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) programs at U.S. universities. These conversations have been hampered by a lack of granular data on the number of enrolled Chinese students by field and degree level. For example, it is currently impossible to calculate the financial impact of Chinese students on the U.S. university system because we do not know how many Chinese graduate students are in master’s programs (and thus likely to pay full tuition) versus Ph.D. programs (for which they often receive university or federal funding). This paper seeks to provide such data and to identify remaining data gaps that should be filled. Because there is no single database of domestic and international students in the United States that includes all the relevant information, analysts have had to produce estimates using several different data sources. These sources often count slightly different things over possibly different periods, complicating the analysis and increasing the risk of inadvertent errors. Our findings differ from widely-cited government estimates. Whereas those estimates suggested that 25 percent of U.S. STEM graduate students and 15 percent of STEM undergraduates are Chinese, we conclude with high confidence that the numbers are 16 percent and 2 percent, respectively. That's right kiddies; one of the nation's top universities that happens to be in our nation's capital with incredible connections to our federal government finds, "..no single database of ...international students in the United States..." In case you were wondering, the number of Americans studying in China in 2020 was 2,481. I can't find out how many are completing a full program of study or just doing a semester ... or what their majors are ... but just look at that delta. From that study, it is clear that they are not in the USA to get Gender Studies degrees. Look at how close the numbers of undergrads and graduate students are. Note that they're all STEM. You cannot classify math. You cannot classify dual-use research. You cannot remove knowledge gained. Just look at those numbers. Look at those fields. Look up-post what areas the PRC wants to advance in. We are making our #1 competitor better, and taking away opportunities for the children of American taxpayers who especially with land grant universities, paid for these universities to exist to serve them. I don't blame the PRC's citizens for wanting to come here to study, for both personal and professional reasons. However, they never really leave their dystopian nation behind; On the bucolic campus of Purdue University in Indiana, deep in America’s heartland and 7,000 miles from his home in China, Zhihao Kong thought he could finally express himself. In a rush of adrenaline last year, the graduate student posted an open letter on a dissident website praising the heroism of the students killed in the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989. The blowback, he said, was fast and frightening. His parents called from China, crying. Officers of the Ministry of State Security, the feared civilian spy agency, had warned them about his activism in the United States. “They told us to make you stop or we are all in trouble,” his parents said. Then other Chinese students at Purdue began hounding him, calling him a CIA agent and threatening to report him to the embassy and the MSS. Kong, who goes by the nickname Moody, had already accepted an invitation from an international group of dissidents to speak at a coming online commemoration of the Tiananmen massacre anniversary. Uncertain if he should go through with it, he joined in rehearsals for the event on Zoom. Within days, MSS officers were at his family’s door again. His parents implored him: No public speaking. No rallies. That powerful hook back home isn't just used to keep people under control - but to get them to do further things for the PRC. In August 2015, an electrical engineering student in Chicago sent an email to a Chinese national titled “Midterm test questions.” More than two years later, the email would turn up in an FBI probe in the Southern District of Ohio involving a suspected Chinese intelligence officer who authorities believed was trying to acquire technical information from a defense contractor. Investigators took note. They identified the email’s writer as Ji Chaoqun, a Chinese student who would go on to enlist in the US Army Reserve. His email, they say, had nothing to do with exams. Instead, at the direction of a high-level Chinese intelligence official, Ji allegedly attached background reports on eight US-based individuals who Beijing could target for potential recruitment as spies, according to a federal criminal complaint. The eight – naturalized US citizens originally from Taiwan or China – had worked in science and technology. Seven had worked for or recently retired from US defense contractors. The complaint says all of them were perceived as rich targets for a new form of espionage that China has been aggressively pursuing to win a silent war against the US for information and global influence. It would be one thing if we took an active roll here in the US and other Western nations (like The Netherlands in the link below), but we allow not just PRC police and intelligence services to run free, we allow other students (many the same people) to act as enforcers. 26-year old UG student Meng avoids interacting with Chinese government supporters altogether, if she can. ‘These Pinkies are way too sensitive’, she says, using the nickname for young Chinese Communist Party supporters. ‘They are always very aggressive and feel they represent the side of justice.’ I’m always careful about choosing people to talk to She is also careful when talking to people she doesn’t know well. And when she participated in a protest in Amsterdam this summer, remembering the 1989 massacre at Tiananmen Square that cost hundreds of lives and left thousands wounded when the Chinese government opened fire on protesters, she wore a mask and disguised herself in cheap clothes. ‘There were Chinese people there who kept taking pictures of us with their mobile phones’, she remembers. ‘When the protest was over, my companion and I walked to a place where no one was around. We changed our clothes and threw the outfit we had on in a trash bin.’ The FBI is, in theory, on the hunt - but read this from NPR and tell me if you think they are getting all the help they need from universities. "The Chinese intelligence services strategically use every tool at their disposal — including state-owned businesses, students, researchers and ostensibly private companies — to systematically steal information and intellectual property," FBI Director Christopher Wray said at the Council on Foreign Relations in April. Former FBI agents say the bureau's recent visits to universities are merely an extension of long-running efforts to collaborate with the private sector and academia on national security issues. Speaking of dual use, not only are many of the finite number of PhD programs going to foreign nationals - and as this is a zero sum game - and not US citizens; so are the jobs. Chinese and Indian students make up nearly half, and “most stay long after graduation”. “In February 2017, approximately 90% of Chinese nationals and 87% of Indian nationals who completed STEM PhD programmes in the US between 2000 and 2015 were still living in the country, compared to 66% of graduates from other countries,” the report states. "Wait..." you say, "How can they help the PRC's military if they are working for American companies and universities?" Well, its complicated - and made more so by the numbers being so large. It is hard for the FBI to keep track of what the threats are when the pool of candidates are so large and the connections so varied. Heck, the problem people don't even have to be from China; The China Initiative’s most high-profile case has been that of Charles Lieber, the chair of the chemistry department at Harvard and a perennial Nobel Prize candidate, as well as the recipient of more than fifteen million dollars of federal funding, including from the Department of Defense. From 2012 to 2017, Lieber participated in China’s Thousand Talents, the most vaunted talent program; his contract paid him fifty thousand dollars per month, along with generous startup fees to establish a lab in Wuhan. He had, however, neglected to inform Harvard of his double-timing in China, and, when approached by federal investigators, he continued to conceal the arrangement—and the sacks of cash he had smuggled through customs. In December, he was convicted of lying to federal authorities, falsifying tax returns, and failing to report foreign earnings. Some felt that this was just another anti-Chinese expedition; a D.O.D. official testified that the investigation was prompted by the sheer number of Chinese students working in Lieber’s lab. But John Krige, the historian, has noted that Lieber’s contract stipulated that he work on the development of batteries for high-performance electric vehicles, an area of industrial competition. “The academic research community must ask itself if it is morally or politically acceptable to engage in international scientific collaboration with China in fields that can seriously harm the domestic economy,” he wrote. This problem of our own creation is worthy of a few books and won't be solved here - but policy makers have to address: - Too many of the finite numbers of US STEM graduate program seats are being taken up by citizens of the PRC. - These STEM degrees feed the knowledge base for dual-use technology. - PRC nationals working in cutting edge technology jobs received by having been given one of those limited positions make them the target for PRC exploitation. - Even if PRC nationals take nothing material when they go home, they take their education and exposure with them. - For a quarter century, us government and educational institutions have developed close and unequal relationships from entities controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. This should be a non-partisan issue - but an American issue. View the full article

Peace is the ultimate goal and is a wonderful thing – but what makes it so special is that peace is not the natural state of things for our species. If you are lucky, you might get a couple of decades of peace before the next conflict of significance. More than that is a blessing few get to enjoy. That is the human benefit of peace, but peace also has a heavy price. As eventually wars come, nations have to be ready for them. From the time the first band of men walked in to your valley, you heard the horses of the steppe archers in the distance, or the tank rumbled through your local gas station – war comes and demands you join it immediately. You go to war with the people, equipment, and concepts built when you were at peace. Good, smart nations make sure that their militaries do their best to ensure they know how the tools of war have advanced since the hard lessons of the last war, and the ideas and techniques that take advantage of those changes adjust with them. You hope smart people with the ability to effect change have a good, if not imperfect, understanding of what the next war will require. The longer the time of peace, the greater the error will be between what you have/think and what you will need/demand. The wisest thing to do is to step away from anyone in the natsec arena who – like some late-night televangelist – tells you they have THE vision of the future or has the ONE thing that you will need to succeed. No, the wise planner and strategist is one who is first humble and has that humility grounded in history. Why humility? Simple. The humble mind is a flexible mind, a mind that can change when facts present themselves. The humble mind is a harder working mind as well. Knowing it might be wrong, it will try harder to get it right and will continually look for indications that it was wrong and will correct accordingly. These are some of the threads that tied together to construct the great fear I have for our Navy: we have been a peace for too long. The ground and to a lesser extent the air component have been tested firsthand in the last couple of decades, though at the low end of the conflict spectrum. Our naval forces at sea simply have not. We have placed large bets on theory and hope. From our airwing to our VLS cells, we have limited our flexibility to change simply by limiting our number of systems/platforms. I think we have been getting better since the Age of Transformationalism at the turn of the century, but we still lack enough humility. That is clearly demonstrated in the haughty attitude of many towards the quality of the People’s Republic of China’s naval growth and the turning of a blind eye to the scale of their growth in units and industrial capacity. Recall earlier that I mentioned that humility is grounded in an understanding of history? History is just a written record of experience. Mistakes should be expected, and in efforts to constantly modernize, new structures can come up that on paper and at peace – or in the face of a different level of war – looked right, but in the practice of war their shortcomings become manifest. Can your military adjust? Can it do so in a timely manner? This whole thread came top of mind today in this brief graph from the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence. This is firmly in the Rumsfeldian “Known-Unknown” realm in that we really don’t know what we have wrong, or slightly wrong. Just one datapoint of many coming out of the Russo-Ukrainian War. The future-perfect turned out not to be, and the neglected “old-think” of artillery, air-defense, logistics, shore-based anti-ship missiles, and armor were, in hindsight, unfairly shunted to the side for not being sexy enough. As we try to get our Navy ready for the next war, what is important is that we don’t convince ourselves that we fully understand what future war will be. That uncertainty should shape our force such that it distributes future-risk such that we have a variety of flexible tools out there, not single points of failure. Single points of failure are a secondary indication of hubris, as we all know what the gods like to do with that. View the full article

Americas Lockheed Martin Space won a $49.9 million modification for Trident II (D5) missile production and deployed systems support. The contract award also benefits a foreign military sale to the United Kingdom. Work will take place in Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Maryland and various other locations. Work is expected to be completed on September 30, 2027. Fiscal 2023 weapons procurement (Navy) funds in the amount of $49,942,303 will be obligated. No funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Raytheon won a $397.7 million modification from the US Navy to exercise options for fiscal 2023 guided missile assemblies, shipping containers, and spare parts in support of the fiscal 2021-2023 Evolved Seasparrow Missile Block 2 full-rate production requirements. Work will take place in Arizona, Australia, California, Norway, Netherlands, Greece, New York, Turkey, Denmark and other locations. Expected completion will be by March 2027. Middle East & Africa Israel’s Elbit Systems transformed its OneSim simulation software infrastructure to be cloud native, and its services can now be delivered to authorized users from a Microsoft Azure cloud. Working closely with Microsoft engineers, Elbit Systems redesigned the architecture of the OneSim infrastructure to meet the requirements of cloud solutions and upload the OneSim to the Microsoft Azure cloud. OneSim is Elbit Systems’ platform-agnostic simulation software infrastructure that provides land, air and marine users a complete solution for training systems, from a stand-alone simulator and up to multi-platform Mission Training Centers. Europe The US Defense Department on Monday announced the approval of a $323 million sale of AIM 9X Block II tactical missiles and AGM-154 Joint Stand Off Weapons to Finland. “The proposed sale will improve Finland’s air-to-air and air-to-surface weapons capabilities and will positively impact US relations with countries in the Nordic region,” the Pentagon said in a statement. The announcement on the sale of 40 AIM 9Xs and 48 AGM-154s comes more than nine months into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which pushed both Finland and Sweden to seek NATO membership. Finland’s Ministry of Defense plans to sign a $13.1 million contract with BAE Systems Bofors to procure 57-millimeter naval guns for the Finnish Navy’s future Pohjanmaa-class multirole corvettes. According to the ministry, the agreement was coordinated with the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration to cut costs, enabling the Finnish and Swedish navies to simultaneously acquire the same 57-millimeter variants at a lower price. The latest contract follows Finland and BAE Systems’ previous partnership that delivered 57-millimeter artillery systems such as 57Mk3 and 57A to the Finnish Navy. Asia-Pacific According to the Nikkei, the Japanese Ministry of Defense is giving consideration to a submarine-launch variant of the new long-range stand-off missile being developed. Japan’s submarines are difficult to detect and this will be a deterrent factor. Today’s Video WATCH: Hamina-class missile boat | The protector of the Finnish coasts View the full article

If you are an American who lived on the European Continent, specifically Western Europe, you’re very familiar with an exceptionally sharp strain of anti-Americanism that resides in a significant percentage of their ruling elite – and adult version of the middle school mean girls. Though present in all nations to one degree to another, it is especially acute in Germany and France for slightly different reasons but are all working towards the same goal; degrade American influence in Europe. The best way for this political and corporate anti-Americanism to find a lever of power is through the the trans-national and anti-democratic modern iteration of the European Union – made even more problematic with the departure of Great Britain who once played a balancing role between the Continental powers as she has for centuries. Why primarily France and Germany? To start with, this is part of the sibling rivalry between the children of Charlemagne for primacy in Europe that has churned Europe over the last thousand years. The Anglo-Saxons on both sides of the Atlantic kept getting in the way of their return to the struggle. Their armies under various blood-soaked leaders moved across Iberia to Moscow and back for centuries in order to be THE driver of power in influence on the continent. The European Union, once the “trade association” nose was in the tent, is now seen – fairly – as a mechanismto centralize power so The Smartest People in the Room™ no longer have pesky minor powers and – Buddha forgive – voters getting in their way. Without checks, power only seeks more power for itself. The morphing of the EU is just the latest example. Not unlike their American counterparts who would like the USA to extract itself from foreign entanglements (NB: as I have written through the years, I am sympathetic/supportive of these efforts), many of the strongest proponents of the EU just want the USA to go home. The Europeans, while benefiting from the WWII/Cold War leftover presence of the USA, want it to end and the influence that comes with it. If any opportunity to push back against the USA appears, they have their talking points ready to dirty up the reputation and standing of the USA. If that can be done while blaming Eurocrat failures on the USA as well, even better. You know the Americans, citizens of that mongrel nation whose gene pool is full of religious zealots, failed revolutionaries, slaves, economic refugees, grasping second sons, criminals, and their descendants – spoiled with a continent overflowing with food, water, minerals, forests and open land they don’t even appreciate. Loud. Fat. Pushy. Americans. The usual snarled insults cobbled together by smug people who get much of their opinions of the USA by reading The Washington Post or The New York Times. “I know America, I read your newspapers.” That is right after, “I’ve been to America. I spent a week in DC/NYC/Boston/Chicago. I studied a semester at Brown.” If you are used to countering America’s resident self-loathing Left, these are easy to deal with, and even entertaining. Don’t laugh too much though. Their externalized insecurity is a mortal danger to Western unity by constantly working to divide the West and undermine its cultural, economic, and military strength. When those snotty 20/30-somethings get in their 40s, 50s, and 60s in the Eurocracy, they start to get access to the levers of power and influence. That is when they can make trouble. For my generation, we used to sneer and poke fun at the useful idiots of the 1980s anti-nuke/anti-war protest movements in Europe – clearly useful idiots for the Soviet Union – but we’re not laughing too much now, one of those fools is the Chancellor of Germany. Knowing these people is as important as tracking what they say and do. With the East ablaze or rising to challenge the West, this is what the Eurocrats want to train their ire at – to the west. There is a lot to unpack in this ... whatever you would call it in Politico - but let's dive in; Nine months after invading Ukraine, Vladimir Putin is beginning to fracture the West. Top European officials are furious with Joe Biden’s administration and now accuse the Americans of making a fortune from the war, while EU countries suffer. Funny opening, and telling. No, Putin is encouraging useful idiots in the West to do the fracturing for him. As for the second part of the pull quote...just let that soak in. As if EU nations have nothing to benefit from keeping the Russians east of the Dnepr, and not threatening the Vistula. “We are really at a historic juncture,” the senior EU official said, arguing that the double hit of trade disruption from U.S. subsidies and high energy prices risks turning public opinion against both the war effort and the transatlantic alliance. “America needs to realize that public opinion is shifting in many EU countries.” Almost comically lacking in self-awareness. Which nation tried to warn, pre-war, against reliance on Russian energy? What was the European reaction? Another top official, the EU’s chief diplomat Josep Borrell, called on Washington to respond to European concerns. “Americans — our friends — take decisions which have an economic impact on us,” he said in an interview with POLITICO. Why yes; the decision by the USA for over half a century to subsidize European defense with American taxpayer largess sure did have an impact on Europeans. It gave them the opportunity to spend not just on unsustainable welfare states, but in virtue signaling and corrupt green energy policies built on Russian gas, Chinese solar panels, and clear cut American forests. The U.S. rejected Europe's complaints. “The rise in gas prices in Europe is caused by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Putin's energy war against Europe, period," a spokesperson for Biden's National Security Council said. Exports of liquefied natural gas from the U.S. to Europe "increased dramatically and enabled Europe to diversify away from Russia," the NSC spokesperson said. This is, of course, correct. An American official stressed the price setting for European buyers of gas reflects private market decisions and is not the result of any U.S. government policy or action. "U.S. companies have been transparent and reliable suppliers of natural gas to Europe," the official said. Exporting capacity has also been limited by an accident in June that forced a key facility to shut down. In most cases, the official added, the difference between the export and import prices doesn't go to U.S. LNG exporters, but to companies reselling the gas within the EU. The largest European holder of long-term U.S. gas contracts is France's TotalEnergies for example. I am shocked ... SHOCKED ... that the French would try to profit while shifting blame to the Anglo-Saxons. Next thing you know, the French might actually facilitate the migration of uninvited military aged males by the hundreds of thousands across the English channel to the Anglo-Saxon homeland. You never know ... It’s not a new argument from the American side but it doesn’t seem to be convincing the Europeans. "The United States sells us its gas with a multiplier effect of four when it crosses the Atlantic," European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton said on French TV on Wednesday. "Of course the Americans are our allies ... but when something goes wrong it is necessary also between allies to say it." Amazing. Just read it again. It is almost high art. Despite the energy disagreements, it wasn't until Washington announced a $369 billion industrial subsidy scheme to support green industries under the Inflation Reduction Act that Brussels went into full-blown panic mode. “The Inflation Reduction Act has changed everything," one EU diplomat said. "Is Washington still our ally or not?” Not content with meddling in the laws of their member states, the EU now wants to control the American legislative process? Hey, I didn't like the stupidly named Inflation Reduction Act either, but these are the people the Europeans like running America, so take is up at the next World Economic Forum discussion roundtable on ESG. ...the EU sees that differently. An official from France’s foreign affairs ministry said the diagnosis is clear: These are "discriminatory subsidies that will distort competition.” French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire this week even accused the U.S. of going down China's path of economic isolationism, urging Brussels to replicate such an approach. “Europe must not be the last of the Mohicans,” he said. I'm not even sure what they means. The EU is preparing its responses, such as a big subsidy push to prevent European industry from being wiped out by American rivals. "We are experiencing a creeping crisis of trust on trade issues in this relationship," said German MEP Reinhard Bütikofer. "At some point, you have to assert yourself," said French MEP Marie-Pierre Vedrenne. "We are in a world of power struggles. When you arm-wrestle, if you are not muscular, if you are not prepared both physically and mentally, you lose.” If the Europeans had that much of an attitude towards Russia, there probably wouldn't be a war in Ukraine right now. Behind the scenes, there is also growing irritation about the money flowing into the American defense sector. Well, this is were I stop laughing and my blood goes cold. The U.S. has by far been the largest provider of military aid to Ukraine, supplying more than $15.2 billion in weapons and equipment since the start of the war. The EU has so far provided about €8 billion of military equipment to Ukraine, according to Borrell. According to one senior official from a European capital, restocking of some sophisticated weapons may take “years” because of problems in the supply chain and the production of chips. This has fueled fears that the U.S. defense industry can profit even more from the war. For decades, USA based voices have pleaded with Europe to spend more on defense, to take the threats to our collective civilizations seriously, to maintain their sovereign defense industries, but from the loss of Dutch submarine building capability to the disappearance of the once spunky Belgian military - here we are in 2022. The diplomat argued that a discount on gas prices could help us to "keep united our public opinions” and to negotiate with third countries on gas supplies. “It’s not good, in terms of optics, to give the impression that your best ally is actually making huge profits out of your troubles,” the diplomat said. No one benefits from this except for the enemies of the West from Russia to China. These are the same useful idiots from the 1980s are with us today ... just with more power. Perhaps we expect too much from France, Germany, and their auxiliaries. There are equally strong friends of the USA in these countries that we should do more to encourage and raise their profile. While doing that, there are other emerging power centers in Europe who could use more support from the USA and may actually appreciate it. The smaller European nations don’t trust France and Germany all that much, for good historical reasons. Most of the Europeans in the “new territories” in the east who like the USA. They see the Americans as a more reliable guarantee of safety from hostile powers in the East, having a few centuries of experience of the Western European Frankish tribes carving them up for fun and profit – irrespective of local desires. Collectively these nations are not that large in GDP or population - not much more than Italy (for now), but that’s OK. They have the correct geography. If we shape this relationship correctly, we don’t have to permanently garrison this part of Europe. Poland is already establishing a new paradigm of proper levels of security investment. Once NATO’s eastern front calms down a bit, we can rotate through forces for exercises and training. Perhaps even create some combined training and logistics bases ready to scale up in case of trouble in Mordor. A template we should have put in place in Western Europe decades ago. Reward positive behavior and let the French and Germans continue their millennium-length struggle – peaceful this time – in the west; keep them frothing in Brussels and Strasbourg while the forward-looking nations try to set up the next thousand years of Western progress in a positive direction. Perhaps. View the full article

Americas Lockheed Martin has awarded Magellan Aerospace a contract to provide machine titanium components for its F-35 Lightning II Fighter Aircraft. The agreement covers the development of machined wing tie bars for the plane’s flap. Tie bars are placed on an aircraft’s joints, curb, or shoulder parts, connecting bordering or adjoining portions to prevent separation and damage in flight. A bipartisan group of US senators has asked Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to explain the reasons behind not sending the MQ-1C Gray Eagle drones to Ukraine. The 16 lawmakers demanded the explanation in a letter following the Pentagon’s reported refusal to send the General Atomics platform for fear of technology theft. Middle East & Africa Rheinmetall has delivered the first tranche of Marder 1A3 infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) to the Hellenic Armed Forces as part of a military “backfill” initiated by the German government. Following the delivery, the Hellenic Armed Forces featured the IFVs on parade in Thessaloniki. In exchange for the Marders, Greece will provide Ukrainian forces with Soviet-made IFVs and other military equipment to support the country in its ongoing struggle to repel the Russian invasion. Europe Rheinmetall has delivered the first tranche of Marder 1A3 infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) to the Hellenic Armed Forces as part of a military “backfill” initiated by the German government. Following the delivery, the Hellenic Armed Forces featured the IFVs on parade in Thessaloniki. In exchange for the Marders, Greece will provide Ukrainian forces with Soviet-made IFVs and other military equipment to support the country in its ongoing struggle to repel the Russian invasion. NATO allied and partner forces have trialed the French Air Force’s Mamba surface-to-air missile defense system in a live-fire exercise in Romania. The activity was conducted to prove NATO’s Integrated Air and Missile Defence (IAMD) System capabilities in guarding and protecting allied airspace. Multinational aircraft tested the missile system, including Turkish F-16 Fighting Falcons and Spanish Eurofighters currently deployed on a separate NATO mission in Bulgaria. Asia-Pacific The Indian Navy has received its second P15B stealth guided-missile destroyer from local firm Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited. The delivery, which took place on Thursday, was part of a 2011 agreement to develop four ships under the navy’s Project 15B. The first ship in the project, INS Visakhapatnam, has been in service with the Indian Navy since last year. Today’s Video WATCH: Marder 1A3: Discover Germany’s IFV Sent to Greece View the full article

Americas Northrop Grumman won an $99.4 million modification from the US Air Force for Active Electronically Scanned Array radars of Air Force F-16 aircraft. This modification is for the exercise of options to include 42 production radars, one initial spare kit, and two readiness spare kits. This modification does not involve Foreign Military Sales. Work will take place in Maryland. Expected completion will be on July 31, 2025. The US Army has completed a test run of the newly-developed missile communication technology, remote interceptor guidance (RIG)-360, from aerospace firm Lockheed Martin. The integrated flight test assessed the data link capabilities of Lockheed’s prototype missile communication device to enhance the accuracy and efficiency of Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC)-3 missiles. The RIG-360, designed to leverage target data from different sensors, offers a 360-degree engagement capability for a missile interceptor. Middle East & Africa Kellogg Brown and Root Services won a $24.8 million deal from the Navy to exercise the fifth option period for base operations support services at Naval Support Activity (NSA), Kingdom of Bahrain. This award brings the total cumulative value of the contract to $139,198,905. Work will be performed at NSA, Kingdom of Bahrain, and completed by November 2023. Work will take place in Bahrain. Estimated completion date is in November 2023. An attack helicopter from Pakistan will be attached to the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali. The helicopter will join the MINUSMA mission in March next year. India will contribute one utility helicopter for MINUSMA as well. MINUSMA was established in 2013 to support foreign and local troops battling militants, but in recent months there have been repeated instances of tensions between the Malian authorities and the mission. Europe Media reports from Greece say Athens will hold crucial talks with Israel over the supply of Spike NLOS anti-tank missiles. Greece wants to equip its AH-64D attack helicopter, Machitis-class gunboat and Mark V Special Operations Craft with the missile. It is said that Greece’s General Directorate For Defense Investments And Armaments is against buying the NLOS. The talks, lead by a permanent director general of the Israeli Ministry of Defense, ll decide whether the project will proceed or delayed indefinitely. Asia-Pacific The Indian Air Force is seeking $171 million to buy the indigenous Rudram-1 new generation anti-radiation missile (NGARM). Cleared to be fired from the Su-30MKI or Mirage 2000, the proposal to buy the weapon will soon be discussed within the Ministry of Defense. Today’s Video WATCH: See it in action: SPIKE NLOS exceptional performance Live View the full article

Americas Raytheon Intelligence and Space won a $34.2 million order by the US Navy, which of the ethernet expansion devices and the platform data server in support of integration of the MV-22 Helmet Mounted Display/Degraded Visual Environment program aboard V-22, and establish a baseline for a common software interface for integration of future capabilities on all V-22 platforms. Work will take place in Indiana and California. Estimated completion will be in July 2027. Lockheed Martin rolled out the first F-16 Block 70/72 aircraft this week from its Greenville, South Carolina, production line. The fighter completed final assembly, checkout, and painting at Greenville on November 21 and is expected to undergo flight trials at Edwards Air Force Base, California, early next year. The F-16 Viper is one of 16 the company is building for Bahrain as part of a $1.1 billion deal inked in 2018. Middle East & Africa The Emirati Air Force led its biannual training exercise advanced tactical leadership course (ATLC) attended by the air forces of seven other nations at Al Dhafra Air Base in the United Arab Emirates. The multinational air warfare training was held to increase the collective proficiency of participating countries in joint mission planning and tactical leadership. Europe The Royal Navy has chosen the Naval Strike Missile (NSM) to replace the Harpoon anti-ship missile for its warships. To be operational in less than 13 months, the missile from Norway will be fitted eleven Type 23 frigates and Type 45 destroyers. Babcock and BAE will be integrating the missile with support from Norway. The Bulgarian government is poised to sign an agreement with Sweden and France to lease their second-hand fighter aircraft amid delays in the delivery of American F-16s. Sofia needs an immediate replacement for its aging fleet of MiG-29s, which are expected to be unserviceable by late 2023 due to maintenance issues. Talks about leasing French and Swedish jets started when Bulgaria sent a letter of request to seven countries (including the US) to temporarily lease their used fighter jets. Asia-Pacific The Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) will dispatch two F-15J fighters to Clark Air Base, Philippines on November 27. Along with 60 personnel, the jets will be there till Dec. 11 for join training with the Philippine Air Force (PAF). Today’s Video WATCH: V-22 Osprey: More than Meets the Eye View the full article

...and a special thanks to everyone at sea who puts in that extra effort to bring a proper Thanksgiving meal to their Shipmates. View the full article

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $47.3 million contract modification, which exercises an option to procure Ancillary Mission Equipment in support of F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Lot 17 production aircraft for the Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy, Foreign Military Sales customers, and non-US Department of Defense participants. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, and is expected to be completed in December 2025. F-35 Lightning II joint strike fighter (JSF) is a stealthy, supersonic multirole fighter developed by Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company for the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and programme partners from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) and US allies. Work will take place in Texas. Estimated completion will be in December 2025. The US Navy’s air-launched torpedo has achieved initial operational capability (IOC) after completing rigorous trials. The development was announced by American defense firm Boeing, which manufactures the anti-submarine weapon. Middle East & Africa Israel Aerospace Industries Ltd., a leader in the Israeli military and commercial homeland defense and aerospace markets, issues its consolidated financial statements for the nine and three months ended September 30, 2022. This period has turned out to be the most profitable one in the company’s history. Europe NATO’s Multinational MRTT Fleet (MMF) and the E-3A fleet have completed the first phase of their air-to-air refueling certification process. The campaign is led by the Royal Netherlands Air Force Test Organisation. Test pilots from the US Air Force is supporting the E-3A fleet for the testing portion. The UK recently delivered Brimstone-2 missiles to Ukraine, The Telegraph reported, citing RAF delivery footage. The missile is an upgrade on the Brimstone-1 — supplied to the country in April/May — with more than twice the range. The laser-guided missile can be fired from land vehicles, helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, and unmanned aerial vehicles. Asia-Pacific The US Air Force’s 319th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron has commenced MQ-9 operations from Kanoya Air Base, Japan on November 21. The unmanned aircraft will be used for surveillance and reconnaissance duties in the East China Sea and other surrounding waters until November next year. An estimated 150 to 200 US military personnel will be stationed in Kanoya to provide operational support. Today’s Video WATCH: Inside the $270 Million Nato’s Flying Control Tower | E-3A AWACS View the full article

By Capt. P.T. Deutermann USN (Ret.) St. Martins Press (2022) Reviewed by Capt. C. Herbert Gilliland, USN (Ret.) In his latest novel, P. T. Deutermann continues his successful mining of World War II themes. This time we follow the spectacular fortunes of USS Holland, a destroyer escort sent from convoy duty in the North Atlantic to an uncertain assignment in the western Pacific. In Deutermann’s braided narrative, alternate chapters are told by ship’s CO, Mariano deTomasi, and his XO, Ephraim Edmond “Eeep” Enright. This structure allows each to observe and comment on the other while working well as a team despite great differences in background and makeup. Lieutenant Commander deTomasi, though born in the US and a Naval Academy product, is by heritage and temperament pure Sicilian. Perceived disrespect by a senior officer will make him boil, and memories of seeing the crew of his first ship butchered at Pearl Harbor gives him a very personal passion for vengeance. He controls it, but “I want [the Japanese] all dead.” Enright’s PhD and brilliance in electrical engineering kept him a valuable civilian until, urged by his father’s grief at the loss of Enright’s older brother in combat in the Pacific, he insists upon active service. With his calmer logic, Eeep plays a Starbuck to his captain’s Ahab. His technical inventiveness is also important to the ship’s success. They confront differences between the Pacific and the Atlantic theatres of war. The icy North Atlantic contrasts with the sweaty southern Pacific. But in terms of naval operations and combat, the major difference is in sheer size: the Pacific is thousands of square miles bigger, and the fleets involve hundreds or even thousands of ships sweeping across that area. When deTomasi indicates he feels neglected, the briefing officer tells him the upcoming operation will involve “eight hundred ships. …Don’t feel picked on, Captain, you’re just going to have to get used to the scale of what’s happening here in the Pacific.” Half the size of a full destroyer, arriving months late and with no convoy to protect, Holland is initially greeted more as a nuisance than anything else. In the context of the huge fleet actions sweeping the Pacific, a lone DE can be easily overlooked. Still, Holland’s designation includes the word destroyer. Learning the Japanese are thought to have set up a picket line of submarines to give warning of the direction of an American task force. deTomasi gets Holland placed where he and his ship may be able to do what they do best—hunt submarines. One of the Deutermann’s strengths here is how smoothly he incorporates essential details of anti-submarine warfare, as practiced at the time, into the action narrative. In the process of following Holland’s mission, the reader absorbs in passing such elements as the difference between depth charges and hedgehogs, the need to measure water temperature, and the tactical values of active versus passive sonar. Any reader with only a little prior knowledge will feel comfortably expert as he turns the pages. Having practiced multi-ship ASW with the British in the Atlantic, deTomasi brings that innovation to the Pacific as well. Another important U.S. Navy development at that time was the Combat Information Center (CIC), and Deutermann shows its importance throughout the novel, for ASW as well as other applications. As in earlier work, Deutermann reminds readers that war is brutal and messy. A discussion of what happens inside when a submarine is destroyed reminds us that those are human beings inside, but Holland’s photographer gags while recording the “evidence”—distorted human remains– of a successful sinking. Simply being at sea has dangers of its own, and after all, what is a good sea story without some rough weather? Between confrontations with Japanese submarines, Holland has to survive a typhoon with sixty-foot waves and winds that rip the anemometer right off its mount. Readers are treated to the full spectacle and fear that such a storm can provide, including coming into the “surreal seascape of the eye itself,” with the “boiling black clouds” of the opposite wall ahead. The rough sublimity of the storm has a counterpart or balancing moment of positive awe later, when Holland encounters Task Force 58. In Deutermann’s beautifully crafted passage, the formation of carriers, battleships, cruisers heavy and light, and lesser ships sweeps past the little DE at twenty-five knots. If some readers might find Holland too successful against Japanese submarines to permit that willing suspension of disbelief upon which fiction depends, an author’s note at the end explains that The Last Paladin is inspired by the true story of USS England (DE-635). What he has produced is not a fictionalization of that story, but rather a different story whose plausibility relies upon the historical reality. If deTomasi and Enright had been real, is the implicit claim, their story might have been as well. Once Holland has resolved deTomasi’s vendetta against Japan as embodied in its submarines, Deutermann makes it the target of a vengeful Japanese command. The result is a spectacular final shootout wrapped in a global framework. By the time we close the book, we have been treated not only to a violent short course in ASW, but also a good deal of surface and air action as well. Faithful Deutermann readers will not be disappointed; nor, I think will new ones. Captain Gilliland is a professor emeritus form the U.S. Naval Academy. P. T. DEUTERMANN is the author of many previous novels including Pacific Glory, which won the W. Y. Boyd Literary Award for Excellence in Military Fiction. Deutermann spent twenty-six years in military and government service, as a captain in the Navy and in the Joint Chiefs of Staff as an arms-control specialist. He lives with his wife in North Carolina. The Last Paladin. By P.T. Deutermann (Manhattan, New York: 2022) The post The Last Paladin first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

By Capt. P.T. Deutermann USN (Ret.) St. Martins Press (2022) Reviewed by Capt. C. Herbert Gilliland, USN (Ret.) In his latest novel, P. T. Deutermann continues his successful mining of World War II themes. This time we follow the spectacular fortunes of USS Holland, a destroyer escort sent from convoy duty in the North Atlantic to an uncertain assignment in the western Pacific. In Deutermann’s braided narrative, alternate chapters are told by ship’s CO, Mariano deTomasi, and his XO, Ephraim Edmond “Eeep” Enright. This structure allows each to observe and comment on the other while working well as a team despite great differences in background and makeup. Lieutenant Commander deTomasi, though born in the US and a Naval Academy product, is by heritage and temperament pure Sicilian. Perceived disrespect by a senior officer will make him boil, and memories of seeing the crew of his first ship butchered at Pearl Harbor gives him a very personal passion for vengeance. He controls it, but “I want [the Japanese] all dead.” Enright’s PhD and brilliance in electrical engineering kept him a valuable civilian until, urged by his father’s grief at the loss of Enright’s older brother in combat in the Pacific, he insists upon active service. With his calmer logic, Eeep plays a Starbuck to his captain’s Ahab. His technical inventiveness is also important to the ship’s success. They confront differences between the Pacific and the Atlantic theatres of war. The icy North Atlantic contrasts with the sweaty southern Pacific. But in terms of naval operations and combat, the major difference is in sheer size: the Pacific is thousands of square miles bigger, and the fleets involve hundreds or even thousands of ships sweeping across that area. When deTomasi indicates he feels neglected, the briefing officer tells him the upcoming operation will involve “eight hundred ships. …Don’t feel picked on, Captain, you’re just going to have to get used to the scale of what’s happening here in the Pacific.” Half the size of a full destroyer, arriving months late and with no convoy to protect, Holland is initially greeted more as a nuisance than anything else. In the context of the huge fleet actions sweeping the Pacific, a lone DE can be easily overlooked. Still, Holland’s designation includes the word destroyer. Learning the Japanese are thought to have set up a picket line of submarines to give warning of the direction of an American task force. deTomasi gets Holland placed where he and his ship may be able to do what they do best—hunt submarines. One of the Deutermann’s strengths here is how smoothly he incorporates essential details of anti-submarine warfare, as practiced at the time, into the action narrative. In the process of following Holland’s mission, the reader absorbs in passing such elements as the difference between depth charges and hedgehogs, the need to measure water temperature, and the tactical values of active versus passive sonar. Any reader with only a little prior knowledge will feel comfortably expert as he turns the pages. Having practiced multi-ship ASW with the British in the Atlantic, deTomasi brings that innovation to the Pacific as well. Another important U.S. Navy development at that time was the Combat Information Center (CIC), and Deutermann shows its importance throughout the novel, for ASW as well as other applications. As in earlier work, Deutermann reminds readers that war is brutal and messy. A discussion of what happens inside when a submarine is destroyed reminds us that those are human beings inside, but Holland’s photographer gags while recording the “evidence”—distorted human remains– of a successful sinking. Simply being at sea has dangers of its own, and after all, what is a good sea story without some rough weather? Between confrontations with Japanese submarines, Holland has to survive a typhoon with sixty-foot waves and winds that rip the anemometer right off its mount. Readers are treated to the full spectacle and fear that such a storm can provide, including coming into the “surreal seascape of the eye itself,” with the “boiling black clouds” of the opposite wall ahead. The rough sublimity of the storm has a counterpart or balancing moment of positive awe later, when Holland encounters Task Force 58. In Deutermann’s beautifully crafted passage, the formation of carriers, battleships, cruisers heavy and light, and lesser ships sweeps past the little DE at twenty-five knots. If some readers might find Holland too successful against Japanese submarines to permit that willing suspension of disbelief upon which fiction depends, an author’s note at the end explains that The Last Paladin is inspired by the true story of USS England (DE-635). What he has produced is not a fictionalization of that story, but rather a different story whose plausibility relies upon the historical reality. If deTomasi and Enright had been real, is the implicit claim, their story might have been as well. Once Holland has resolved deTomasi’s vendetta against Japan as embodied in its submarines, Deutermann makes it the target of a vengeful Japanese command. The result is a spectacular final shootout wrapped in a global framework. By the time we close the book, we have been treated not only to a violent short course in ASW, but also a good deal of surface and air action as well. Faithful Deutermann readers will not be disappointed; nor, I think will new ones. Captain Gilliland is a professor emeritus form the U.S. Naval Academy. P. T. DEUTERMANN is the author of many previous novels including Pacific Glory, which won the W. Y. Boyd Literary Award for Excellence in Military Fiction. Deutermann spent twenty-six years in military and government service, as a captain in the Navy and in the Joint Chiefs of Staff as an arms-control specialist. He lives with his wife in North Carolina. The Last Paladin. By P.T. Deutermann (Manhattan, New York: 2022) The post The Last Paladin first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

We need more and more clear and direct talk like this from senior uniformed leaders throughout NATO; In a remarkable speech in Prague today, the Czech Republic’s most senior army leader demanded, as an “absolute necessity.” that the service embarks on its “biggest rearmament” ever. Major General Karel Řehka, chief of the General Staff of the Czech Republic Army, told delegates at the Command Assembly convened to announce the army’s strategic and procurement plans for 2023 that “serious challenges await us,” as he reflected on the “crisis” in Ukraine. “The biggest rearmament of the army in the country’s history is no longer just a wish, but an absolute necessity,” Řehka said. Russia’s actions have left the Czech Army with many urgent tasks that can no longer be postponed, he said, before unveiling a five point plan covering long-term priorities. The Czechs are an interesting bunch. In my travels in Central Europe earlier this year, I spent a few days in Prague and most of the other capitals of the nations of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire. Nowhere were there more Ukrainian flags than in Prague. Since the start of the war they backed up this vibe with substantial and ongoing military support. As in most things, you have to look for steadfastness, follow through and ... follow the money. With a population of only a little more than 10-million souls, less than Belgium, there is only so much the Czechs can do, but they can pull their fair share of the effort. Sadly, the last two decades of disinterest has left the once mighty Czech defense industry flat footed. She has good company in the alliance, as we've discussed before. She has a lot of work to do not just to support herself, much less have spare capacity to continue to support the Ukrainian defense against Russian aggression. Look at the quote above again and see the path the Czechs have to go just to get to the 2% floor. All should applaud the effort, but also have an understanding of the limitations here and from other NATO members who coasted through the previous decade. View the full article

Americas Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) has authenticated the keel of the US Navy’s Virginia class submarine Arkansas (SSN 800). The Arkansas is the 27th fast-attack submarine of its class, being constructed as part of the navy program with General Dynamics Electric Boat. The Virginia class fleet will eventually replace the aging Los Angeles-class submarines first commissioned in 1976. The ceremony was sponsored by members of the Little Rock Nine, the first African-American students to attend the all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, during desegregation in the US. Northrop Grumman Systems won a $99.4 million deal by the Air Force Life Cycle for Active Electronically Scanned Array radars of Air Force F-16 aircraft. This modification is for the exercise of options including 42 production radars, one initial spare kit, and two readiness spare kits. Work will take place in Maryland. Expected completion date is July 31, 2025. Middle East & Africa Advanced Technology Systems won a $8.7 million contract modification for the Egypt Mobile Surveillance Sensor Security System Follow-on Support case expansion project. This contract provides for the acquisition of mission-critical spares, an additional training course, and continued repair and return activities to support continued Contractor Logistics Support. Work will take place in Egypt. Expected completion date is December 31, 2023. Europe The UK Defense and Security Accelerator (DASA) has started market exploration of innovative solutions for uncrewed anti-submarine warfare capabilities. The initiative is part of the UK Ministry of Defence Project CHARYBDIS under the Royal Navy’s Spearhead Program. Under the effort, DASA experts will identify, prototype, evaluate, and provide systems to classify, track, and report underwater vessels and submarines. Finland’s Ministry of Defense has announced it will exercise a $137 million contract option to purchase additional K9 155mm self-propelled anti-tank howitzers for the Finnish Army. The option was approved by Finnish Defence Minister Antti Kaikkonen and the country’s Finance Committee on November 17. Asia-Pacific South Korea recently conducted an interception test of its Long-range Surface-to-Air Missile (L-SAM). The missile defense system successfully intercepted an incoming missile target during the test, which followed a flight test in February, Yonhap News Agency wrote, citing military officials. Today’s Video WATCH: Finland To Buy 48 pieces of the K9 Thunder self-propelled howitzers View the full article

One of the more difficult things for me to work through is a certain intolerance at my core that is easily triggered, and I have to make a conscious effort to not be petty, mean, and flinty towards people an institutions who put it in my face. To be more specific, I have a very short fuse when people act shocked today when something happens that they have been warned about - and even suffered from - in the past that they could have avoided repeating in the future if they took basic and clear steps to learn their lesson. Let's go back to 2011, almost a dozen years ago; Less than a month into the Libyan conflict, NATO is running short of precision bombs, highlighting the limitations of Britain, France and other European countries in sustaining even a relatively small military action over an extended period of time, according to senior NATO and U.S. officials. The shortage of European munitions, along with the limited number of aircraft available, has raised doubts among some officials about whether the United States can continue to avoid returning to the air campaign if Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi hangs on to power for several more months. ... The six countries conducting the air attacks, led by Britain and France, were unsuccessful at a meeting this week in Berlin in persuading more alliance members to join them. NATO officials said that their operational tempo has not decreased since the United States relinquished command of the Libya operation and withdrew its strike aircraft at the beginning of April. More planes, they said, would not necessarily result immediately in more strike missions. But, they said, the current bombing rate by the participating nations is not sustainable. “The reason we need more capability isn’t because we aren’t hitting what we see — it’s so that we can sustain the ability to do so. One problem is flight time, the other is munitions,” ... Libya “has not been a very big war. If [the Europeans] would run out of these munitions this early in such a small operation, you have to wonder what kind of war they were planning on fighting,” said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a defense think tank. “Maybe they were just planning on using their air force for air shows.” Despite U.S. badgering, European allies have been slow in some cases to modify their planes and other weapons systems so they can accommodate U.S. bombs. Retooling these fighter jets so that they are compatible with U.S. systems requires money, and all European militaries have faced significant cuts in recent years. And so here we are, at the end of 2022; Top defense officials in Europe say arms shortages among Ukraine’s Western allies are forcing difficult conversations about how to balance support for Ukraine with concerns Russia may target them next. NATO members that have sent billions of dollars worth of weapons and equipment are discussing what stockpile levels they need to meet their obligations under the mutual defense treaty. Decisions facing them now could have consequences for their their own security and for Ukraine, in its fight to repel Russia’s nine-month-old invasion. The strain on stockpiles is “across the board,” and particularly sharp for ammunition, he said. In the years before some countries donated to Ukraine, they maintained stockpiles at half capacity or less because they saw little risk or couldn’t afford more, and took a “just-in-time, just-enough,” approach to the defense industry. “So the urgency now is seen and understood, I think in most of the nations,” Bauer said. Really? Now they'll get it? It’s an acute challenge for some of NATO’s smallest members, like the Netherlands, which even before its donation of more than $800 million’s worth of aid to Ukraine, was straining to meet its NATO obligations. Gen. Onno Eichelsheim, chief of defense of the Netherlands, said Dutch stocks were “not that high” when the Netherlands opted to send Ukraine 155mm howitzer ammunition and air defense missiles. “We started with stocks that were not completely filled, that were not completely ready, did not have all the materiel to support what we needed for NATO,” Eichelsheim said. “It means that I immediately have to get stocks filled up by getting contracts with industry, which we started, luckily, a year ago.” The Dutch government and other European allies have been having discussions with industry about their long-term procurement plans to incentivize production increases ― and how to prioritize deliveries based on which country needs a weapon most. One aim is to build Europe’s defense industry and not depend too much on the U.S. This isn't an industry problem, this is a people problem. In Europe and North America we continue to promote people, priorities, and budgets for the wrong reasons. We have incentives and disincentives that reward myopic behavior and promote people who don't really understand what their job actually is. This is not a new problem. It has existed throughout human written history. In peace, we like people and policies that seem easy (and inexpensive) and really hope that we don't have to be prepared for the worse, because that is sad to think about. No, we need to be comfortable and look peaceful so people (we for some reason value) will say nice things about us and our priorities. Of course, reality always regresses to the mean. War is a constant in our species. Always has been. Always will be. The question, as always, is which society will gain when the next war comes? Will it be a society that a Westerner would call "progressive," "liberal," or based on "individual liberty," or will it be some autocratic force who will bring another period of darkness - the boot smashing the face etc. Those who know their history, and what is needed to keep the global order from regression in to barbarity, need to speak up more. They need to support each other more. They need not be cowed. Care not what names you are called. Be not bothered the invitations you do not receive. They need to be open in their argument - clear in their purpose. Once again, we have a small war (in 2011) warning us about a critical vulnerability. We now have a medium war (in 2022) yelling a little louder about this critical vulnerability. History is trying to warn us, again, about what can undermine the Western project when the next big war comes. There is no honorable or logical argument for shallow magazines, but the argument for deeper magazines will not win on its own. It needs advocated, it needs argument, it needs funding. There also needs for a fair bit of "calling out" those who ignored warnings for so long. Fear and shame are great motivators - we should not be shy about using them. View the full article

Americas The US Navy awarded Adams Communication and Engineering Technology with a $37.4 million deal, which provides for non-recurring and recurring efforts required to fabricate, assemble, and support prototyping, system integration, and installation of depot modifications associated with engineering changes to H-53 aircraft for the Navy, Marine Corps and Foreign Military Sales customers. Work will take place in California, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey, Arizona, Japan, Korea and Bahrain. Expected completion will be in November 2027. Raytheon won a $23.4 million deal for the procurement of AEGIS Modernization kits for Navy guided-missile destroyers and allied nations. The Aegis Combat System is the Navy’s most modern surface combat system. It was designed as a complete system: the missile launching element, the computer programs, the radar and the displays are fully integrated to work together. Work will take place in Massachusetts and Virginia. Estimated completion will be by March 2026. Middle East & Africa Turkey announced on Sunday it had carried out air strikes against the bases of outlawed Kurdish militants across northern Syria and Iraq, which it said were being used to launch “terrorist” attacks on Turkish soil. The overnight raids in northern and northeastern Syria killed at least 31 people, said the British-based monitoring group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. They were mainly against positions held by Syrian Kurdish forces. Europe France and Germany on Friday hailed the conclusion of a deal to build a new European fighter jet after months of disagreements between two companies involved — Airbus and Dassault Aviation. Launched by France and Germany in 2017 and since joined by Spain, the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) aims to have a next-generation jet in service by 2040, along with integrated drone fleets. The Royal Norwegian Air Force has selected the Lockheed Martin TPY-4 as its new early warning radar. Norway becomes the first export customer of the radar, joining the US Air Force which has selected the TPY-4 for the Three Dimensional Expeditionary Long Range Radar program in March. Asia-Pacific Asahi news in Japan reports that Tokyo will finalize an agreement with Italy and United Kingdom to develop its next fighter. The report says Avio Aero from Italy will be involved in researching for a new engine for the F-X fighter together with Mitsubishi and Rolls-Royce. Today’s Video WATCH: THAAD: FCAS / SCAF : The Future European Jet ? View the full article

OK, not really sure what to call this ... and I don't think the Portuguese do either. It is a scientific ship, which will be a kind of base on the high seas, equipped with scientific laboratories, accommodation for 90 people permanently and another 100 if necessary, for example in a situation of emergency evacuation, ramps for boarding and disembarking of vehicles, heliport, runways for aerial drones, a stall for submarine drones and speedboats, various cranes In its candidacy for the PRR, the Navy stressed that "this ship, idealized under a new concept of operation, has no military requirements and is not armed. Its main functions are environmental monitoring, in particular in the fight against maritime pollution, the supervision of fisheries, the preservation of resources, the development of knowledge and research in the hydrographic and scientific field". According to this text, "all its drones do not have weapons and the sensors used serve to monitor, monitor and control maritime spaces under national jurisdiction". The ship, it was stressed, "will also serve for the eventual transport and evacuation of citizens in case of need. With the concept of double use, and being a technologically innovative and disruptive ship, it will allow you to test technological solutions in the robotic area, contributing to the development of national technology". The counter-admiral said that this project represents a "stimulus for the entire community linked to the sea, industry and academia", with "very interesting challenges and tremendous opportunities". And he stressed that it is intended to "involve the national industry as much as possible", reinforcing that "we should not, as a country, waste this opportunity". In relation to this, criticism emerged from some of those present, already in the question and answer phase. "The Navy did not know how to promote this project to society, academia and industry," lamented one of the actors, who did not identify himself, presenting himself as someone with business links to the sector. This seems like a bit of an Offshore Patrol Vessel, a little bit of an Expeditionary Support Base, a funky T-AGOS or ... if squint a bit, butch her up, and will allow myself to say such a thing - a reimagining of the Littoral Combat Ship? Yes, yes, yes ... I see that she is not armed and there's not a lot of information available. Well, that can be fixed if so needed. I have ideas ... but I like to think you can weaponize anything ... but what I'd like to do is spend a few drinks with a marine architect and the ship's blueprints to see what "white space" there would be to play with in this design. Heck, I'll start ... MIW mothership? Pocket destroyer tender? Repair and salvage ship? Forward VLS re-arming ship? Whatever she is, I have to give a nod to the Portuguese Navy. They have my interest...though...I wonder how that thing rides on a bad North Atlantic winter day... Once again we have a very small nation - 10.3 million souls, about 3% of the US population and 6% of our defense budget - coming up with some rather innovative ideas. Also note this timeline; According to this official, the forecast is that, "by the end of the month" (November), "the proposal will be delivered" and that "by the end of the year the contract will be signed". According to the calendar shown at this meeting, the construction of this platform is expected to take place between 2023 and 2025, delivered at the end of 2025, with 2026 being the "year of guarantees". Huh. h/t DPW. View the full article

What do you need tp know to make sure you have all the right talking points around the Thanksgiving table? If someone brings up the Navy, China, Ukraine, inflation, or supply chain issues - well, we know Midrats regulars are already up to speed - but now's your opportunity to make sure all your talking points are up to date! No guests, no set agenda, just open phones, open minds, and open chat room for those who are with us live Sunday from 5-6pm Eastern. Don't be stuck talking about twitter or Taylor Swift this Thanksgiving! Join us live if you can, but it not, you can get the show later by subscribing to the podcast. If you use iTunes, you can add Midrats to your podcast list simply by clicking the iTunes button at the main showpage - or you can just click here. You can find us on almost all your most popular podcast aggregators as well. View the full article

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $97 million modification by the US Army for the PAC-3 Missile Field Surveillance Program and missile post-production activities. Bids were solicited via the internet with one received. Bids were solicited via the internet with one received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of May 19, 2023. The US Army tapped General Dynamics with a §146.7 million deal for flat-bottom hull Stryker vehicles. Bids were solicited via the internet with one received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of November 30, 2024. Middle East & Africa Israel and the United States blamed Iran Wednesday after what they said was a drone strike against a tanker operated by an Israeli-owned firm carrying gas oil off the coast of Oman. The Pacific Zircon was “hit by a projectile approximately 150 miles off the coast of Oman” on Tuesday, Singapore-based firm Eastern Pacific Shipping which operates the vessel said in a statement, adding that there were no reports of casualties or any leakage of the cargo. The Israeli Navy, the Israel Ministry of Defense, and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems completed an advanced interception test of the C-Dome Naval Iron Dome System. The C-Dome is an advanced configuration of the Iron Dome aerial defense system and is operated from the Missile Ship (INS) ‘Oz’ from the Sa’ar 6 ‘Magen’ Class Corvette. As part of the interception test, the system was installed on the INS ‘Oz’ corvette, the second of four advanced missile corvettes received by the Israeli Navy in the last two years. Operationalizing the system constitutes a significant milestone in enhancing the capabilities of the corvettes. Europe State-owned Czech aviation firm LOM PRAHA has tapped manufacturer AERO Vodochy to deliver four new L-39NG advanced military trainer aircraft to the country’s air force. The contract, which includes an option for four more jets, also covers the delivery of special and high-altitude equipment, survival equipment, flight planning and analysis systems, and a ground training system. Asia-Pacific The South Korean government will receive eight electromagnetic wave detectors for the US missile shield base in the southeastern county of Seongju, a defense ministry official said. Five detectors will be installed near the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) base to monitor “potentially hazardous electromagnetic waves of THAAD’s X-band radar around the clock.” The equipment is slated for delivery in April 2023. Today’s Video WATCH: THAAD: America’s Super Shield against Ballistic Missiles View the full article

Wednesday, December 7th @ 1:00 PM EST at the Museum Education Center of the National Museum of the United States Navy, Washington Navy Yard, DC 20374 Special Meeting of the Membership – Register Here The post Special Meeting of the Membership first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

Wednesday, December 7th @ 1:00 PM EST at the Museum Education Center of the National Museum of the United States Navy, Washington Navy Yard, DC 20374 Special Meeting of the Membership – Register Here The post Special Meeting of the Membership first appeared on Naval Historical Foundation. View the full article

It can take awhile sometimes, but at last Master Chief Slabinski is recognized appropriately. During the early morning on March 4, 2002, then-Senior Chief Slabinski led a SEAL reconnaissance team to the top of the 10,000-foot, snow-covered Takur Ghar mountain in Afghanistan. The team’s insertion helicopter was attacked by an enemy rocket-propelled grenade attack, causing Petty Officer Neil Roberts to fall out of the aircraft and onto the enemy-infested mountaintop, and the helicopter to crash-land in the valley below, according to the Navy. “Fully aware of the risks, a numerically superior and well-entrenched enemy force, and approaching daylight, without hesitation Senior Chief Slabinski made the selfless and heroic decision to lead the remainder of his element on an immediate and daring rescue back to the mountaintop,” according to a Navy statement. Slabinski’s team was able to successfully reach the top of Takur Ghar, where the Navy states that Slabinski, “without regard for his own life, charged directly toward the enemy strongpoint. He and a teammate fearlessly assaulted and cleared one enemy bunker at close range. The enemy then unleashed a murderous hail of machine gun fire from a second hardened position 20 meters away. Senior Chief Slabinski exposed himself to enemy fire on three sides, then moved forward to silence the second position. With bullets piercing his clothing, he repeatedly charged into deadly fire to personally engage the enemy bunker with direct rifle fire, hand grenades and a grenade launcher on the surrounding enemy positions.” With mounting casualties and diminished ammunition, Slabinski led his team away from enemy fire to a more defensible position. He was able to direct close air support on the enemy positions, request reinforcements and direct medical care of his wounded teammates, according to the Navy. For 14 hours, Slabinski led his team across tough terrain, called in fires on enemy positions on surrounding ridges and continued to engage the enemy. At one point, Slabinski even carried a seriously wounded teammate through waist-deep snow to reach a more defensible position until the team could be extracted. Slabinski, who retired from the Navy in June 2014 after more than 25 years of service, will be only the 12th living service member awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery displayed in Afghanistan, according to a Navy statement. Slabinski’s Medal of Honor is an upgrade of the Navy Cross he previously was awarded for his actions. He is set to receive the medal during a White House ceremony scheduled for May 24. To ensure service members were appropriately recognized for valor, former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter directed all service branches to review all Service Cross and Silver Star recommendations for actions since September 11, 2001. First posted May 2015.View the full article

There are occasions where even the most rah-rah supporters of all things DOD need to pause and wonder, “Are we really getting our best where they need to be?” At the very top of the list of dysfunctions in the American officer corps is the culture of happy-talk. From FITREPS to Decision Briefings, the layer on top of layer of not telling hard truths bleeds over into areas that are not just irritating, but dangerous. Regulars here are familiar with our almost two-decades long series “The Long Game” but for the new folks lets pull out one of the defining reason the series even exists; for reasons of economic greed, political expediency, historical ignorance, and even national self-loathing, The Smartest People in the Room™ have for decades downplayed the challenge from the People’s Republic of China and have left the USA flatfooted as she reaches regional parity. At its worst in the 1990s when we helped them with their aerospace, through the Bush malaise, to the Obama peaceful rise - it wasn’t until the Trump Administration that we saw any realistic appreciation of what the PRC was. With the Biden Administration there is a mixed bag towards the PRC, but surprisingly remains clear-eyed towards the threat than regressing to the Obama years, however … speaking of the Trump Administration; the man the Trump Administration placed as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Milley, USA, continues to prove that he has spent too much time studying “White Rage” and not enough time … well … understanding the world. This is the guy who oversaw the greatest national humiliation since the fall of Saigon with the negotiated retreat from Afghanistan and the disgraceful fall of Kabul. The advice coming from The Pentagon prior to the Russian invasion of Afghanistan was equally worthy of resignation. And yet, he persists in a job – one he remains serially unsuited for. Here is another data-point you can put down as one of the most historically, statistically, and strategically inept statements by a head of a military in … well … pick a moment. As reported by Lucas Tomlinson, BEHOLD! Gen. Milley: “China is not going to be a better military than the United States military is, but they're going to try. But they're not going to get there. We will be number one five years from now, 10 years from now, and 50 years from now.” — Lucas Tomlinson (@LucasFoxNews) November 16, 2022 One should not be shocked being that his Pentagon has insisted for years that the PRC was a “pacing threat” when they were a gaining or surpassing threat. Equally clear is a lack of humility or historical perspective. There is a bit of a whiff of MacArthur’s misreading of China back in 1950/1 and could bring equally bad consequences. Such talk as Milley’s must be bluntly confronted. If the PRC is not a threat, then why spend money on more of a Navy? Why on more of an Air Force? Just do more of the same and we’ll be OK? See how this works? It is a recipe for sleepwalking into strategic failure. “…but the Chairman does not see China as a threat as you do…” – you can hear it now. At the inflection point at the start of greatest threat of a new conflict with China, our uniformed leadership seems hellbent to ensure that we are not prepared, and the PRC is emboldened. Pray for peace. View the full article

Americas General Atomics won a $46.9 million contract modification by the US Navy, which exercises an option to provide spares necessary for the successful operational capability of the Marine Air Ground Task Force Unmanned Aircraft System Expeditionary Medium Altitude Long Endurance MQ-9A Block 5 Reaper air vehicles, ground control stations, and ancillary equipment. Work will take place in California, Massachusetts, Missouri, New York, Virginia, Ohio, Arkansas, Florida and South Carolina. The US Navy awarded Sikorsky a $14.1 million modification, which exercises an option to provide non-recurring engineering, supplies and support necessary for the low rate initial production Lot 1 deployable configuration updates for the CH-53K heavy lift replacement aircraft for the Navy. Work will take place in Florida. Expected completion is in December 2023. Middle East & Africa Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems has received a $72-million contract to supply an undisclosed international customer with Hermes 900 unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). Under the two-year agreement, Elbit will deliver Hermes 900 drones equipped with the company’s electro-optical system, including a wide area persistent surveillance system, multi-spectral electro-optical payload, satellite communication, and signal intelligence payloads. Europe The US State Department has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to the Government of Switzerland of PATRIOT Advanced Capability (PAC) 3 Missile Segment Enhanced (MSE) missiles and related equipment for an estimated cost of $700 million. The proposed sale of the PAC-3 MSE missiles will enhance the capability of Switzerland’s PATRIOT missile defense system. The proposed sale supports Switzerland’s goal of improving national and territorial defense as well as interoperability with U.S. and NATO forces. Switzerland will use the PATRIOT system and missiles to defend its territorial integrity and for regional stability. The prime contractor will be Lockheed-Martin, Dallas, Texas. French President Emmanuel Macron said Thursday that an offer to cooperate with Australia on submarines still stood, after a bitter row over a cancelled contract last year threatened to torpedo relations. Macron was left furious when Australia’s previous prime minister Scott Morrison abruptly tore up a contract for France to build a dozen diesel-powered submarines and announced a deal to buy US or British nuclear-powered subs. Asia-Pacific The New Zealand government has enhanced its defense commitments to Ukraine, boosting military equipment funding and extending training for Ukrainian warfighters. Prime Minister Jacina Ardern on Monday announced an undisclosed amount of additional military support to improve Ukraine’s self defense nine months into Russia’s invasion. Today’s Video WATCH: Elbit Systems / HERMES 900 – Next Gen Multi-Role MALE UAS View the full article