Economic security

How Trump’s Steel Tariffs Could Harm National Security

Fog afflicts all wars, those over trade in particular. And no fog is thicker than that created by the age-old national-security rationale for trade restrictions, applied most recently in defense of the tariffs imposed by President Trump on March 8 (and then delayed for Canada and Mexico until June 1) on steel imports, under section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962.

Per the president’s proclamation,

the Secretary [of Commerce] found . . . that steel articles are being imported into the United States in such quantities and under such circumstances as to threaten to impair the national security of the United States . . . [by] “shrinking [our] ability to meet national security production requirements in a national emergency.” Because of these risks and the risk that the United States may be unable to “meet [steel] demands for national defense and critical industries in a national emergency,” and taking into account the close relation of the economic welfare of the Nation to our national security . . . the present quantities and circumstances of steel articles imports threaten to impair the national security.

If “national security” is the justification for protectionism in the steel market, then we must consider all the national-security effects that tariffs would have, recognizing the applicability of that rationale to a very large number of sectors.

Weapons

Why the US should stock up on Tomahawk cruise missiles

The Tomahawk cruise missile is one of the most effective and highly utilized weapons in the U.S. arsenal ― and we have decided to stop producing them.

Last month, the U.S. Navy placed its final order for 100 replacement Tomahawks, citing a new cruise missile under development as the reason for closing the production line. Well and good, but the new missiles are not expected to be available until 2030. In the meantime, the U.S. should maintain — and even grow — its inventory of the cruise missile, which has been aptly described as the military’s “weapon of choice.”

Look at the numbers. Although exact figures are not publicly available, it is estimated that the Navy fires about 100 Tomahawks per year. In its first 15 months, the Trump administration has used Tomahawks at least twice, first launching roughly 60 against the Shayrat air base in Syria in response to that regime’s use of chemical weapons. Then again last month, in a coordinated strike with France and the U.K. against the Assad regime, the U.S. launched approximately 100 Tomahawks, according to U.S. Department of Defense officials.

National security

Bolton Installs Anti-Muslim Wingnut As NSC Chief of Staff

While less flamboyant in fear and loathing of Muslims than Flynn was, Bolton is one of many fringe neoconservatives who’s taken up residence in the alt-right-wing foreign-policy think tanks erected by the Islamophobia industry: Since 2013, Bolton has served as chairman of the Gatestone Institute, an organization that claims Muslims have established hundreds of  “microstates governed by Islamic Sharia law”(a.k.a. “no-go zones”) throughout France; that Muslim refugees have brought “a rape epidemic” and “exotic diseases” with them to Germany; and that the United Kingdom is on the cusp of becoming an “Islamist colony.”

And now, Bolton is remaking the National Security Council in his image. On Tuesday, Trump’s latest national security adviser named former CIA analyst Fred Fleitz as his chief of staff. 

War on terror 

Artillery Strike Kills More Than 50 Taliban Leaders In Afghanistan, U.S. Military Says

More than 50 senior Taliban commanders were killed in an artillery strike on a meeting in Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand, a U.S. military spokesman said on Wednesday, as fighting continues across the country.

The attack on a meeting of commanders in the district of Musa Qala in Helmand, one of the heartlands of the Taliban insurgency, was a significant blow to the insurgents, said Lt. Col. Martin O’Donnell, spokesman for U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

“It’s certainly a notable strike,” he said, adding that several other senior and lower level commanders had been killed during operations over a 10-day period this month.

The Taliban dismissed the report as “propaganda” and said the attack had hit two civilian houses in Musa Qala, killing five civilians and wounding three.

Prediction

Scientist predicts our future will be ‘worse than extinction’

A Russian theoretical physicist has predicted a grim future for our civilization that “is even worse than extinction.”

Alexander Berezin, a highly-cited scientist from Russia’s National University of Electronic Technology Research, outlined his bleak prediction in an article entitled 'First to enter, last to leave: a solution to Fermi's paradox'.

Fermi’s paradox is the contradiction that’s been maddening scientists for years. The idea that if the universe is so vast, practically guaranteeing the existence of extraterrestrial life, then why hasn’t humanity ever detected a trace of it?

Berezin theorizes that alien civilizations may have not reached the technological advancement needed to be detectable by Earthlings – like space travel or interstellar communication.

Berezin also says that those who first accomplish interstellar travel would be naturally tasked with eradicating “all competition to fuel its own expansion.” Or in other words: whoever finds the other first will have the power of the universe.

While that dog-eat-dog theory may seem harsh, Berezin says total destruction of other life forms likely won’t be a conscious obliteration. "They simply [will] not realize, in the same way that a construction team demolishes an anthill to build a property because it has no incentives to protect it," writes Berezin.

Nuclear security

Forget North Korea: Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons Should Truly Terrify You

Sandwiched between Iran, China, India and Afghanistan, Pakistan lives in a complicated neighborhood with a variety of security issues. One of the nine known states known to have nuclear weapons, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and doctrine are continually evolving to match perceived threats. A nuclear power for decades, Pakistan is now attempting to construct a nuclear triad of its own, making its nuclear arsenal resilient and capable of devastating retaliatory strikes.

Pakistan’s nuclear program goes back to the 1950s, during the early days of its rivalry with India. President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto famously said in 1965, “If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass or leaves, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own.”

Defense

Are We Preparing to Fight the Wrong War?

Are we preparing to fight the wrong war? That’s the question being asked increasingly frequently by Australian defence planners, especially in the RAAF. What makes some people nervous are a number of emerging disruptive technologies that will have a profound effect on military operations in the very near future.

These include, but aren’t limited to: artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning; micro uninhabited aerial systems (UAS); quantum computing; hypersonics; micro ‘cube’ satellites and matching launch technologies; uninhabited underwater systems; the vastly increasing power of conventional explosives utilising nanotechnology; and information operations and cyber warfare.

In fact it’s not the maturing of any single one of these technologies that’s causing such concern, but rather that all of them—and more—are being developed in parallel at an extraordinary rate. That gives rise to a myriad of possible combinations that risk turning all of the tens of billions of dollars’ worth of platforms the ADF is acquiring into so much obsolete junk.

Terror threat

Credible Report Alleges US Relocates ISIS from Syria and Iraq into Russia via Afghanistan

Katehon, a think-tank dedicated to the protection of nations’ sovereignty against invasions and coups from abroad, headlined, on May 15th, “Special Services Agent: Attack on Russia Is Being Prepared”, and reported that [with editorial clarifications and links supplied by me in brackets]:

According to Russian and Chinese law enforcement agencies, militants fleeing by sea from Syria and Iraq follow a route from the Qasim port in the Pakistani city of Karachi to Peshawar, and are then distributed along the Nangarhar province in the east of the country. …

Since late 2017 the leaders of the Islamic State managed to transfer from Syria and Iraq to Afghanistan an additional 500 foreign fighters, including more than two dozen women. A source in one of the Russian law enforcement agencies says: "All of them are also in the province of Nangarhar. They are citizens of Sudan, Kazakhstan, Czech Republic, Uzbekistan, France and so on."

Poll results


Glasnost for US Intelligence: Will Transparency Lead to Increased Public Trust?

Here are several key takeaways from the initial report:

• 56 percent of respondents indicated that the U.S. intelligence community “plays a vital role in warning against foreign threats and contributes to national security” while only 7 percent of those questioned thought our intelligence agencies were “no longer necessary”. Large differences were noted in this pool based on respondents’ general knowledge of foreign affairs;
• 75 percent of respondents regarded the intelligence community as effective in “preventing terrorist attacks against the U.S.”, but only 43 percent judged the intelligence community equally effective at “protecting the privacy an civil liberties of Americans”. More Democrats than Republicans credited the intelligence community with protecting their rights (see figure above);
• More than 90 percent of Americans agreed with the longstanding charge by U.S. presidents that the intelligence community employ “[a]ll reasonable and lawful means” to ensure the government receives the best possible intelligence, but only 38 percent believe that in gathering this information the U.S. intelligence community should “respect the privacy rights of foreigners to the same extent as Americans”. Democrats were more likely than Republicans or Independents to extend privacy protections to foreigners;
• 63 percent of Democrats believe the intelligence community can share more information with the public without compromising its effectiveness, while only 42 percent of Republicans hold that view;
• From a shortlist, 24 percent of respondents selected the NSC as the institution primarily responsible for monitoring U.S. intelligence, while only 11 percent thought the president played this role. Only 20 percent of those polled associated the Congress with intelligence oversight, while 21 percent (incorrectly) believe federal courts and judges play a central role in regulating U.S. intelligence.

Cybersecurity

Mainstream Media Warns of 'Russian Malware', Ignores CIA's Own Virus Development

While the meme of omnipotent Russian hackers has been a recurrent one in the Western mainstream, supporting evidence has been scant. Conversely however, evidence of Western intelligence agencies employing sophisticated hacking techniques, and creating malicious software to attack citizens, is ample.

Homegrown Viruses

For instance, as part of its ‘Vault 7' series of exposures, whistleblower organisation WikiLeaks revealed how US Central Intelligence Agency contractor Raytheon Blackbird Technologies helped the CIA's Remote Development Branch (RDB) to collect ideas for developing their own advanced malware projects — and how the CIA's UMBRAGE malware development teams also borrowed codes from publicly available malware samples to build the Agency's own spyware tools.

Nuclear security

CIA assessment suggests North Korea not planning on ridding itself of nuclear weapons: Report

An assessment from the Central Intelligence Agency indicates that North Korea is not planning to rid itself of nuclear weapons in the near future, but may open a hamburger franchise as an amicable gesture to the U.S., according to a new report.

“Everybody knows they are not going to denuclearize,” an intelligence official who viewed the report said of the rogue regime, per NBC News.

According to officials familiar with the CIA’s assessment, a more pragmatic goal would be persuading leader Kim Jong Un to roll back progress the regime has already made recently regarding their nuclear weapons program.

Military spending

China Outspends the U.S. on Defense? Here’s the Math.

When is $227 billion greater than $606 billion? When comparing Chinese defense spending to that of the U.S. — and if Army Chief of Staff Mark Milley is the one doing the math.

At a hearing last week, the ranking Democrat of the Senate’s defense appropriations subcommittee, Dick Durbin of Illinois, said to Milley: “You tell us that one of our biggest threats, greatest enemies, is Russia; turns out we read recently that Russia spends about $80 billion a year on its military. So let me get this straight: We’re spending 600, 700 billion dollars against an enemy that’s spending $80 billion. Why is this even a contest?”

...Fortunately, Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. of Breaking Defense chose to spare us all a lot of work and crunch the numbers. Freedberg decided that there were two adjustments needed to get to oranges-to-oranges: factoring in the purchasing power parity of the three countries (necessary because Russia and China buy most of their military goods from government-owned or heavily subsidized contractors and pay using domestic currency rather than dollars) and subtracting Pentagon spending on pay and benefits from its budget. 

Nuclear security

Iran's exit from nuclear weapons treaty would pour 'rocket fuel' on oil market, says analyst

The U.S. exit from the Iran nuclear deal creates the risk that Iran will drop out of a separate 50-year-old United Nations treaty meant to stop the spread of atomic weapons, according to Helima Croft, global head of commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets.

Oil prices have recently surged to 3½-year highs, fueled the U.S. nuclear deal pullout and falling output in Venezuela. However, crude prices began tumbling last week after Saudi Arabia and Russia said two dozen oil-producing nations could soon ease output caps that have been in place since January 2017.

But fears of nuclear weapons proliferation in the restive Middle East could quickly reverse that drop, according to Croft.

An Iranian official threatened last week to pull out of the U.N. Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which has sought to prevent the spread of atomic weapons since 1968. Iran signed the treaty that year, but the nation's leadership in Tehran is now in a standoff with the West over its nuclear program after President Donald Trump abandoned the 2015 nuclear deal and restored punishing sanctions on the Middle Eastern country.

Economic security

Dow tumbles nearly 400 points on Italy fears and US-China trade tensions

The Dow plunged more than 392 points, or 1.6%, on fears about political turmoil in Italy and renewed trade uncertainty between the United States and China. It was the worst day for the Dow since April 24.

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq slipped 1.1% and 0.5% apiece.

Italy is headed for new elections, and investors worry the result could throw the European Union into turmoil. Investors soured on Italy's debt, demanding higher yields in return for taking on added risk.

The tension in Italy spread to US markets. In Wall Street's worst-case scenario, Italy, the third-largest economy in the European bloc, would vote to leave the euro.

"It's got the earmarks of a disgruntled Italy," said Arthur Hogan, chief market strategist at B. Riley FBR. "We've gotten to the point now where it's catching people's attention."

The White House also announced Tuesday that it would impose 25% tariffs on $50 billion worth of goods from China and place new limits on Chinese investments in the United States. The move caught investors by surprise. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said a trade war with China was "on hold" less than 10 days ago.

International cooperation

What the CIA and Britain's MI6/SIS should learn from each other

Like any major organization, a spy service must constantly endeavor to improve. But unlike most other industries, learning from competitors is not that easy in the spy business. After all, organizational methodology and operational tactics are some of an intelligence service’s most closely guarded secrets.

But there are two human-intelligence focused spy agencies can learn from each other: the CIA and its British equivalent agency, the Secret Intelligence Service. With many shared interests, these two services work together to define the special relationship between the two countries. Only the NSA and its British equivalent, GCHQ work more closely together. Thanks to that trust, the two services have the ability to scrutinize each other for their own improvement.

For a start, the SIS could learn from the CIA’s recent focus on expanding its workforce diversity. While the SIS is focusing more on the espionage benefits of this diversity, it should copy the CIA and appoint a diversity-lead who has open-door access to the SIS chief Alex Younger. Doing so would emphasize diversity not just as an institutional priority but as a mission necessity.

Navy

The Navy Doesn't Want You To Know About this Top Secret Spy Submarine

Sometime apparently in August 2013, the U.S. Navy’s nuclear-powered attack submarine USS Seawolf eased out of the port of Bremerton, in Washington State, on what was probably her fifth or sixth deployment since commissioning in 1997.

A month later the U.S. Sixth Fleet, in charge of ships in European waters, posted a series of photos to the Website Flickr depicting the U.S. ambassador to Norway, Barry White, touring the 350-foot-long Seawolf pierside at Haakonsvern naval base … in southern Norway. Thousands of miles from Washington State.

How Seawolf got to Norway—and what she might have done en route—offer a rare and tantalizing glimpse into some of the most secretive quarters of the most poorly understood aspects of American naval power.

For it seems Seawolf traveled to Norway along a path rarely taken by any vessel — underneath the Arctic ice.

The Navy doesn’t like to talk about its submarines. After all, a sub’s biggest advantage is its stealth. And of the sailing branch’s roughly 70 undersea boats, Seawolf and her two sister vessels Connecticut and Jimmy Carter are among the most secretive.

Financial safety

Soros Sees New Global Financial Crisis Brewing, EU Under Threat

A surging dollar and a capital flight from emerging markets may lead to another “major” financial crisis, investor George Soros said, warning the European Union that it’s facing an imminent existential threat.

The “termination” of the nuclear deal with Iran and the “destruction” of the transatlantic alliance between the EU and the U.S. are “bound to have a negative effect on the European economy and cause other dislocations,” including a devaluing of emerging-market currencies, Soros said in a speech in Paris on Tuesday. “We may be heading for another major financial crisis.”

The stark warning from the billionaire money manager comes as Italian bond yields have jumped to multi-year highs and major emerging economies including Turkey and Argentina are struggling to contain the fallout from runaway inflation. Soros, who has been the object of ire by the government of his native Hungary, saved his gloomiest outlook for the EU.

Drones

Europe’s first MALE drone hits the skies using space-based tech

The first European-built medium-altitude, long-endurance drone has flown in Italy using satellite navigation and data links provided by a European satellite, its manufacturers said.
The Piaggio P.1HH, which has hitherto made test flights using line-of-sight navigation, flew out of Trapani airport in Sicily using satellite navigation provided by the Athena-Fidus satellite.
The linkup was provided by Italian satellite services company Telespazio, which is 67 percent controlled by Italy’s Leonardo and 33 percent by Thales. Athena Fidus is managed from Telespazio’s space center in Fucino, Italy.
The test comes as Europe is showing more interest in homegrown satellite navigation for drones, which is considered crucial to developing an autonomous UAV able to fly without GPS.

Energy security

Oil prices could soon 'spike' toward $100 a barrel regardless of OPEC and Russia, strategist says

OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia is determined to keep oil prices trading around current levels, one strategist told CNBC Monday, but a total shutdown in Venezuelan production could soon prompt crude futures to skyrocket toward $100 a barrel.

Prices in the oil market have been steadily rising since last year, with global benchmark Brent climbing to multi-year highs of $80 a barrel earlier this month. An upswing in crude futures has largely been driven by OPEC-led production cuts and robust global demand.

However, more recently, crude futures have slipped amid renewed fears of an oversupplied energy market.

"I think that Saudi Arabia, the rest of OPEC and Russia have achieved their objective of clearing this industry overhang from the oil market," Bob Parker, investment committee member at Quilvest Wealth Management, told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" Monday.

International security

RUSSIA WARNS MORE U.S. TROOPS IN POLAND COULD 'LEAD TO COUNTERACTION' FROM KREMLIN

A Kremlin spokesman on Monday responded to reports that Poland offered $2 billion for the U.S. to be stationed permanently within its borders for protection from Russia, saying the move could “lead to counteraction from the Russian side.”

Poland's monetary offer stems from a desire to deter “potential Russian aggression,” according to a Polish Defense Ministry proposal reported by Poland's Onet.pl news site. 

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov in a press conference said, “When we see the gradual expansion of NATO military structures towards our borders...this of course in no way creates security and stability on the continent,” according to Reuters.

Peskov continued, “On the contrary, these expansionist actions of course lead to counteraction from the Russian side in order to balance the parity which is violated every time in this way.”

International security

'Poker player' Xi made Trump think twice about Kim summit

U.S. President Donald Trump spoke these words on Tuesday as he described the Chinese leader's meddling with the U.S.-North Korea summit.

It was a prelude to Trump canceling the summit two days later.

The American leader had similarly expressed his displeasure toward Xi Jinping in a tweet. "The word is that recently the Border has become much more porous and more has been filtering in," Trump said, referring to the boundary between China and North Korea.

The cooperation between Washington and Beijing to stem the flows of goods and people across the border came to symbolize the warming relations between Trump and Xi. The trust had led the two to agree that if a U.S. military strike on North Korea were to take place, and a war were to erupt, it would not lead to a confrontation between the world's two major powers.

Trump's tweet was an expression of annoyance that this understanding had been broken.

Nuclear security

China steps up pace in new nuclear arms race with U.S. and Russia as experts warn of rising risk of conflict

China is aggressively developing its next generation of nuclear weapons, conducting an average of five tests a month to simulate nuclear blasts, according to a major Chinese weapons research institute.

Its number of simulated tests has in recent years outpaced that of the United States, which conducts them less than once a month on average.

Between September 2014 and last December, China carried out around 200 laboratory experiments to simulate the extreme physics of a nuclear blast, the China Academy of Engineering Physics reported in a document released by the government earlier this year and reviewed by the South China Morning Post this month.

In comparison, the US carried out only 50 such tests between 2012 and 2017 – or about 10 a year – according to the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

As China joins the US and Russia in pursuing more targeted nuclear weapons as a deterrent against potential threats, the looming arms race would in fact serve the opposite purpose by increasing the risk of a nuclear conflict, experts warn.

Technology security

How China acquires ‘the crown jewels’ of U.S. technology

The U.S. government was well aware of China’s aggressive strategy of leveraging private investors to buy up the latest American technology when, early last year, a company called Avatar Integrated Systems showed up at a bankruptcy court in Delaware hoping to buy the California chip-designer ATop Tech.

ATop’s product was potentially groundbreaking — an automated designer capable of making microchips that could power anything from smartphones to high-tech weapons systems. It’s the type of product that a U.S. government report had recently cited as “critical to defense systems and U.S. military strength.” And the source of the money behind the buyer, Avatar, was an eye-opener: Its board chairman and sole officer was a Chinese steel magnate whose Hong Kong-based company was a major shareholder.

Cybersecurity

How hackers can exploit devices used at home

As Americans increasingly fill their homes with smart technology, the risk of hackers exploiting their devices is growing.

Experts say the expanding ecosystem of internet-connected devices such as smart thermostats, home security systems and electric door locks are increasingly susceptible to hackers, including those trying to leverage voice-command devices.

This risk is further compounded if an individual stores sensitive data on certain internet-connected products, like a credit card number or mailing address, which a hacker may be able to gain access to through other connected devices.

Election security

The London-to-Langley Spy Ring

Even before the first Republican primary, a London-to-Langley spy ring had begun to form against Donald Trump. British spies sent to CIA director John Brennan in late 2015 alleged intelligence on contacts between Trumpworld and the Russians, according to the Guardian.

Here’s the crucial paragraph in the story:

GCHQ first became aware in late 2015 of suspicious “interactions” between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected Russian agents, a source close to UK intelligence said. This intelligence was passed to the US as part of a routine exchange of information, they added.

Notice it doesn’t say the “Trump campaign” but “figures connected to Trump.” One of those figures was Michael Flynn, who didn’t join the campaign until February 2016. But Brennan and British intelligence had already started spying on him, drawing upon sham intelligence from Stefan Halper, a long-in-the-tooth CIA asset teaching at Cambridge University whom Brennan and Jim Comey would later send to infiltrate the Trump campaign’s ranks.

It appears that Halper had won Brennan’s confidence with a false report about Flynn in 2014 — a reported sighting of Flynn at Cambridge University talking too cozily with a Russian historian. Halper had passed this absurdly simpleminded tattle to a British spy who in turn gave it to Brennan, as one can deduce from this euphemistic account in the New York Times about Halper as the “informant”...

War on terror

Libya's Haftar Forces Take Control of Entrance to Derna - Spokesman

he Libyan National Army (LNA), headed by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, liberated the entrance of the city of Derna from terrorists, LNA spokesman Ahmed Al-Mismari said on Monday.

"Army has taken control of the entrance to Derna and five new positions," the spokesman said on Twitter.

Earlier in May, Haftar announced the start of a military operation to liberate Derna, which has been under siege since the overthrow of country’s longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. On May 8, a Libyan military source told Sputnik that the LNA took control of Derna’s eastern districts. Earlier this week, Haftar said that the army was nearing the liberation of Derna.

Derna is located 620 miles to the east from Tripoli and it is controlled by terrorist groups linked to al-Qaeda* (terror group banned in Russia). Previously, the city was controlled by the Daesh* terrorist group, outlawed in Russia. This city is considered to be the last stronghold of Islamic militants in the east of the country, which is now controlled by Haftar's forces.