Putin. ISIS. A Chechen whacked in broad daylight in Berlin
Putin. ISIS. A Chechen whacked in broad daylight in Berlin
Someone pointed out to me that I should put the fundraising link in this first, in case you get distracted before you finish this.
The next section is only for people who’ve contributed to my GoFundMe or my Patreon accounts. It’s behind a paywall, but it works on the honor system. If you haven’t contributed, you can go straight to the free stuff after the jump. Just avert your eyes and scroll down if you don’t want to pay.
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The Paywall of Honor
Welcome, honored friends.
This isn’t from my Twitter feed. None of today’s newsletter really is, actually. I wasn’t that interesting on Twitter.
Hey you—you’re not cheating there, are you?
Good. I didn’t think so.
As you’ve perhaps heard, the President of the United States has tweeted a photo of an Iranian launchpad. It came from an intelligence briefing he’d received earlier in the day.
As you’ve probably also heard, he has the right to declassify anything he wants. (That is not strictly speaking true, but that’s what the White House claims, and let’s just assume it for the sake of argument.)
Irrespective of legality, was it wise of him to disclose billions of dollars of secret intelligence capabilities on Twitter, I wondered? I was unsure. You may be, too. So I asked not just one, not just two, but three high-level sources for you. The high-level sources agreed to speak with this reporter on condition of anonymity.
Claire to High-level Source 1: Was it wise of the President of the United States to disclose billions of dollars of secret intelligence capabilities on Twitter?
High-level Source 1, on condition of anonymity: Without acknowledging any past positions, experience, knowledge, or covenants, and relying entirely on open source information, there is a lot of information about capabilities that can be discerned from a piece of imagery. One thing in particular that has been mentioned is that if it is not an image sourced from a satellite, then it very likely exposes other capabilities of the United States or partner nations that aren’t widely known or acknowledged.
But it wasn’t in this case. Based upon some math and open-source tracking information on items in earth orbit, there is now high confidence that this was a picture taken from USA 224, an NRO satellite launched in 2011 at a $2B cost. Not only does the picture make it clear what that particular satellite is capable of, if atmospherics at the time were different than clear air, it exposes additional capabilities of said satellite.
It also provides some rough level of capability that could be then used to discern what it cannot do (which is just as bad, to be honest, as we want our enemies to assume we can see everyone, everything, anytime. Obviously we cannot do that, so knowing what are limitations are is of direct strategic value to our enemies)
As an aside, commercial satellite operators are prohibited from selling images with resolutions better than 24cm. This image is estimated to be of a quality of at least twice as good as that.
And yes, I’m actually personally convinced this was a photo taken on a cell phone directly from a printed page in the PDB. Whether or not that is the exact source, it’s a big shock to see that stuff in the open, and it does hurt our capabilities to the advantage of our enemies. Sad!
Claire to High-level Source 1: Could there be any conceivable strategic purpose or advantage in releasing that image?
High-level Source 1, on condition of anonymity: Depends. Which country’s strategic interest are you asking about?
You’re still behind the Paywall of Honor
Claire to High-level Source 2: Was it wise of the President of the United States to disclose billions of dollars of secret intelligence capabilities on Twitter?
High-level Source 3, on condition of anonymity: Without adding any details my own personal past employment history, I can just say that I nearly had a stroke when Trump tweeted this out. Dismissal of it is inappropriate. It’s actually worse than it looks.
Claire to High-level Source 2: Could there be any conceivable strategic purpose or advantage in releasing that image?
High-level Source 2, on condition of anonymity: I actually can make an argument that there could be some rationale here, but that quickly gets into 4D chess excuse-making territory. More to the point, for every strategic reason I can come up with, I can think of about a dozen alternatives to accomplish that same purpose without disclosing sensitive information about our capabilities. Maybe it’s just a failure of my imagination.
As for the hand-waving dismissals, we have literally jailed dozens of people and/or fired and barred them from government service for disclosing less information about our overhead capabilities. It’s shocking. Really.
The reason we handle imagery with such high expectations of secrecy is precisely because of inferences like these that can be made about sources and methods.
You remain behind the Paywall of Honor. Thank you for supporting my work.
Claire to High-level Source 3 Was it wise of the President of the United States to disclose billions of dollars of secret intelligence capabilities on Twitter?
High-level Source 3, on condition of anonymity: No.
Claire to High-level source 3: Could there be any conceivable strategic purpose or advantage in releasing that image?
High-level Source 3, on condition of anonymity: No.
Free stuff from here to the end
The rest of this newsletter is totally free. Enjoy!
Have a look at the Operation Inherent Resolve Lead Inspector General Report to the US Congress. ISIS is growing, again, in Iraq and Syria, to a now-estimated 14,000 to 18,000 militants. The report specifically and repeatedly attributes this to Trump’s decision to rapidly draw down our troop presence in Syria and Pompeo’s decision to pull our diplomats from Iraq. “ISIS continued its transition from a territory-holding force to an insurgency in Syria, and it intensified its insurgency in Iraq,” they say.
If you’re of the “Come on Claire, you’re exaggerating about Trump” School of International Relations, look at that report. Obama was pilloried for “throwing away our victory in Iraq.” But even I would say, in his defense, that he didn’t have the benefit of hindsight that Trump had.
The way Obama got out of the war was, you know, disgraceful, and idiotic. When he announced the date certain, they pulled back, and they said, “Oh, well.” As much as they don’t mind dying, they do mind dying. And they pulled back, and then, you know, it’s a, it was a terrible thing the way he announced that, and then he didn’t leave troops behind so that, you know, whatever there was of Iraq, which in my opinion wasn’t very much, because I think that, you know, the government was totally corrupt, and they put the wrong people in charge, and you know, that in its own way led to the formation of ISIS, because they weren’t given their due. But, I think that President Obama, the way he got out of that war was unbelievable.
Trump knew exactly what would happen if he drew down the forces in Syria. I would wager he couldn’t find a single general, indeed a single person who knew anything at all about Iraq or Syria and would tell him in good faith that “getting out of Syria” would lead to anything but a renewed ISIS insurgency and an Iranian bridge to the Mediterranean. Everyone familiar with the situation warned him of this—in the strongest of terms.
“Mattis made his case for keeping troops in Syria. Trump rejected his arguments. Thirty minutes into the conversation, Mattis told the president, ‘You’re going to have to get the next secretary of defense to lose to ISIS. I’m not going to do it.’”
Our historic victories against ISIS
So ISIS has been reconstituting in Iraq, where they’re ramping up for an “aggressive insurgency” and engaged in “an extensive worldwide social media recruitment effort to draw foreigners to the cause.” There are now an estimated 14,000 to 18,000 ISIS militants in Iraq and Syria.
The Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve’s acronym is CJTF-OIR. For the sake of readability, I’ve replaced the acronym below with the words “our soldiers,” and replaced other acronyms with conventional pronouns. The Syrian Defense Force are our mostly Kurdish (indeed mostly PKK) allies.
Our soldiers told us that it estimates that 45,000 “ISIS supporters” reside at the [al Hol refugee camp in Syria]. Our soldiers stated that the “uncontested spread” of ISIS’s ideology in the camp reflects the Syrian Defense Force’s inability to provide more than minimal security around the camp’s perimeters. … our soldiers reported that they provide security support to Syrian Defense Force’s elements that secure the perimeter of the al Hol camp … [but] they reported that due to the drawdown of U.S. forces in Syria, it lacks resources to track the humanitarian situation in the camp.
Meanwhile, Iran is increasing, not decreasing, its regional footprint:
The United States has sought the removal of Iranian and Iranian-proxy militias from Syria as part of broader goals to defeat ISIS and bring an end to Syria’s 8-year civil war. However, Iran showed no signs of decreasing its activities in Syria this quarter, and in some instances increased its presence.
And Russia has been blocking aid from reaching stranded Syrian civilians at the Rukban settlement:
USCENTCOM reported that Russia has halted aid to the settlement to undermine the legitimacy of U.S. forces stationed at the garrison by creating poor humanitarian conditions and then orchestrating a disinformation campaign to blame the United States for the dire state of the camp. USCENTCOM said that Russia hoped to use controversy over Rukban to force U.S. troops to leave.
Trump lied when he said ISIS was defeated. Flat-out. He lied when he said there was no longer a reason to have troops in Syria.
Anyone with even a glancing familiarity with the region—but especially everyone serving there—knew when he said it that it was an outright lie.
But did Trump himself know it was a lie, I wonder? Or was he lying to himself?
Trump’s not the only one lying about this situation. If only by omission, all the Democratic presidential aspirants are lying too. None have said, frankly, “This is what we’ll confront during the next Administration.” None have said, “Even though we all wish we’d never heard of Iraq, the reality is that as soon as I’m elected, I’ll be up to my neck in it, and this is my plan.”
You’ll notice the conspicuous absence of “a plan for that.”
Actually, the word “lying” isn’t quite right. None of them are talking about this, at all, so they can’t be lying, technically. But they either know we’re facing this or they don’t. I don’t know which is worse.
Let’s cut them all some slack, though. Our politicians have lied about this, and will continue to lie about it, because we don’t want them to tell us the truth.
Every single Democrat is promising to get the troops out of Afghanistan yesterday. Trump’s negotiating with the Taliban.
Headline: Taliban launches large-scale attack on key Afghan city.
Our Partners in Peace? Say it ain’t so!
Syria and Russia have shifted their strategy in Idlib. They’re no longer trying to capture the territory, because Iran isn’t willing to provide the ground troops. Turkey is arming what this report euphemistically call “opposition groups,” by which, I presume, they mean some combination of US-approved opposition groups and jihadi gangs like Ansar al-Tawhid and Hay’et Tahrir al-Sham. (Better known to you as “al Qaeda.”)
Why would Turkey do this? Because otherwise Russia and Syria will march into Idlib, and they’ll gas and they’ll butcher as many men, women, and children as they can. Those they can’t kill will become refugees. Turkey can’t take any more refugees. Erdoğan has made himself essential to Europe—which is a helpful position to be in, at this otherwise difficult time in his political career—by preventing refugees from escaping. The Turks are using jihadi goons because no one else is prepared to make Assad’s goons think twice before driving in with the gas canisters.
What’s the problem, though, if Assad kills terrorists? The problem is that in addition ten thousand jihadis, Idlib also contains three million Syrian souls, almost half of whom were forcibly displaced from other parts of Syria and driven like cattle into Idlib. They’re not there by choice. They’re innocent men, women, and children. Mostly the latter. Half are children. Women and children together make up two-thirds of the population. Widowed women lead many of these households. They’ve all been herded into a region the size of Delaware and they’re trapped in it with ten thousand jihadis.
“Overcrowded camps and temporary shelters are everywhere,” according to myriad credible reports. “It is not uncommon to meet people who have fled the fighting five times.”
The rest of the world pretty much agrees that their death would be an unfortunate but minor price to pay if it means getting rid of their 10,000 jihadi companions (or captors, or protectors: the relationship is no doubt getting more complex and intimate by the day).
NB: 10,000 terrorists are not a trivial problem. To the contrary. They’re a danger to the world, a danger to the United States, and a danger to civilians in Idlib. We can’t just ignore them.
But because there’s a large and desperate civilian population in Idlib, you can’t bomb that territory indiscriminately.
And, in fact, we don’t. The US aims for—and hits—terrorists and their training camps: legitimate military objectives. So far, I’ve seen no reports that we’ve hit anything but legitimate military targets in Idlib.
This is what Russia and Assad claim to be doing there, too. “Killing terrorists.”
But no, that’s not what they’re doing. Russia and Syria have probably killed a few terrorists by accident, simply because they’ve killed so many people. But they’re not aiming at them. They’ve converged on a strategy, if you can call it that, of punitive bloodletting: massive, indiscriminate, aerial and artillery bombing, with no military objective. The killing is the point.
Not only do they not discriminate between military and civilian targets, they take aim, deliberately, at the hospitals.
Deliberately? Surely not. By mistake, possibly. The US has bombed hospitals by mistake, too. In Afghanistan, for example.
No, deliberately.
How do we know?
Because at first, UN officials just couldn’t believe it either. The Russian air force wouldn’t deliberately target hospitals, would they? Why would they do that? That would be monstrous. It would be an out-and-out war crime. Not only would it violate the Geneva Conventions, it would violate every ancient warrior taboo and every code of honor among professional soldiers. And why would they do it? It would serve no strategic purpose. These hospitals aren’t secret military installations. They’re not part of an infrastructure that supports a military aim.
Russia, they assumed, must be making the kind of mistake we made in Kunduz.
So, as part of their deconfliction program, the UN began asking the region’s hospitals to send them their precise GPS coordinates. They passed these along to Turkey, the United States, and Russia.
Why the G8 became the G7
You may not have known about Russia’s hospital-targeting, but obviously our military knows it, and presumably the President has been fully briefed about it. That’s why it caused apoplexy among our allies when Trump showed up at the G7 to argue, vigorously, that Putin should be invited back to the G7.
Diplomats present at the G7 stress that this did not seem to be, “one of those weird things he says off the top of his head.” He was adamant about it. It caused significant discord.
Pour le mémoire: Russia was ejected in the first place because it invaded and occupied another European country. (More than one, in fact.) That’s not a frozen conflict, by the way, or ancient history. More than 10,000 Ukrainians have been killed so far and the number rises every week. dangerously subservient to Vladimir Putin.
Putin is slowly inhaling Europe, village by village. He’s becoming more brazen every day. Two days ago, a Chechen exile was assassinated, in broad daylight, in the streets of Berlin. Shot twice in the head at close range. Right in the Kleiner Tiergarten park. The suspect, one Vadim S., a Russian national, was arrested after two teenagers saw him tossing a Glock, a silencer, a bicycle, and a wig into the river Spree. Der Spiegel said German security agencies “were increasingly confident Russia’s signature could be detected behind Khangoshvili’s killing.”
You think?
The Kremlin has denied any involvement in the killing. “I categorically reject any link between this incident, this murder and official Russia,” said Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov.
(Incidentally, when I lived in Istanbul, I noticed that Chechens got whacked there on the regular. It never made international news. Either Russian hitmen operate there with impunity or they have private agreement with the Turkish state, which perhaps reserves the right to whack one or two of its own terrorists on Russian soil. Who knows.)
The point is this happened in Germany, where such things don’t usually happen in public. This means, as Der Spiegel’s source says, “If it turns out that a state player like Russia is behind this, we have a second Skripal case on our hands, with everything that entails.”
And what exactly does it entail?
It’s not as if anyone can do much about this if the US is playing for the wrong team, is it?
Tears of mirth
But seriously, why was Trump banging on about inviting Russia back into G7? Is the President a Russian asset or just a useful idiot?
A few days later, Politico reported that the White House was slow-walking the funding for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative—again putting Trump and the Pentagon directly at odds. Congress has already appropriated the money for security aid to Ukraine, including funding for weapons, training, equipment, and intelligence.
The White House is saying it wants to be sure the money is well-spent. This could sound convincing if you’re not paying close attention. Yes, of course we have to be sure it’s well spent! Ukraine is very corrupt. We can’t be wasting our money on corrupt Ukrainians— we need to waste it on corrupt Americans right here at home.
Except the Pentagon had just finished conducting that review, exactly. “The department has reviewed the foreign assistance package and supports it,” a “senior defense official” told Politico.
Trump isn’t just saying strange things about Putin. He’s rowing the whole boat of foreign policy in the wrong direction, over the urgings of his own military, a bipartisan consensus in Congress, and the protests of our allies—yes, including the ones who “pay their bills.” It’s more than passing strange.
Whether he’s an asset, a useful idiot, or just differently-abled, strategically, this is not in the American national interest.
These things tend not to make headlines in the US, but they sure get the attention of security establishments in Europe.
“It's not the time to decrease military or any other support to Ukraine, it’s the time to provide more support to Ukraine,” [said] a Baltic diplomat …
National security adviser John Bolton spent two days this week in Ukraine, in part to advise Zelensky not to “rush into" any agreement with Russia pertaining to the conflict. …
And you can be quite certain the Kremlin notices these things, too.
Other countries, Trump says, used to laugh at us because we were so weak.
You don’t need to understand Russian to grasp who’s laughing at whom, do you?