Carl Osgood

March 9—The Russian Defense Ministry published documents this morning it said prove that the Kiev regime was preparing an offensive in the Donbas set to begin in early March. The document posted this morning is an order signed by the commander of Ukraine’s National Guard, Colonel-General Mykola Balan, dated Jan. 22, 2022. This document, entitled “On organizing the training of a battalion tactical group of the 4th operational brigade to perform combat (special) tasks in the joint forces operation as part of a brigade of the armed forces of Ukraine,” "details the plan for preparing one of the shock groups for offensive operations in the zone of the so-called ‘Joint Forces Operation’ in the Donbas, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov this morning.Konashenkov stressed that the order focused on the 80th separate air assault brigade which had been trained by American and British instructors under the “NATO standard” training programs in Lviv. As part of the preparation for offensive action, “the National Guardsmen are ordered to provide ‘visual agitation, information and propaganda materials, flags, and printing products,’” Konashenkov continued. “The deputy commander of the National Guard for personnel was ordered to organize ‘an effective system of moral and psychological support for the battalion tactical group of the 4th operational brigade, internal communication of commanders with subordinates, information.’ At the same time, it is important to provide ‘an explanation to the personnel of the decisions of the leadership and the importance of fulfilling the tasks ahead.’” Konashenkov drew attention to a paragraph in the order that “prohibits sending National Guardsmen who showed ‘unsatisfactory’ results of psychological testing according to the criterion of ‘risk readiness’ to the area of combat coordination and to the place of performance of ‘combat special tasks.’” “We well remember the statements by the leadership of the Kiev regime circulated in February by the Western media about the alleged absence of any plans for the armed seizure of the Luhansk and Donetsk People’s Republics. Their desire to resolve all issues allegedly in a political and diplomatic way,” Konashenkov continued. “However, the originals of the secret military documents of the National Guard of Ukraine clearly prove the falsity of these statements.” Only one question remains to be answered, he concluded: “how deeply the U.S. leadership and its NATO allies were involved in the planning and preparation of the operation to storm the Donbas by the Ukrainian inter-service grouping of troops in early March. All those who care so much about peace in Ukraine today.”

Feb. 10—Pentagon spokesman John Kirby announced yesterday that Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has picked billionaire environmentalist “Mussolini Mike” Bloomberg to chair the Defense Innovation Board. Kirby said that Austin had nominated Bloomberg to “leverage his experience and strategic insights on innovation, business and public service.” Kirby added that Bloomberg will bring “a wealth of experience in technology innovation, business and government to the Defense Innovation Board.”“His leadership will be critical to ensuring the department has access to the best and brightest minds in science, technology and innovation through the team of diverse experts that he will lead as chair of that board,” Kirby said. “And obviously the secretary is very grateful that Mr. Bloomberg was willing to take on this additional responsibility and very grateful that he’s willing to serve in that capacity,” he continued. The Hill notes that the Defense Innovation Board is an advisory board that was established in 2016 to provide the department with recommendations on emerging technologies and innovative approaches to development. In other words, it was created as part of then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work’s Third Offset Strategy to “leverage” Silicon Valley into making the U.S. military technologically superior to Russia and China. “Innovation and adaptability are absolutely critical at any large organization, and there is no organization bigger or more complex than the Department of Defense,” Bloomberg said in a statement. “I’m honored to work with Secretary Austin, Deputy Secretary [Kathleen] Hicks, other senior Defense Department leaders and innovators from government and business to help bring new ideas and outside perspective that can help protect Americans and our values, interests, and allies around the world.”

Secretary of State Tony Blinken went on a Goebbels-style rampage against Russia, turning history since 2014 completely on its head, in remarks to reporters following NATO’s virtual foreign ministers meeting. “We’re prepared to respond forcefully to further Russian aggression, but a diplomatic solution is still possible and preferable, if Russia chooses it,” he said, according to the State Department transcript. “That’s what we, together with our allies and partners, will continue to pursue intently next week at the Strategic Stability Dialogue between the United States and Russia, and at the meetings of the NATO-Russia Council and the OSCE, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.”“Ahead of these urgent discussions, let’s be clear about how we got to this moment,” he said, before unleashing a completely false narrative about events since 2014. “In 2014, the Ukrainian people chose a democratic (!) and European future for themselves. Russia responded by manufacturing a crisis and invading,” he said completely reversing the reality that an elected government was overthrown by a neo-Nazi-dominated violent coup in which the U.S. played a direct role. Acknowledging the reality, however, would make it impossible to then paint Moscow as the aggressor trying to crush the “democratic aspirations” of the Ukrainian people. That of course includes the rhetoric that NATO is only a “defensive alliance” that “exists to protect, not to attack.” Additionally, “NATO never promised not to admit new members,” Blinken went on, “It could not and would not—the ‘open door policy’ was a core provision of the 1949 North Atlantic Treaty that founded NATO.” Turning to the topic of the series of meetings beginning on Monday, Jan. 10 in Geneva, Blinken declared that “Russia is now demanding that both the United States and NATO sign treaties to withdraw NATO forces stationed in the territory of Allies in Central and Eastern Europe and to prohibit Ukraine from ever joining NATO. They want to draw us into a debate about NATO, rather than focus on the matter at hand, which is their aggression toward Ukraine. We won’t be diverted from that issue, because what’s happening in Ukraine is not only about Ukraine. It’s part of a broader pattern of destabilizing, dangerous, and often illegal behavior by Moscow as it tries to build a sphere of influence that covers the countries that were once under Soviet dominion, and to stop them from realizing their democratic aspirations as fully sovereign, independent nations.” As for yesterday’s NATO meeting, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was on the same track as Blinken in terms of blaming Russia for everything. “Russia’s aggressive actions seriously undermine the security order in Europe,” he said. “NATO remains committed to our dual-track approach to Russia: strong deterrence and defense, combined with meaningful dialogue. It is a positive signal that Russia is now prepared to come to the table and talk because when tensions are high, dialogue is even more important.” “We are always ready to listen to Russian concerns and NATO will make every effort to find a political way forward,” Stoltenberg droned on. “But for dialogue to be meaningful, it must also address Allies’ long-standing concerns about Russia’s actions. It must be based on the core principles of European security and it must take place in consultation with Ukraine.” But there’ll be no halt to NATO expansion. “We will not compromise on core principles, including the right for every nation to decide its own path, including what kind of security arrangements it wants to be a part of,” he said. Stoltenberg claimed that the Russian military buildup that sparked fears of an invasion has continued. “We see armored units, we see artillery, we see combat-ready troops, we see electronic warfare equipment and we see a lot of different military capabilities,” he said. This buildup, combined with Russia’s security demands, and its track record in Ukraine and Georgia, “sends a message that there is a real risk for a new armed conflict in Europe,” Stoltenberg said.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was in Berlin yesterday to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel one more time before she retires, and to address the German Atlantic Association “NATO Talk” Conference 2021. During that speech he suggested, apparently in response to an audience question, that should the German government that’s expected to replace that of Merkel decide to opt out of NATO’s nuclear sharing program, then the estimated 20 B61 nuclear gravity bombs that are currently stored at the German Büchel air base could be moved to another country—closer to Russia. “Of course, it’s up to Germany to decide whether the nuclear arms will be deployed in this country, but there’s an alternative to this; the nuclear arms may easily end up in other European countries, including those to the east of Germany,” he said.Stoltenberg didn’t bother to venture a guess as to how Russia might respond to such a thumb-in-your-eye provocation. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova responded to earlier comments by Stoltenberg demanding “transparency” from Russia. She branded NATO claims as ludicrous that the alliance observes Russia’s desire to use its force and military capabilities against neighboring countries. “I would like to remind the NATO secretary general that in modern history exactly NATO member countries have been a source of aggression that has claimed millions of lives. NATO’s militarism and imperial ambitions have triggered dozens of armed conflicts, devastated states and led to the plight of civilians and millions of refugees,” she asserted. “However, these things somehow do not concern the alliance and this bloc is not going to bear responsibility for its crimes.” Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko, whose portfolio includes Russia’s relations with Europe and NATO, again made it clear that Russia is prepared to talk and negotiate, according to TASS. Grushko pointed out that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposed post-INF missile moratorium remains on the table. “The President’s initiative on reciprocal moratoriums is still in force. Moreover, it has become more topical in the current conditions. And we are convinced that healthy forces, including within NATO, who see the pernicious effects on European security of the prospects for the turning of our continent into a Cold War-style arena of confrontation, will draw conclusions and finally demonstrate the political will for continuing the dialogue on this topic,” he said. “We have repeatedly said we are ready to negotiate all other aspects linked with the implementation of this initiative, including the use of transparency and verification mechanisms.”

British Retired Officer Wants To Court-Martial Biden for Afghanistan Decision In the aftermath of the collapse of the idea of “Global Britain,” it’s not surprising that there would be Brits joining the calls in Washington for Biden’s removal from office. Lt. Col. Richard Kemp (ret.), CBE, who once commanded British troops in Afghanistan, said in a Sunday TV interview that Biden should be court-martialed for “betraying the United States of America and the United States’ armed forces.” Kemp apparently doesn’t understand that under the American constitutional system, there is no military authority that can court-martial the President. Or perhaps he does and is actually calling for a military coup in the United States. “I don’t say this lightly and I’ve never said it about anybody else—any other leader in this position. People have been talking about impeaching President Biden,” Kemp told Fox News host Mark Levin. “I don’t believe President Biden should be impeached. He’s the commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces who’s just essentially surrendered to the Taliban: He shouldn’t be impeached. He should be court-martialed for betraying the United States of America and the United States armed forces.” Kemp predicted China, which along with Russia “has all but recognized the Taliban” as the new government of Afghanistan, will join with neighboring Pakistan and Iran to further “enrich themselves by plundering” the war-torn country. China is also poised to use Afghanistan’s wealth of minerals and natural resources as a way to “hit against the West,” Kemp claimed. “So the whole world just became vastly more dangerous. The U.S. government—President Biden humiliated the United States. He humiliated the United States Army,” Kemp argued. “I think the consequences of what’s just happened and what’s still happening are absolutely devastating for the whole of the Western world.” Observer Commentator: Biden Has Left Global Britain ‘Impotent and Friendless’ Andrew Rawnsley, Chief Political Commentator of the Observer, writes in a commentary posted yesterday that Boris Johnson’s “Global Britain” has been exposed as “impotent and friendless” by Biden’s decision-making on Afghanistan. The Anglo-American special relationship was declared to be “warm and friendly” after Biden took office and made his first phone call to Boris Johnson, but “Now we know differently,” Rawnsley laments. “When it came to the calls that mattered over Afghanistan, Mr Johnson’s capacity to influence Mr Biden was less than that of the president’s dog,” he continues. “The withdrawal of what remained of the NATO presence in Afghanistan was dictated by abrupt and unilateral decisions made in Washington. Ministers privately admit that not only did they fail to see a resurgent Taliban coming, they have been reduced to second-guessing what the United States will do next.” The reaction of Conservatives in the House of Commons was intense. “Where is Global Britain on the streets of Kabul?” Theresa May angrily demanded of Johnson in Parliament last week. “I have never heard so much fury so ferociously expressed by Conservative MPs about the behaviour of the U.S. Behind their hot anger was a cold fear: the foreboding sense of an impotent Britain friendless in a frightening world,” Rawnsley writes. The future of “Global Britain” seems to be left hanging. “If we are entering an era of American disengagement, the questions are acute for a Britain that chose to estrange itself from the liberal democracies in its neighborhood at the same time as the U.S. was becoming a less dependable partner,” Rawnsley writes near the end. “Some plausibly conjecture that the future is a new world disorder in which the great powers jostle for predominance and norms of international conduct are trampled underfoot. This will be a rough place for a country in the north-east Atlantic with lots of vital interests around the globe, but not the means to safeguard them by itself and no one it can count on as an all-weather friend….” “‘Very well, alone’ did good service for Winston Churchill as a wartime rallying cry in 1940. British impotence in Afghanistan demonstrates that it is an utterly hopeless strategy for survival in the 21st century,” he concludes.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is to land in Kiev today with Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland by his side. The Associated Press admitted that Nuland’s presence is “likely to irritate Russia,” given her history and orchestration of the 2014 Maidan coup, including coordination with openly neo-Nazi leaders and networks in the country. AP presented this as “Nuland’s advocacy for reform-minded, pro-Western Ukrainian politicians incurred the Kremlin’s wrath.”Other media sources point out there will be “tension” in Blinken’s trip, because of his focus on fighting corruption and institutional reform. Money from the IMF will be dependent on Ukraine carrying out the reforms the U.S. demands, Unian press agency warns, and reporting that Blinken will demand results. Unnamed State Department officials, briefing reporters on the G7 foreign ministers meeting in London on background yesterday, said that during the plenary session, the ministers spent an hour-and-a-half on Russia, including Ukraine and Belarus. Ukraine was also discussed in the bilateral meetings that took place on the sidelines. “[W]e’re all in agreement and stand in solidarity with Ukraine against Russian aggression,” one of the officials said. Viktor Medvedchuk, the head of the political council of the Opposition Platform—For Life party in Ukraine, warned yesterday that the main U.S. interest in Ukraine is in the confrontation with Russia. “The world leaders who supported [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky made the right choice. But in this chorus of support the United States sets the tune. It wants Ukraine to be a stronghold of confrontation on the border with Russia that benefits U.S. interests above all,” Medvedchuk tweeted on May 4, reported TASS. Meanwhile, Polish President Andrzej Duda, with support from his counterparts in the Baltic states, seems to be doing everything to keep the Ukraine pot stirring. He hosted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Warsaw on Monday (May 3), after which the Ukrainian President declared that Poland is ready to fully support Ukraine’s European and Euro-Atlantic aspirations. Ukraine’s prospective membership in both the EU and NATO were on the agenda. “Our bilateral meeting ended today with the signing of a joint declaration on the European prospect for Ukraine, i.e. belonging to the EU. In this issue, Poland has always supported Ukraine,” Duda said at a joint briefing on the results of bilateral talks, reported Zelensky’s presidential website. As for NATO, Duda promised that a roadmap for Ukraine’s entry into the alliance will be discussed at the NATO summit in June. It is well known that Moscow considers Ukraine’s membership in NATO a casus belli. According to Duda, at the June summit, the heads of state and government of NATO countries will discuss the security of Ukraine, and in this regard, the security of all of Central Europe. “Secondly, this issue will also formally indicate to Ukraine the path it should take towards membership in the North Atlantic Alliance, a roadmap for membership, which is now a fundamental matter and for which Ukraine is fighting,” he said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov expressed concern this morning that the situation in the Donbas could escalate into the full-scale resumption of military operations. “There are concerns that Ukraine’s civil war will resume. And if a civil war with full-scale military activities resumes near our borders, it will pose a threat to Russia’s national security,” he emphasized, reported TASS. “The current developments and Ukraine’s behavior in general create the risk of full-scale military activities. It is clear from various statements that Kiev does not completely reject the idea of using force to resolve its issue with the southeast,” Peskov said.At the Foreign Ministry, spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned during her weekly press briefing today that Ukraine’s accession to NATO will lead to disaster. “We have taken note of a statement by Ukrainian President Zelensky, who visited Donbas yesterday and said that the country’s accession to NATO would supposedly help end the conflict in the region. However, contrary to Kiev’s expectations, potential NATO accession will not only fail to bring peace to Ukraine but will, by contrast, lead to a large-scale rise in tensions in the southeast, possibly causing irreversible consequences for Ukraine’s statehood,” she said. “We once again call on the Kiev authorities to adopt a responsible approach and finally start implementing their obligations under the Minsk Package of Measures,” TASS quoted her as saying. Zakharova stressed that the situation in Donbas remained complicated and tended to get worse because of “the bellicose intentions of Kiev, still guided by the illusion that there can be a military solution to the conflict in the country’s southeast.” “Troops and military equipment are being deployed to the region and mobilization plans are being updated,” she declared. “Ukrainian media outlets are whipping up hysteria based on the myth of the Russian threat, claiming that Moscow has plans to attack Ukraine in the near future. Kiev’s Western sponsors openly support most of the developments,” Zakharova said. Her complete briefing is posted on the Foreign Ministry’s website.

The Biden Administration’s explanation of a “legal” air strike in “self-defense” in Syria on Feb. 25 against Iranian-backed Iraqi groups alleged to be responsible for rocket attacks on U.S. bases and the Green Zone in Baghdad began to fall apart almost as soon as it was delivered. The explanation of the air strike has been rejected officially by Russia, Iran and Syria, by international legal experts and even by progressive members of President Biden’s own party in the U.S. Congress. It has also caused embarrassment for the government in Baghdad despite the administration’s assertion that targets were hit in Syria precisely to avoid problems for the Iraqi government.The Explanation Defense Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters at the Pentagon yesterday that Thursday night’s air strike involved a pair of F-15Es dropping seven precision-guided munitions, which totally destroyed nine facilities and partially destroyed two others, functionally destroying them. “The strike was authorized in response to recent attacks against American and coalition personnel in Iraq and to ongoing threats to those personnel.” The structures were in the city of Abu-Kamal, Syria, near a “terrorist” entry-control point close to the Syria-Iraq border, Kirby said, adding the claim that the location is known to facilitate activity by Iranian-allied militia groups. The target was also in an area known to have also been bombed by Israel but this was not apparently mentioned by Kirby. Kirby claimed that the purpose for striking those targets was twofold: to clearly try to make an impact on the groups and their ability to conduct future attacks and to send a clear signal that the United States is going to protect its people and its interests and those of its partners in the region. “These targets were chosen carefully, very deliberately,” Kirby said. “This really was a defensive strike meant to help protect … American forces and coalition partners,” he said. This is where the logic begins to get really twisted as we shall see. Politico cited unnamed defense officials saying that planning for the strike began on Feb. 15, in the aftermath of the rocket attack on the airport in Erbil, Iraq, but Biden held off on authorizing the strike immediately while officials worked to determine who was responsible for the attack, said the officials. On Feb. 20, a few days after the attack on Erbil, there was another rocket attack on the Iraqi airbase in Balad which wounded a contractor employed in maintaining Iraq’s F-16 fleet which is based there. Politico and other news outlets failed to report, is that the Iraqi security forces were engaged in an operation against ISIS sleeper cells just north of Baghdad at the time, an operation which was being supported by the Iraqi F-16s at Balad. This leads to the suspicion that ISIS may have been behind the attack on Balad, but instead it’s being lumped with the Erbil and Green Zone attacks as if Iran were responsible. Unlike with the Erbil attack, no group is reported to have claimed credit for the attack on Balad. The Pentagon presented Biden with a broad range of military options, according to a defense official, the Politico report continues. Biden chose the “middle” option, limiting the number of targets in order to keep collateral damage and civilian casualties to a minimum. Officials went through a “rigorous process” ahead of the strike, including a legal review, the spokesperson said. In ordering the operation, Biden acted “pursuant to inherent self-defense powers enshrined in our Constitution and the UN Charter.” “The targets were chosen to correspond to the recent attacks and to deter the risk of additional attacks over the coming weeks,” the spokesperson said. “The strikes were necessary to address the threat and proportionate to the prior attacks.” Biden made the strategic decision to conduct the strike in Syria, rather than on Iraqi soil, in order to avoid pressure on the Iraqi government, the official said. Biden’s decision to attack in Syria did not appear to signal an intention to widen U.S. military involvement in the region but rather to demonstrate a will to defend U.S. troops in Iraq and send a message to Iran, claimed The Associated Press. Legal Assessments Legal experts, however, are rejecting the administration’s logic as incompatible with international law. A National Security Council spokesperson told Alex Ward of Vox news site that the administration has two main legal arguments for why Biden had the authority to retaliate against Iranian-backed proxies operating on the Syria-Iraq border. Both of them rely on the idea that responding to the last two weeks’ attacks on coalition facilities counts as self-defense. Regarding domestic law, the spokesperson said, “the President took this action pursuant to his Article II authority to defend U.S. personnel.” Article II of the Constitution names the President as the commander-in-chief of the military. Mary Ellen O’Connell, a professor at Notre Dame and co-author of Self-Defense Against Non-State Actors, told Ward that the administration got international law all wrong. Article 51 of the UN Charter states that “Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.” O’Connell said the attack wasn’t on the American homeland, and the U.S. surely had enough time to work with UN Security Council partners to punish Iran using diplomacy—not force. That means Biden’s team either willfully misread what that provision says or didn’t comprehend its true meaning. “They are citing the correct sources of law,” O’Connell said, but “they are wildly misinterpreting them.” Adil Ahmad Haque, a Professor of Law at Rutgers Law School, argues that there are two reasons why the attack violated international law. “The airstrikes did not repel an ongoing armed attack, halt an imminent one, or immediately respond to an armed attack that was in fact over but may have appeared ongoing at the time,” he writes in a commentary on “Just Security” online forum. “And the airstrikes were carried out on the territory of another State, without its consent, against a non-State actor (or two, or more). These two reasons, combined, are decisive. It cannot be lawful to use armed force on the territory of another State when it is clear that no armed attack by a non-State actor is ongoing or even imminent.” The “ongoing threats” that the Pentagon cited were not an imminent attack, Haque goes on. “The United States is free to take lawful action in Iraq to improve the long-term security of its forces and contractors in Iraq,” Haque says. “It may not legally take military action in Syria to improve the long-term security of its forces and contractors in Iraq.” Haque reports that the State Department said after the Erbil attack that “we will respond in a way that’s calculated within our own timetable and using a mix of tools at a time and place of our choosing.” But: “That is not how international law works. The use of armed force is lawful only if, when, and where it is necessary. The U.S. government appears to concede that it was not necessary to strike inside Syria. It was merely convenient.” Furthermore, “A proportionate military response to a previous armed attack, that is clearly over, is not proportionate self-defense. That is an armed reprisal. And even proportionate armed reprisals are illegal.” “The U.S. airstrikes were not defensive. They were expressive,” Haque concludes. “The Pentagon says that the operation ‘sends an unambiguous message: President Biden will act to protect American and coalition personnel.’ The operation sends another message: President Biden will violate international law, much like his predecessors.” Congressional Responses Democrats and Republicans in Congress are also questioning the legality because the strike was launched without Congressional consultation. “Offensive military action without congressional approval is not constitutional absent extraordinary circumstances,” said Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA). “Congress must be fully briefed on this matter expeditiously.” “We need to extricate from the Middle East, not escalate,” progressive Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), said in a statement Feb. 26. “The President should not be taking these actions without seeking explicit authorization instead of relying on broad, outdated [authorizations]. I spoke against endless war [under] Trump, and I will speak out against it when we have a Democratic President.” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) highlighted a 2017 tweet from current White House press secretary Jen Psaki that criticized then-President Donald Trump’s decision to bomb Syria in retaliation for a chemical weapons attack. “What is the legal authority for strikes?” Psaki asked, stating “Syria is a sovereign country.” Omar tweeted in response: “Great question.” Omar told CNN that “We in Congress have congressional oversight in engaging in war and we haven’t been briefed yet and we have not authorized war in Syria.” Republican Reps. Nancy Mace, SC; Jim Banks, IN.; Rand Paul, KY; and Lauren Boebert, CO, also protested the attack. Russian, Iranian, Israeli Official Responses In Moscow, a reporter asked Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to comment on the U.S. air strike in Syria during a joint press conference with his Afghanistan counterpart. In addition to repeating that they were given only a five-minute warning of the attack, that the U.S. presence in Syria is illegal under international law, that they are stealing Syrian oil, and that the U.S. forces are blocking even humanitarian aid to the areas of Syria under control of the legitimate government, He also made the following announcement: “Recently, we have been receiving information from various sources (we cannot confirm them yet, and we want to ask the Americans directly) that they are allegedly in the process of making a decision never to leave Syria and even to break up that country.” Lavrov went on that the deconfliction arrangement is important, but aos said: “we believe it’s important to resume political and diplomatic contacts. We hope that the new U.S. administration will soon form its teams to deal with these matters. It is important for us to understand how Washington will be building its strategy on the ground and in the region, since the United States is voting for resolutions confirming the need to respect Syria’s sovereignty, political independence and territorial integrity.” The Iranians, for their part, finally spoke up late yesterday. Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said in a statement: “The attacks … have taken place in a context in which U.S. forces have illegally entered Syrian territory in recent years, occupying areas of the country and plundering its natural resources, including oil,” which rightfully belong to the Syrian nation, Khatibzadeh said, PressTV reported. “Illegal U.S. bases on Syrian soil also train terrorist forces and use them as tools,” he further said. He also denounced the U.S. attacks as a clear violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity that would exacerbate military conflicts and further destabilize the region. The Israelis, on the other hand, are delighted with the U.S. strike. Times of Israel reported yesterday that unnamed officials told the Walla news site: “The Iranians didn’t realize that Biden is not Obama, and that if they will continue down this road of miscalculation they will eventually get hit.” The report added that Washington had notified Israel in advance of the airstrikes. Iraq Rejects U.S. Claims of Cooperation The administration also complicated things for Baghdad, which it expressly said it was trying to avoid. Kirby caused a bit of a scandal in Baghdad when he stated, during his briefing yesterday, that Secretary of Defense Austin “was very sincere when he praised our Iraqi partners for the investigative and intelligence work they did. There was some very good work done on the intelligence side that helped lead to these successful strikes.” “We deny this,” the Defense Ministry said in a statement, reported Sputnik. Baghdad’s cooperation with the international coalition is limited to the “fight against terrorism threatening Iraq, in a form that allows for preserving the country’s sovereignty and security,” the statement read. The Interior Ministry issued a similar statement saying “the cooperation with the international coalition is limited to developing the security forces’ field skills to improve the police work in maintaining the internal security, fighting crime, and achieving societal peace,” reported Shafaq News. “Accordingly, no intelligence information has been exchanged by the ministry agencies and the international coalition forces related to the aforementioned airstrike.” After these denials, Kirby was forced to walk back his original statement. “The Iraqi government is investigating who launched rockets on its soil in recent days and weeks.” He said on Twitter yesterday, “But to be clear: we did not use Iraqi information to develop our targets for last night’s strikes.”

U.S. European Command confirmed rumors circulating for about the past two weeks yesterday that a contingent of B-1 bombers will indeed be deploying to Norway. “For the first time in Norway, more than 200 U.S. Air Force personnel from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, with an expeditionary B-1 Lancer bomber squadron, will arrive to support upcoming Bomber Task Force (BTF) missions out of Ørland Air Base, Norway,” a Eucom release said without providing any further details. “The Airmen will be a part of the advance team for scheduled missions in the coming weeks which will occur for a limited time. While at Orland, the airmen will conduct operations in the High North and work with allies and partners across the European theater,” reported Stars & Stripes.Ørland is just over 300 miles from the Arctic Circle, about a half-hour’s flight time for a B-1. This means that Russia’s military complexes on the Kola Peninsula are well within strike range for the big bombers, a fact that the Russians undoubtedly will take notice of. According to a report in “The War Zone” website, “the deployment signals the Air Force’s increasing commitment to working alongside NATO allies and other partners on Russia’s northwest borders as well as its ability to work in the High North.” Sputnik reports the Russian Embassy in Oslo earlier said that the activation of a foreign military presence in Norway, including the placement of U.S. strategic bombers, doesn’t contribute to overall stability in the region. It also pledged to monitor the situation and vowed to implement measures to defend the security of its country and region.

In an article heavily influenced by the 2018 National Defense Strategy, which defines Russia and China as strategic adversaries, published yesterday in the U.S. Naval Institute’s Proceedings, Adm. Charles Richard, commander of U.S. Strategic Command, warned that nuclear war with Russia and China is very possible and that therefore we must reshape our nuclear deterrent to make sure it doesn’t happen. “The implications of today’s competition and the associated risk of great power crisis or direct armed conflict are profound; they affect nearly every fundamental assumption we make about the use of armed force in the defense of the nation and its allies,” Richard writes.Richard complains that for the past two decades the U.S. military has been focused on anti-terrorism operations, thus “ignoring the nuclear dimension,” while Russia and China have been aggressively modernizing and expanding their nuclear forces. “At the U.S. Strategic Command, we assess the probability of nuclear use is low, but not ‘impossible,’ particularly in a crisis and as our nuclear-armed adversaries continue to build capability and exert themselves globally,” Richard writes further. “Further, assessing risk is more than just assessing likelihood; it also involves accounting for outcomes. We cannot dismiss or ignore events that currently appear unlikely but, should they occur, would have catastrophic consequences.” Richard goes on to give the entire laundry list of offenses and “aggressions” of which Russia and China are supposedly guilty, offenses that, of course, require a response from the U.S. “We must actively compete to hold their aggression in check; ceding to their initiatives risks reinforcing their perceptions that the United States is unwilling or unable to respond, which could further embolden them. Additionally, our allies may interpret inaction as an unwillingness or inability to lead. Remaining passive may deny us opportunities to position in ways that underpin one of our greatest strengths: strategic power projection.” “Faced with Russia and China’s growing threats and gray zone actions, the United States must take action today to position itself for the future,” Richard declares. “We must start by acknowledging that our most fundamental assumption—that strategic deterrence will hold, even through crisis and conflict—is going to be tested in ways not seen before.” Unfortunately, he continues, “our opponents invested in nuclear and strategic capabilities designed to constrain U.S. actions, test our alliances, and, if necessary, escalate past us—to include nuclear use. There is a real possibility that a regional crisis with Russia or China could escalate quickly to a conflict involving nuclear weapons, if they perceived a conventional loss would threaten the regime or state. Consequently, the U.S. military must shift its principal assumption from ’nuclear employment is not possible” to “nuclear employment is a very real possibility,’ and act to meet and deter that reality. We cannot approach nuclear deterrence the same way. It must be tailored and evolved for the dynamic environment we face.” This is clearly an argument for continuing the sweeping modernization plan for the U.S. nuclear arsenal and is perfectly in line with Pompeo’s scorched-earth approach to U.S. policy on China while in office, something that Richard cites in the article. The Washington Times reports that Richard said in an interview that the article, which was actually written last September, is meant to energize Navy leaders regarding the rapidly changing threat environment and how to provide the best military advice to civilian leaders. “In this new era of competition, this will be the first time in our nation’s history that we will have to face two nuclear-capable peers by the end of this decade,” he said. “We’ve assumed strategic deterrence will hold in the future, but as the threat environment changes, this may not be the case,” he added. “We need to be ready to respond to cross-domain threats to ensure the security of our nation and allies by thinking holistically about strategic deterrence in the 21st century.” Strategic nuclear competition should be viewed as maintaining relative advantage over competitors, with the United States seeking to play the dominant role. “As a department, we are wise to establish unity of effort in addressing Russian and Chinese aggression, while understanding they require different deterrence approaches, and incorporating that thinking into professional military education at the earliest opportunity,” Adm. Richard said. The same day, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr. and Marine Corps Commandant Gen. David Berger placed an op-ed in the Washington Post which, while focused on military readiness rather than nuclear deterrence, was based on the same assumptions about Russia and China from the National Defense Strategy.