Tag: Cuba
Stevenson’s army, June 8
-WaPo says the Ukrainian offensive has begun.
– WSJ says China is building a “spy base” in Cuba.
– European opinion isn’t so hostile to China, NYT reports. Here’s the poll.
– Military journalist Mark Thompson notes poor maintenance of US equipment:
One of the most interesting things about covering the Pentagon is the surprises you get when it’s caught with its cammies down. Take, for example, the massive stockpiles of weapons the U.S. military has stored around the world, primed to be shipped to the front lines and into battle within days. “The Army Prepositioned Stock program is a cornerstone of the Army’s ability to rapidly project power and send a clear signal of U.S. commitment,” the service says (PDF).
Um, not so much.
We’d likely never have learned just how unready this Army arsenal is if Vladimir Putin hadn’t invaded Ukraine. The U.S. has provided Ukraine with nearly $40 billion in military aid (PDF) since Russia invaded 15 months ago, nearly half (PDF) of which has come from U.S. military stockpiles. Some came from a U.S. depot in Kuwait, which is the subject of a Pentagon inspector general’s report released May 25. “We identified issues that resulted in unanticipated maintenance, repairs, and extended leadtimes to ensure the readiness of the military equipment selected to support the Ukrainian Armed Forces,” the IG said.
The inquiry examined the state of Ukraine-bound M777 howitzers and M1167 High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles. The Army had “identified the equipment as fully mission capable and ready for issue to the Ukrainian Armed Forces,” the IG noted (PDF). Au contraire: the inspector general concluded that a stunning 91% of the guns and vehicles (32 of 35) were, in fact, not ready for war.
The cannons were so poorly maintained they “would have killed somebody” (PDF) — and it wouldn’t have been the enemy. Quarterly inspections and repairs hadn’t been done for 19 months, leading to internal gun misalignments on four of the six guns “that could be fatal to the crew operating the howitzer.” Old hydraulic fluid had been recycled, which the operator’s manual forbids (PDF) because it can cause “disastrous results and malfunctions of critical systems.” Once shipped to Europe, worn firing pins and faulty firing mechanisms further delayed the guns’ delivery to Ukraine.
Twenty-six of the 29 M1167 tank-killing Humvees weren’t operational due to dead batteries, fluid leaks, broken gauges, and other woes. Tires on 25 of them had to be replaced due to dry rot. One Humvee tire shredded because of the problem on its way to Ukraine; the spare also failed “due to dry rot” (PDF).
The U.S. military has paid contractors close to $1 billion (PDF) to keep the gear in Kuwait ready for combat since 2016. But apparently that’s not enough (PDF). Which is why the U.S. Army graciously included a note to their Ukrainian allies along with one of the Humvees lacking a part. In the middle of a war for Ukraine’s survival, the U.S. Army suggested Ukraine seek the MIA part “through the established process for requesting parts” (PDF).
That’s the U.S. military’s key to victory: send in the paperwork.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Politico has background on the US decision on F16s for Ukraine.
Politico has this: BEIJING BLASTS U.S. ‘COERCIVE DIPLOMACY’: China’s foreign ministry chose the opening of the G7 meeting in Hiroshima, Japan on Friday to publish a 5,000 word screed accusing the U.S. of being the “inventor and master of coercive diplomacy.” The document lists examples ranging from the decades-long trade and economic embargo on Cuba to recent Treasury Department sanctions against China and Russia. The timing of the report’s release underscore’s Beijing’s sensitivity to the G7’s focus on countering Beijing’s economic coercion against countries that challenge Chinese policies. Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin declared the document “a good read” in a Friday press briefing.
And note that “5000 word screed.”
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, December 20
– The omnibus bill. including appropriations across the government and the Electoral Count Act as well as other measures, has been released. Here’s the reporting by Politico and RollCall. Also the bill text and summaries by Democrats and Republicans.
– NYT summarizes the growing criticism of the Supreme Court’s seizure of power from the other branches.
– Guardian reports the embarrassing breakdown of German Puma tanks.
– Vox tries to make sense of the crisis in Peru.
– NYT discovered that a newly elected GOP Congressman faked most of his resume.
To me, the blame goes to the Dems for inadequate oppo research. Punchbowl notes:
Yet the DCCC can hardly be accused of ignoring Santos’ candidacy. The campaign arm compiled an 87-page opposition document in August complete with dozens of social media posts, financial filings and information on Santos’ employment with a scandal-ridden corporation. The bulk of the research centered on Santos’ false claims of voter fraud, his hardline anti-abortion rights stances and support for conspiracy theories.
But the DCCC appears to have missed out on fact-checking basic biographical information, such as Santos’ education and employment. The NYT also revealed that Brazilian authorities charged Santos for making fraudulent purchases with a checkbook in 2010.
There are actions the new Congress could take, as a CRS report indicates.
WOTR hasa good historical summary of Truman, Eisenhower & Kennedy policies on Taiwan.
Charlie added this interesting note later:
I was exchanging reading recommendations with a friend and realized that there have been a few books in recent years that actually changed my mind regarding what I thought happened in history. I read a lot of disappointing books — too shallow, too heavy, too incomplete — but I generally enjoy revisionist historians, especially if they have a provocative thesis and ample evidence. If you want to buy one of these, the best place to look is https://www.bookfinder.com/ So here’s a short list:
World War I: I’m now persuaded that Russia shares much of the blame for the start of the Great War by its policies to dominate Turkey and by mobilization during the July 1914 crisis. After deep dives into long-hidden Russian archives, Sean McMeekin showed in The Russian Origins of the First World War that even Barbara Tuchman got the sequence wrong by relying on the falsified memoirs of the Russian Foreign Minister. McMeekin’s books on Russian diplomacy and the July crisis changed my view of German war guilt, though Austria-Hungary still deserves shared blame with Russia. See also his Russian Revolution, July 1914, and Stalin’s War, which describes World War II from Stalin’s viewpoint rather than the usual FDR/Churchill one.
Philip Zelikow’s The Road Less Traveled persuaded me that leaders missed a chance to end the war in December 1916 with a poorly staffed peace initiative by Woodrow Wilson that was undercut by Secretary Lansing and “Colonel” House.
FDR’s boldness: I had long admired Franklin Roosevelt’s strategic bravery in maneuvering the United States in support of Britain and against Hitler, believing that he was just ahead of public opinion, skillfully pulling it along. Lynne Olson’s Those Angry Days persuaded me that, much of the time, FDR vacillated, doing less than many of his advisors urged and hoped. He still was a great leader, just not quite as bold as I had thought.
World War II: James Lacey’s The Washington War, a bureaucratic politics analysis of FDR’s leadership, persuaded me that administrative and economic policies had as much to do with America’s ultimate success as its military operations. Phillips Payson O’Brien’s The Second Most Powerful Man in the World: The Life of Admiral William D. Leahy, Roosevelt’s Chief of Staff persuaded me that Leahy was far more influential on FDR’s war policy than General George Marshall. Jonathan Schneer’s Ministers at War: Winston Churchill and His War Cabinet persuaded me that much of Britain’s success was due to the way the cabinet worked together; Churchill dominated, but the cabinet mattered.
Postwar American policy: Derek Leebaert’s, Grand Improvisation: America Confronts the British Superpower, 1945-57, persuaded me that Britain hoodwinked America into doing what it wanted until the collapse at Suez. Samuel F. Wells, Jr.’s Fearing the Worst: How Korea Transformed the Cold War, convinced me that American misjudgments in the Korean war made the nuclear arms race with the USSR more likely. Serhii Plokhy’s Nuclear Folly: A History of the Cuban Missile Crisis, persuaded me that JFK lied about his policies and we came dangerously close to a full-scale nuclear war.
Slave Power’s influence on foreign policy: I never thought that slavery and its perpetuation had much impact on American foreign policy until I read Matthew Karp’s eye-opening history, This Vast Southern Empire: Slaveholders at the Helm of American Foreign Policy.
Karp details how the South dominated key foreign policy posts and consciously advocated policies to protect and even extend slavery in the decades before the War of the Rebellion. Defenders of slavery really had a “deep state.”
The Revolutionary War: I used to have a typical American high school student’s view of our war for independence as a story of brave patriots, toughened at Valley Forge and led by George Washington, who finally triumphed at Yorktown. Two books have changed my understanding of that conflict. One was Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy’s of British politics during the conflict, The Men Who Lost America. He argues that the British gave up for broader strategic reasons. Add to this Holger Hoock’s Scars of Independence, which describes the local violence on both sides and the mistreatment of Loyalists during and after the war. The good guys won, but they won dirty.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, October 28 and 29
– Fed Kaplan critiques the nuclear posture review.
– Atlantic Council team has good menu of options related to Russian nukes in Ukraine.
– Robert Draper worries about the GOP.
– WaPo says Russians are undermining Moldova.
– National Security Archive has more on how JFK lied to keep Cuban missile deal secret.
I failed to post yesterday’s edition:
– DOD released its new National Defense Strategy. Here’s NYT analysis. The Guardian notes the nuclear posture section.
– National Security Archive has JCS documents during Cuban missile crisis.
– House Veterans Affairs Committee warns of extremists in the military.
– House GOP plans tough China policy.
– Somalia wants more US drone strikes.
– Army strategist has good ideas for defense innovation.
NYT has good background on micro-targeting of political ads.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, October 17
– Mail-in voting rules may affect midterms.
– 28% of election-denier candidates are veterans, War Horse reports.
– Intercept reports on AIPAC election efforts.
– Belarus may be next Russian front, WSJ reports.
– Hill says Russia may conduct pre-election cyber attacks.
Charlie added later:
These can’t wait until Tuesday:
– New Yorker has excellent article on evolution of US support to Ukraine’s military.
– WSJ says US wants to keep B-52s in service.
– Max Boot says Israel-Lebanon agreement is a big win for Biden.
– Alice Hunt Friend says we don’t have standards on how civilians are supposed to do civ-mil relations.
– FP article details how JFK lied about Adlai Stevenson and the Cuba missile deal.
– National Security Archive has more on this.
A question for you: when did YOU learn that JFK had lied and actually made the Turkish missile removal part of the deal?
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Stevenson’s army, October 7
– GOP promises China focus if they control House.
– China blocks UN criticism of its human rights policies.
– Josh Rogin wants limits on lobbying by foreign dictators.
– WaPo says US intelligence reported direct criticism of Putin.
– NYT reports abuses by Mexican military.
– Axios reports anarchy in Haiti.
– CNN reports criticism of Havana syndrome investigations.
– CNN notes infrastructure bill opponents who now want the money.
– Why would a sitting US Senator want to quit to be a university president?
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, sometimes adding videos. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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