CHINA
While the corona virus (Covid-19) continues making headlines around the world there is yet another less talked about, but significant, threat looming on the horizon and emanating again from China. A senior State Department official on Thursday reported on background that China’s new “military-civil fusion,” or MCF, poses serious ramifications for US national security.
MCF embodies the Chinese concept of targeting emerging and advanced technologies to develop the most technologically advanced military in the world using dual-use technology diverted to its armed forces. Its methods include outright technology theft, according to the official. By hiding its true intentions in collaborative research and development, and diverting technology acquired through civil trade to military programs, Beijing has been able to skip the time and cost normally associated with such programs. MCF works by eliminating the barriers between China’s defense industrial complex and the civilian economy, the official told reporters. In reality, what it means is that any research or academic institution, or private company anywhere, is at risk of unwittingly contributing to the development of China’s advanced military capabilities.
Chinese law requires join ventures to share all information with the military, including AI-enabled technologies with offensive end-use. The State Department official said: “The United States and our partners around the world have made commitments to transparency and provided assurances through international agreements and norms that dual-use technologies will not be diverted to military end-use. But with MCF, the PRC flouts these norms and is in fact explicitly working to divert dual-use technology to military end-uses, and often without the knowledge of all the parties involved.”
SYRIA
A senior State Department official in background reported that the Russians have been supporting a win-the-war offensive by the Assad regime in Idlib against the remaining opposition forces, violating the 2018 Sochi ceasefire agreement between Turkey and Russia, which was then subsequently endorsed by Merkel and Macron when they gathered in Istanbul at the end of October with Erdogan and Putin. He noted that is significant as there have been heavy casualties, including 33 Turkish soldiers killed. The Turkish government has now turned to the United Nations and NATO for assistance.
The risk, according to the official, is that 3.5 million refugees are being pushed into Turkey and further due to Russian and Syrian military actions. Complicating matters is the deliberate targeting of UN-identified safe zones in Idlib. He said: “You have 14 European Union foreign ministers that published an editorial in Le Monde on Wednesday attacking both Assad and the Russians….” Moscow also blocked two of the four humanitarian crossings into essentially non-regime areas and made it clear that they wanted this to end six months from now, the official added.
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According to a State Department official, Washington is involved in efforts to bring about an immediate end to Libya’s ongoing conflict and to minimize toxic foreign interference, with the goal of fostering a stable, unified, and democratic Libyan state that can partner with the U.S. to defeat terrorism and stabilize energy production. The official noted that the US is meeting regularly with “…Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, General Khalifa Haftar, and other Libyan leaders as part of our effort to de-escalate the fighting and demonstrate that the underlying drivers of the conflict can be addressed through political negotiations.” He pointed out that the situation risks becoming a proxy war.
The Libyan civil conflict, reignited in April 2019 when Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army launched a military offensive to seize Tripoli from the Government of National Accord. The State Department official pointed out that “Ten months of inconclusive fighting with frontlines roughly 10 miles outside central Tripoli that have remained largely unchanged since April 5th last year have amply demonstrated that there is no military solution to the conflict, short of a bloodbath or a long-term insurgency. Both the LNA and the GNA have sought military and financial support from outside backers, transforming the Tripoli conflict into a regional proxy war over political and economic clout in the broader Middle East.
DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government. Each Saturday, she presents key updates on U.S. foreign policy from the State Department.
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