Author: Frank V. Vernuccio, Jr.

The Air Force plans to procure both a new long-range bomber, known as the B-21, and a new long-range standoff (LRSO) cruise missile during the 2020s. DOE is also modifying and extending the life of the B61 bomb carried on B-2 bombers and fighter aircraft and the W80 warhead for cruise missiles. Are these additions enough to supplemented the severely shrunken U.S. nuclear deterrent?

According to Navy Adm. Charles “Chas” A. Richard, the commander of the U.S. Strategic Command “Given Russia and China’s expanding capabilities in increasingly aggressive behavior, and those posed by nuclear North Korea and possibly Iran, we must reinvigorate the national conversation on the importance of strategic deterrence,” he said.

During the last 30 years, however, the Defense Department has focused on capabilities-based development and planning, because there was no existential threat, he said. “Our post-Cold War experiences of operating in uncontested domains are over. Our adversaries took advantage of this period, emboldened … their aggressive behavior, expanded their capabilities and reconsidered their tactics and strategies.” 

But, as the commander in charge of employing strategic deterrence capabilities for the nation and U.S. allies, Richard said he simply doesn’t have the luxury of assuming a crisis conflict or war won’t happen. 

“I know I painted a pretty sobering picture, but I really want to highlight the reality in front of us. It’s also important to understand how our modernization programs support and integrate with our efforts to rethink how we do strategic deterrence,” he noted.

The admiral said the DOD must prioritize the sustainment modernization of U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile bombers, ballistic missile submarines, weapons complex and its nuclear command, control and communications systems, also known as NC3.

Richard said he is committed to investing in modernizing NC3 systems to be more robust and survivable against physical, electromagnetic and cyber attacks. 

To shape the strategic environment to the U.S.’ advantage, the DOD must first face the reality that its adversaries have blurred the lines between conventional and nuclear conflict, and have developed capabilities to directly challenge the strategy, doctrine and advantages the United States has held as a nation and alliance. 

“We can no longer expect our potential adversaries to act within our long-standing, self-imposed constraints based on our rule sets or values, particularly between conventional and nuclear,” he said.

Richard has challenged Stratcom to revise its 21st-century strategic deterrence theory that considers U.S. adversaries’ decision calculus and behaviors and identifies threat indicators or conditions that could indicate potential actions. Crafting this revised theory, he added, minimizes risks inherent in competing against another nuclear-armed state. 

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“It’s an exhaustive assessment to fully account for current conditions, emerging capabilities, changing norms and rule sets, and potentially unintended outcomes within a spectrum of conflict,” he noted. 

“By the end of the decade, if not sooner, we will face two nuclear-capable peer adversaries who have to be deterred differently. We’ve never had to face that situation in our history,” Richard said.

Additionally, the DOD must engage in the environment early to shape its potential adversaries’ actions, using a synchronized whole-of-government and integrated global mindset, he said. 

“Our ability for globally integrated planning, communications and execution in a defined, shared understanding of the threat and what we do about it may be our last remaining advantage over the adversary,” the Stratcom commander said.

The DOD must advance its abilities to integrate its coordination processes across the globe and across all domains, Richard said, adding that will include rethinking how DOD executes its NC3. 

“As advanced kinetic capabilities are developed, we must have the ability to detect, identify, track and integrate our command and control architecture. NC3 architecture is a patchwork of deliberate systems that have been piecemealed over decades, [and] it works quite well, but it needs to be updated,” he said.

Illustration: Planned B-21 bomber (USAF)

The nation has not seriously considered the possibility of engaging in competition through a crisis or possible direct armed conflict with a nuclear-capable armed adversary in more than 25 years, Navy Adm. Charles “Chas” A. Richard, the commander of the U.S. Strategic Command stated at a International Security at the Nuclear Nexus conference hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

According to a Congressional Research study,  the United States has reduced the number of warheads deployed on its long-range missiles and bombers, consistent with the terms of the 2010 New START Treat.

In 1990, as the Cold War was drawing to a close and the Soviet Union entered its final year, the United States had more than 12,000 nuclear warheads deployed on 1,875 strategic nuclear delivery vehicles. As of July 1, 2009, according to the counting rules in the original Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), the United States had reduced to 5,916 nuclear warheads on 1,188 strategic nuclear delivery vehicles. Under the terms of the 2002 Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty (known as the Moscow Treaty) between the United States and Russia, this number was to decline to no more than 2,200 operationally deployed strategic nuclear warheads by the end of 2012. The U.S. Department of State reported that the United States had reached that level, with only 1,968 operationally deployed strategic warheads in December 2009. The New START Treaty, signed by President Obama and Russia’s President Medvedev on April 8, 2010, reduced those forces further, to no more than 1,550 warheads on deployed launchers and heavy bombers. According to the U.S. Department of State, on September 1, 2020, the United States had 1,457 warheads on 675 deployed ICBMs, SLBMs, and heavy bombers, within a total of 800 deployed and nondeployed ICBMs, SLBMs, and heavy bombers.

Moscow has a history of cheating on nuclear arms deals, so it is appropriate to ask whether they have carried out their end of the bargain. China, which has become the predominant military threat, is not a signatory to nuclear arms deals, and remains free to build up their arsenal beyond any limits.

At the present time, the U.S. land-based ballistic missile force (ICBMs) consists of 400 landbased Minuteman III ICBMs, each deployed with one warhead, spread among a total of 450 operational launchers. This force is consistent with the New START Treaty. The Air Force has modernized the Minuteman missiles, replacing and upgrading their rocket motors, guidance systems, and other components, so that they can remain in the force through 2030. It has initiated a program to replace these with a new Ground-based Strategic Deterrent beginning around 2029.

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The U.S. ballistic missile submarine fleet currently consists of 14 Trident submarines. Each can carry 20 Trident II (D-5) missiles—a reduction from 24 missiles per submarine—with the total meeting the launcher limits in the New START Treaty. The Navy converted 4 of the original 18 Trident submarines to carry nonnuclear cruise missiles. Nine of the submarines are deployed in the Pacific Ocean and five are in the Atlantic. The Navy also has undertaken efforts to extend the life of the missiles and warheads so that they and the submarines can remain in the fleet past 2020. It has designed and is beginning production of the new Columbia class submarine that will replace the existing fleet beginning in 2031.

The U.S. fleet of heavy bombers includes 20 B-2 bombers and 40 nuclear-capable B-52 bombers. The B-1 bomber is no longer equipped for nuclear missions. This fleet of 60 nuclear-capable aircraft is consistent with the U.S. obligations under New START. The Air Force has begun to retire the nuclear-armed cruise missiles carried by B-52 bombers, leaving only about half the B52 fleet equipped to carry nuclear weapons.

The Report concludes tomorrow.

Photo: Adm. Charles “Chas” A. Richard, the commander of the U.S. Strategic Command (DoD)

Judge John Wilson analyzes the “American Rescue Plan.”

In March of 2021, President Joe Biden signed a $1.9 Trillion economic stimulus bill, called the American Rescue Plan Act (the ARPA). This legislation provided for $656.18 Billion in “Direct Financial Assistance,” of which $402.2 Billion took the form of $1400 stimulus checks; $40.16 Billion for Transportation, of which $1.7 Billion was given to Amtrak alone; $362 Billion for “State and Local Fiscal Recovery Plans,” of which $219.8 Billion was allocated to states and $130.2 Billion earmarked for cities and counties, “based on each county’s share of US population”;  and $56.27 Billion for “Assistance to Individuals and Families,” which represented an enormous expansion of the welfare state, providing for $5 Billion in “Tenant Based Rental Assistance,” another $5 Billion in “Homelessness Assistance,” $21.6 Billion in “Emergency Rental Assistance,” $150 Million for something called “Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting” and $37 Million for the “Commodity Supplemental Food Program,” which claims to “improve the health of low-income persons at least 60 years of age by supplementing their diets with nutritious USDA foods.”    .

Many of these are clearly the usual “Great Society” social programs that have been unsuccessfully fighting the “war on poverty” for the last 50 years.  Others are clearly payoffs to Democrat controlled counties and states (a review of the most populous counties and cities will include places like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles at the head of the list).  Others, like any funding for Amtrak, are just a waste of taxpayer funds.

But some of these giveaways are discriminatory, and patently unconstitutional.

One provision which faces an immediate challenge provides states with $200 billion in financial aid.  However, under Section 602(c)(2)(A) of the ARPA, states cannot use these funds to finance a reduction in their state taxes.  “The intent was clear: to prevent Republican states from using the funds to offset tax cuts.” 

Shortly after the Act was signed into law, 21 Attorney Generals from states including Georgia, Arizona and West Virginia wrote to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, asking “that the Department of the Treasury take immediate action to confirm that certain provisions of the American Rescue Plan Act (the “Act”) do not attempt to strip States of their core sovereign authority to enact and implement basic tax policy…(the relevant) language could be read to deny States the ability to cut taxes in any manner whatsoever…this provision would amount to an unprecedented and unconstitutional intrusion on the separate sovereignty of the States through federal usurpation of essentially one half of the State’s fiscal ledgers.” 

Not bothering to join the other Attorney Generals, Ohio forged ahead with a lawsuit of their own.  “This coercive offer of federal funds violates the Constitution. The Spending Clause empowers Congress to ‘provide for’—that is, to spend money in support of—the ‘general Welfare.’ Art. I., §8. c.1. But while ‘Congress has substantial powers to govern the Nation directly, including in areas of intimate concern to the States, the Constitution has never been understood to confer upon Congress the ability to require the States to govern according to Congress’ instructions.’ New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144, 162 (1992). And Congress may not circumvent that limitation by using its spending power to ‘indirectly coerce[] a State to adopt a federal regulatory system as its own.’ NFIB, 567 U.S. at 578 (op. of Roberts, C.J.). That is precisely what the Tax Mandate attempts to do: it seeks to ‘drive the state legislatures under the whip of economic pressure into the enactment’ of Congress’s preferred tax policies. Steward Mach. Co. v. Davis, 301 U.S. 548, 587 (1937).”

At last count, 13 states have joined into a separate lawsuit filed in the US District Court in Alabama to challenge the Tax Mandate, including Utah, Alabama, Florida, South Dakota, and Alaska. 

As described by Josh Blackman in Reason, “(s)omeone in the White House must know this case is a loser. And even if Secretary Yellen issues some favorable guidance, I don’t think Ohio’s injury will be satisfied…if the spending provision is ambiguous, the government cannot cure that separations of powers problem through guidance documents. The remedy for an ambiguous spending provision is to declare it unconstitutional. Merrick Garland knows all too well how this case will end.”  

While the rest of the American Rescue Plan might survive the severance of the unconstitutional Tax Mandate from the balance of the bill, there is a more fundamental issue which may spell doom for the majority of the bill.  At heart, the bill is discriminatory, providing for the distribution of its funds on the impermissible basis of race.

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“The ARPA, which passed along party lines and was signed into law by President Joe Biden, appropriated $28.6 billion to a Restaurant Revitalization Fund to be doled out to applicants. Section 5003 of the bill requires the SBA (Small Business Association) to prioritize applicants who are women, veterans, and socially and economically disadvantaged business owners… Economically disadvantaged individuals are defined as those whose ‘ability to compete in the free enterprise system has been impaired due to diminished capital and credit opportunities as compared to others in the same or similar line of business who are not socially disadvantaged.’”

In response to these regulations, “The Texas Public Policy Foundation and America First Policy Institute have sued the U.S. Small Business Administration… Greer’s Ranch Café vs Guzman was filed against the SBA and its acting director, Isabella Casillas Guzman, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas… ‘These race and sex preferences are patently unconstitutional, and the Court should promptly enjoin their enforcement,’ the complaint states. ‘Doing so will promote equal rights under the law for all American citizens and promote efforts to stop racial discrimination.”’

Quoting further from the lawsuit: “SBA is currently disbursing funds on a first-come, first-serve basis, but only to ‘priority’ applicants, having pushed all disfavored applicants—mostly white males—to the back of the line, regardless of when they applied… In enacting this program, Congress did something it has never done in the modern era. It created a huge government program in which the great majority of the funds will be made available on the basis of race and gender. All (or almost all) racial minorities who are not veterans are preferred to all (or almost all) white males who are not veterans. The priority is dispositive: no one who does not enjoy a priority will get a dime.” 

Even more blatantly discriminatory is the Emergency Relief for Farmers of Color Act, which provides for $5 Billion  “to provide assistance for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers and socially disadvantaged groups,”  by directing the Secretary of Agriculture to “forgive the obligation of each socially disadvantaged farmer or rancher who is a borrower of a farm loan made by the Secretary to repay the principal and interest outstanding as of the date of enactment of this Act on the farm loan” as well as “pay to each lender of farm loans guaranteed by the Secretary an amount equal to the principal and interest outstanding as of the date of enactment of this Act on all farm loans held by the lender, the borrowers of which are socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers.” 

Under 7 USC Sec 2279(5) and (6), a “socially disadvantaged farmer or rancher”  is defined as a member of  ” a group whose members have been subjected to racial or ethnic prejudice because of their identity as members of a group without regard to their individual qualities.” 

It didn’t take long for this law to be challenged.  “An organization led by former Trump White House adviser Stephen Miller is suing the Agriculture Department over the definition of socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers that Congress used to create a $4 billion debt relief plan for minority farmers…(t)he lawsuit challenges Sections 1005 and 1006 of the pandemic relief law as unconstitutional…America First Legal is providing the lawyer for the plaintiff, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, who is acting in his capacity as a farmer and rancher.” 

Further, “Scott Wynn from Jennings — about 90 minutes west of Jacksonville in Hamilton County (Florida) — sued U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in Jacksonville federal court Tuesday over a loan-forgiveness program that was folded into the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan.  The lawsuit says the program for ‘socially disadvantaged’ farmers uses race as a standard for getting financial help, whether the farmer who’s applying is financially strained or not.” 

And that’s not all; “The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty last week filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the alleged race discrimination in the American Rescue Plan. Specifically, the organization targets a provision to offer loan forgiveness based on racial categories. The organization filed the lawsuit Thursday on behalf of five plaintiffs from Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Ohio.” 

Let us give the last word on this topic to former New York Lieutenant Governor Betsy McCaughly; “Most Americans oppose racial preferences, though Democratic politicians push them. Voters in California and Washington state, two of the bluest states, recently rejected ballot measures for affirmative action. The public agrees with Chief Justice John Roberts that ‘the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race’… (f)or now, the battle to defeat the anti-white provisions of Biden’s American Rescue Plan will be fought in court. Fortunately, that’s where the Constitution still matters.” 

Illustration: Pixabay

The Defense Department is concerned that the danger of aggression from enemy nations in earth orbit could prove harmful to the United States. Both the civilian economy and national security depend on orbital assets.

Speaking at a defense conference, Space Force Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond outlined the U.S. need for defense above the atmosphere.

“The Space Force has a strong and daily connection with nearly every American citizen,” he said. “GPS enables people and goods to move efficiently and it is estimated that a billion dollars a day of U.S. economic activity depends on it. Precision timing signals synchronized clocks on smartphones, enables global financial networks and optimizes the performance of critical infrastructure. Our missile warning centers provide an unblinking eye, protecting the homeland and our forces around the globe.”

More so than any other nation, America is dependent on its satellites.  The Russians and the Chinese have noticed. Both have developed the capability of attacking that vulnerability.  

Threats include jamming GPS and communication satellites, and directed energy systems that can blind, disrupt or damage orbital assets. They have positioned weapons in space and on the ground, designed to destroy satellites and cyber capabilities used to control satellites.

General Raymond stated “Let me be clear, we do not want to get into a conflict that begins or ascends into space. The best way I know to deter is to do so from a position of strength. To preserve the peace, you have to be ready to win.”

In an effort to rapidly confront the challenge, the Space Force has slashed bureaucracy at every level, accelerated acquisition timelines and expanded space domain cooperation with industry, allies and partners, according to the Space Force chief.

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“The domain of space accounts for just 2% of the entire DOD budget. That 2% underwrites the design of the entire joint force. DOD cannot afford, nor does it have the time, to build a joint force that can win without space,” he said. 

The threat demands balancing investments across four broad areas, Raymond notes. “First, we have to defend the architecture that we rely on today. Secondly, we have to shift to a more defendable architecture. Third, we must evolve offensive capability to be able to deny benefits and impose costs on our adversaries. And finally, the Space Force has to look at what other missions should go to space, now that technology allows us to do so and launch costs have gone down, so we can do it more effectively and efficiently.”

Missile warning capabilities need to evolve into survivable architectures, he said. The U.S. also needs to modernize across the entire GPS architecture to deliver assured precision, navigation and timing capabilities in denied environments. Command and control capabilities must also be upgraded to meet the growing threat.

“We’re making rapid progress, but it’s just the beginning and there’s a lot of good work to do. We cannot innovate at speed on our own. Rapid and cost effective modernization will require a closer relationship with industry,” he noted.

Those points have also been made by the new Secretary of Defense, Lloyd J. Austin III.  He has testified that the growth of Chinese and Russian counter space capabilities presents the most immediate and serious threats to U.S. allied and partner space activities. Additionally, defense officials note, Russia and China view space as critical to modern warfare and consider the use of counterspace capabilities as both a means of reducing U.S. military effectiveness and winning future wars.

A “space conflict” would not be a war distinct from terrestrial war, but would represent ”an extension of traditional armed conflict into the space domain.

Photo: Department of Defense

NORTHERN TRIANGLE

The United States is committing $4 billion to the countries in the Northern Triangle area of Latin America to combat corruption, migration issues, democracy and human rights. Accord to Julie Chung, Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, the State Department is working out the details of the president’s proposed program.

NICARAGUA

“The United States has been very concerned about the situation in Nicaragua, the oppression of people, of freedom of press, of civil society and human rights defenders,” according to Acting Assistant Secretary Chung. She noted that  Costa Rica has been a strong partner within the OAS framework and has called for democracy and human rights in Nicaragua. She added that in Washington there are big concerns about elections being planned for later this year and whether the right conditions are there for those free and fair elections.

HONG KONG

The Chinese government continues to undermine the democratic institutions of Hong Kong, denying Hong Kong residents the rights that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) itself has guaranteed, according to Secretary of State Antony Blinken. In a statement release by the Department this week, the Secretary said that “The Hong Kong Legislative Council (LegCo) passage on May 27 of new measures that alter the composition of the LegCo and Election Commission severely constrains people in Hong Kong from meaningfully participating in their own governance and having their voices heard.” 

Decreasing Hong Kong residents’ electoral representation, according to Blinken, will not foster long-term political and social stability for Hong Kong.  The legislation defies the Basic Law’s clear acknowledgment that the ultimate objective is the election of all members of the LegCo by universal suffrage.  He called on China and the Hong Kong authorities to allow the voices of all Hong Kongers to be heard.

 EGYPT

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Secretary Blinken met in Cairo with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi to convey President Biden’s appreciation to President Sisi for Egypt’s critical mediation efforts in support of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and other groups in Gaza and for Egypt’s help in evacuating American citizens to safety. Blinken reaffirmed the strong strategic partnership between the United States and Egypt, and President Biden’s commitment to the relationship and America’s commitment to Egypt’s water security and resolution of the dispute over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). The Nile River accounts for 97% of Egypt’s supply of freshwater.

GAZA

In a press briefing this week in the Middle East, Blinken said that “The most urgent thing is humanitarian assistance for the people in Gaza, and particularly water, sanitation, electricity.” Beyond that he suggested reconstruction and rebuilding as additional priorities. Blinken said he wants to see reduced tensions and the building of more trust. On Tuesday, Washington announced it is in the process of providing more than $360 million of assistance to the Palestinian people.  It includes nearly $40 million in new assistance that is directed primarily to support the humanitarian efforts in the West Bank and Gaza.  The new assistance includes nearly $33 million for UNRWA in support of the West Bank and Gaza operations, an additional five and a half million for humanitarian partners.

ISRAEL

When asked in a television interview this week when President Biden planned to visit Israel, Secretary Blinken said: “I don’t have the time, I don’t have the date….” He added that anti-Semitic acts of violence are on the rise in the United States and that this is not a good sign.

BELARUSThe forced diversion of a flight between two EU member states and the subsequent removal and arrest of journalist Raman Pratasevich in Minsk drew sharp condemnation from the State Department this week. “We demand his immediate release. This shocking act perpetrated by the Lukashenka regime endangered the lives of more than 120 passengers, including U.S. citizens,” said Secretary Blinken. Initial reports suggested the involvement of the Belarusian security services and the use of Belarusian military aircraft to escort the plane are deeply concerning and require full investigation. Given indications the forced landing was based on false pretenses, the US is calling for the earliest possible meeting of the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization to review the events.

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..

Illustration: Pixabay

China is busy planning a treacherous mega project that could emerge as a critical new battlefield among three armed nuclear states and potentially impact the entire planet.

While the West concentrates on responding to increasingly aggressive Chinese naval activity in the South China Sea, Beijing is covertly active elsewhere. Far from prying eyes, high in the Himalayan Mountains on the Tibetan plateau bordering India, China is prepping to create a mega project that, if completed, will likely serve as ground zero for the world’s worst ecological and geopolitical disaster. The area is so pristine and remote that the first, year-round, road into the region was built only eight years ago.

China’s President, Xi Jinping, is vying for the jugular in an attempt to control Asia, and indirectly the rest of the world. His infrastructure plan could impact, without employing much hyperbole, everyone. Ask what is critical to life and also extremely limited in Asia. It’s drinking water and the nutrients carried in river sediment that create the fertile Asian agricultural plains. The headwaters of the Himalayan Mountains serve to moderate monsoonal flooding, too, downstream. 

The mountains provide water supporting 47% of the world’s population. The Himalayan ice deposits support major tributaries, including the Indus, Ganges, Brahmanputra, Irrawaddy, Salween, Mekong, Yangtze and Yellow Rivers. Chinese scientists and politicians are considering building the world’s largest mega dam with more than three times the hydropower output of Three Gorges Dam, the greatest now in existence. When China completed in 2006, Three Gorges was the largest dam ever built and an ecological and historical disaster, wiping out hundreds of thousands of homes and irreplaceable historical sites. It displaced between 1.3-1.9 million Chinese people. 

To put it in perspective, Three Gorges is so large that NASA calculated it slowed the rotation of the earth by .06 milliseconds. The new Himalayan Motuo Hydropower Station, as proposed, would bore a tunnel through two of the highest Himalayan Mountains to divert water from the Brahmanputra and Yarlung Tsanpo Rivers, which drop over 1.24 miles in elevation in a short distance. China would use the elevation change to create immense hydropower. The river canyon at the proposed site is three times as deep as the Grand Canyon in the United States at 17,388 feet and the world’s longest at over 310 miles in length. It also is identified by ecologists as a biodiversity hotspot.

Contestation over the region dates back to the 18^th and 19^th century when British soldiers pressed northward and the Qing bureaucrats from China pressed southward into what the dynasty called Zangnan, or southern Tibet. The region was later seized by China in the 1950’s. India has disputed the border since that period with minor skirmishes popping up from time to time. More recently China began sending troops into the area again, remilitarizing what had been a negotiated calm.

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The Motuo Hydropower mega project was mentioned in China’s upcoming Five-Year Plan draft set to be discussed at the 100-year, anniversary meeting of the Chinese Communist Party this July in Beijing. According to University of Melbourne Professor Mark Wang, its mention is a clear indication China will go ahead with the project. “If they list something, even it’s impossible, that will get done. I’m 120 percent sure of that,” he said.   

Given Chinese President Xi Jinping’s desire to create a lasting legacy as a world leader who is as powerful as Mao himself, analysts must consider how China could use the proposed Motuo Hydropower Station to cement Xi’s global ambitions. Controlling the water supply supporting 47% of the world’s population certainly lends credence to Xi’s repetitive statements that he intends to “remake the world in China’s image.” India justifiably fears China will weaponize the water and hurt its population and the region’s fragile ecologies. Both countries are nuclear armed states. No one knows how far China will go to dominate the subcontinent or how India will respond if China curtails the flow of water.

Violent fights over water rights are not new: from ownership of Nile Basin water resources to disputed irrigation plans for the Euphrates-Tigris Bain shared by Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. Given China’s predilection for aggressive, long-term planning and action, the slow violence of state-building and militarization of water redistribution in the Himalayan Mountains cannot be overlooked simply due to the remoteness of its headwaters or the lack of transparency by the Chinese government planners. On the Chinese side of the border Beijing is building military-grade roads and state-of-the-art railroads that cross permafrost. Its competitive territorialization of the region disregards the transboundary ecological systems and the billions of humans living downstream. If Xi Jinping decides to weaponize water, the whole world will pay a high price, not just those in the lower reaches.

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 Friday, she presents key updates on China.

Photo: Tibet Discovery.com

In the nightmares of our collective political imagining, our freedom is lost to jackbooted men strutting down any town’s Main Street. It’s not happening that way, but the danger is just as real.

The more subtle tactics of dishonesty, propaganda, censorship, and the undermining of normal Constitutional order, it turns out, are more effective on American soil than beerhall putsches. Over the past dozen years, what could not be achieved through revolution or at the ballot box has made worrisome progress through the extraordinary domination of key influential institutions by progressive extremists.

Consider the overwhelming alterations in our schools, where “Woke” curriculum reigns supreme. Examine our justice system, where a number of district attorneys and states’ attorneys generals, elected with the heavy financial assistance of left wing campaign contributions abuse their office for partisan political purposes. Watch nightly television “entertainment,” where propaganda is inserted in everything from detective shows to late night comedy talk programs. Look at news media, whether online, in print, or over the airwaves, where anything differing from progressive orthodoxy is frequently censored.

There have been no melodramatic episodes of book burning, but a similar effect has been accomplished by driving moderate and conservative teachers and professors out of education, while students not agreeing with left wing ideas are harassed and segregated into “free speech zones.” Social media giants censor out non-Progressive users and ideas. The most commonly used search engines hide or ignore results that reflect accurate information that counters extremist propaganda. 

Americans have endured the ascension of a political, media, and educational class that has contempt for their fellow citizens. Some elected officials vote for the taxpayers to pay for private protection for them, while defunding police forces. Congress passes laws establishing second-rate health care systems that they are exempt from.

The keystone concept of transparent, honest elections has become anathema. Illogical arguments abound against maintaining accurate voter rolls, having voters prove their identity with appropriate identification, and securing truthful mail-in ballots.

Dissatisfaction by those elites with the current population has led to an open border policy, in which massive numbers of noncitizens are lured into the nation with the expectation that they will receive generous benefits. Americans who have paid for Medicare, Social Security, and educational programs throughout their lives are expected to happily empty federal, state and local treasuries to finance their replacement with foreigners. 

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In Washington, every bedrock foundation of American Constitutional order is under relentless attack. Freedom of Speech is considered subject to not hurting Progressive’s feelings. The Second Amendment is an endangered species. The Ninth and Tenth Amendments, which reserve those powers not specifically given to the federal government to the people and the states, are viewed as little more than an anachronism.

In a 2018 article in The Week, national correspondent Ryan Cooper wrote: “The American Constitution is an outdated, malfunctioning piece of junk — and it’s only getting worse.” Elena Kagan, refused to acknowledge the inherent concept of inalienable rights during her 2010 confirmation hearing.

That, indeed, is the crux of the matter.  America was founded on the concept that the individual, not the government, was sovereign.  The whole purpose of the Bill of Rights was to protect the people from government.  But in the twisted logic of the Left, the rights of the individual are subject to the current will of the federal government.

Very recently, the scope of the attack on the Constitutional structure has been breathtaking. The electoral college, which protects the rights of citizens within smaller states, has been vigorously assaulted. Similarly, the concept of a Senate with equal representation from each state has been harshly criticized. There is a powerful move afoot to pack the U.S. Supreme Court to ensure that Leftists win every case.

No mustachioed, strutting figure has made an overt attempt to publicly overthrow the Constitution. But the multifaceted, subtle assault by the Progressive Left is just as real and even more dangerous.

Illustration: Pixabay

Judge John Wilson (ret.)

It is also no secret that minorities have more hesitancy about taking the vaccine than white people.  According to WebMD, “African Americans have nearly the lowest rates of vaccination among any ethnic group. In fact, white Americans are being vaccinated at a rate 3 times higher than Black Americans. New CDC figures show that of those who have received at least the first dose of a vaccine, 5.4% are Black people, compared to 60% who are white people…”  One woman was asked why she would not get the vaccine.  She said, “I’m not a person who clings on to conspiracy theories, but I simply do not trust the government at this point.”  She cited to the “stain of the Tuskegee Study, the Henrietta Lacks case, and other examples of how Black people have been treated…(which) makes her skeptical. In the Tuskegee experiments, Black men with syphilis were promised treatment but didn’t receive it. Many of the men died, went blind, or developed other serious health issues. Henrietta Lacks’ cancer cells were used for medical research without her or her family’s knowledge, and without financial compensation.” 

Hence, the new CDC rules – get vaccinated, and you can take off your mask.

Except for when you can’t.  Despite the new recommendations, giving up that mask is impossible for some in authority.  For instance, when asked if the mask mandate will be lifted in the House of Representatives, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) stated, “No. Are they all vaccinated?”  According to the Washington Post, “(u)pdated guidelines issued…by Brian P. Monahan, the attending physician to Congress, say that the mask mandate will continue on the House floor ‘until all Members and floor staff are fully vaccinated.’” 

This translates to never, since “(t)hree months after vaccinations were made available to all members of Congress, about 1 in 4 members of the House have not received the shots… Democrats have rejected the notion from Republicans that a 75 percent vaccination rate is a sufficient level to reopen the House of Representatives.” 

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Giving credence to the belief that Pelosi and the Democrats merely enjoy the power that comes with enforcing mask mandates, according to the New York Times, “(s)ince the start of the pandemic, the figure that many epidemiologists have offered has been 60 to 70 percent (for “Herd immunity”). That range is still cited by the World Health Organization and is often repeated during discussions of the future course of the disease.” 

Another state which has chosen to ignore the CDC’s new guidelines is Hawaii.  “Gov. David Ige is bucking CDC guidance on mask wearing for fully vaccinated residents, saying he’ll keep his mask mandate in place for now…(t)he governor also acknowledged that while it ‘may be OK and safe’ for vaccinated individuals to forgo a mask in public, keeping the mandate in place benefits the broader community… The governor’s sentiments are in stark contrast to national trends ― and in opposition to Lt. Gov. Josh Green’s own opinion on the issue.  Green told Hawaii News Now…that he believes the state’s mask mandate should be lifted for fully vaccinated residents.  Lifting the mandate, he said, is ‘part of the process to return to normalcy and to trust the vaccines. It will have an impact as we go forward in having people do the right thing.’” 

Will the CDC’s strategy work?  Will lifting the mask guideline encourage people to get the vaccine?

In Fayetteville, Ark., Richard McGinnis and his staff at Richard’s Country Meat Market have had some difficult conversations already… McGinnis is skeptical of the idea that lifting mask mandates will encourage vaccine holdouts to get the shot. ‘If they’re not going to, they’re not going to,’ he said. ‘There’s vaccines sitting on the shelves. They could have one this afternoon if they want one.’  Still, he’s not worried about unvaccinated people coming into the store. He and his employees are all fully vaccinated and therefore, according to the CDC, protected. He welcomed last week’s change in CDC guidance as it finally made clear why vaccinations are important. If you still had to wear a mask after getting vaccinated, he’d wondered, what was the point?” 

Illustration: Pixabay

Written by the distinguished jurist, John Wilson (ret.)

The announcement came with a general sigh of relief nationwide; “(F)ully vaccinated people no longer need to wear a mask or physically distance in any setting,” The Center for Disease Control stated in the middle of May.  “Fully vaccinated people can… (r)esume activities without wearing masks or physically distancing… (r)esume domestic travel and refrain from testing before or after travel or self-quarantine after travel…(r)efrain from testing before leaving the United States for international travel…and refrain from self-quarantine after arriving back in the United States.” 

But there are some very large caveats involved with this guidance; “except where required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance,” and in the case of international travel, testing can be refrained from, “unless required by the destination.” 

This sudden change came as a shock to most Americans.  Just three months ago, when the Governors of Texas and Mississippi removed state mask mandates, President Biden said, “The last thing — the last thing — we need is the Neanderthal thinking that in the meantime, everything’s fine, take off your mask. Forget it. It still matters.”  Predictably, “Gilberto Hinojosa, chair of the Texas Democratic Party, called Abbott’s decision ‘extremely dangerous’ and referred to him as ‘the worst governor in modern Texas history.’  ‘This will kill Texans,’ Hinojosa said in a statement. ‘Our country’s infectious disease specialists have warned that we should not put our guard down even as we make progress towards vaccinations.'” 

Despite this hysterical rhetoric, and after more than a year of demanding that Americans wear masks in every possible social setting, indoors and out, the CDC abruptly turned an about face. Why?  Did the science change?  Have enough people been vaccinated that the legendary “herd immunity” has occurred?

More likely than not, the CDC made the change to avoid embarrassing itself any further, and to encourage people to actually get the vaccine.

Recently, The Atlantic revealed that “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is conflating the results of two different types of coronavirus tests, distorting several important metrics and providing the country with an inaccurate picture of the state of the pandemic. We’ve learned that the CDC is…combining test results that diagnose current coronavirus infections with test results that measure whether someone has ever had the virus…(t)he agency confirmed…that it is mixing the results of viral and antibody tests, even though the two tests reveal different information and are used for different reasons…(t)his is not merely a technical error. States have set quantitative guidelines for reopening their economies based on these flawed data points.”    

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Further, “(i)n a report that challenges widely accepted COVID-19 prevention guidelines, researchers (from MIT) say there’s ‘little benefit’ to health officials’ ‘6-foot rule,’ especially when wearing masks inside… the amount of time spent indoors with an infected person is more important than the distance you are from them — a factor that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization have overlooked…MIT engineering professor Martin Bazant, who authored the study, said… “What our analysis continues to show is that many spaces that have been shut down in fact don’t need to be. Oftentimes the space is large enough, the ventilation is good enough, the amount of time people spend together is such that those spaces can be safely operated even at full capacity and the scientific support for reduced capacity in those spaces is really not very good.” 

These revelations are embarrassing enough, and would justify a rethinking of the recommendations made by the CDC which relied upon such faulty data.  But the other reason for the agency’s change in position is revealed by former New York Lieutenant Governor Betsy McCaughey, writing in the New York Post; “Even less scientific than the 6-foot rule is the (CDC’s) guidance for the fully vaccinated. The agency tells them to ‘continue to wear masks, maintain physical distance and practice other prevention measures when visiting with unvaccinated people.’  That guidance eliminates a major incentive for getting the shots in the first place and will slow America’s recovery. Infections among the vaccinated do occur, but very rarely, and serious illness is even rarer. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines reduce the risk of developing COVID by 90 to 95 percent, compared with being unvaccinated. US data show the risk of getting infected after these vaccines is a minuscule 0.008 percent.” 

In other words, why should I get a vaccine if I still have to maintain social distance, and stay quarantined with a mask on?

Even the CDC must have noticed this sort of thinking was becoming prevalent.  “More than 5 million Americans have skipped out on their second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, according to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention…(a)pproximately 141 million, or about 43% of Americans, have received at least one dose of the vaccine so far and 29% of Americans have been fully vaccinated, according to the (CDC).” 

Obviously, then, if you want to encourage people to take the vaccine, you have to give them some incentive.  This is especially true after Democrats like Kamala Harris publicly stated they had no trust in the vaccine, since it was developed under the Trump Administration. 

Judge Wilson’s analysis concludes tomorrow

Illustration: Pixabay

Great power politics is back in fashion. 

It isn’t a short-term trend or fad; it is the solemn political reality we face today. Russia and China have partnered to push their agenda on the world. Together they intend to knock the United States out of its premier position as leader of the free world and then remake the world in their image. When Ronald Reagan held office in the 1980’s, he labelled the Soviet Union “the evil empire” and led the free world in restraining its aggressive and repressive policies. Today, we are entering a second Cold War period as Moscow and Beijing have teemed up to stop the West from supporting the cause of freedom and fledgling democratic states. 

We hear a lot about Chinese military aggression, but what is Russia up to these days? Has it changed its behavior since the days when Mikhail Gorbachev called for accommodation with the West? Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lt. General Scott D. Berrier, testified before the US Senate Armed Services Committee recently that the two communist giants will be key adversaries within the next two decades in the area of high-technology weaponry. According to Berrier, any of the three main powers, the US, China, or Russia, will possess the most “disruptive” military technologies by 2030-2035. According to Berrier, the new weapons or concepts “will change the character of warfare.” Russian power is not going away. 

Russia’s current President, Vladimir Putin, has promised his people a return to the “glory days” of the Russian Empire. He is working hard to make it the new Russian reality. Before becoming president, Putin held the rank of lieutenant colonel as a KGB intelligence officer for 15 years. He then assumed the position of prorector of Leningrad State University, mayor of St. Petersburg, and onto to political positions in Moscow. He is a savvy public politician and a brilliant strategist when it comes to operating behind the scenes. Putin views his partnership with President Xi Jinping as one that provides Russia with the needed financial resources from energy exports and military sales. Russian missile technology still is better than what China possesses. Putin knows this won’t last for long and recognizes he has to take advantage of the situation now. He needs the money to fund his military buildup to make Russia whole again.

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To avert an outright conflict with the United States, Berrier says that Russia has adopted a strategy of targeting military technologies to “match, counter, or offset” US capabilities and those of its other adversaries, rather than pursing pure R&D research inside its “massive” military-industrial complex. Berrier wrote in the DIA report to Congress that Moscow has the ability to produce “large numbers of weapons” today while also expanding its ability to develop cutting-edge technologies. At issue, he says, it that Russia is “challenged both organizationally and technically”  to manufacture the “high-tech subcomponents required for advanced weapons” due to “severe funding, resource, and infrastructure constraints” in the S&T sector.

Does that make Russia less dangerous than a rising China? Berrier says that what is means is Putin will rely more heavily on a profusion of new-style nuclear weapons unlike those possessed by the West. Last fall Russia conducted live drills using battlefield nuclear weapons. Their small size may lower the threshold for their use. Putin also has in his inventory an undersea version capable of creating a tsunami that could inundate and destroy infrastructure along vast stretches of the US coastline. Add to this Russian space and counterspace capabilities and cyberspace weapons, and the answer is that Russia remains a formidable power capable of impacting the US and the West should it choose to use its power. The free world must plan for a worst case scenario while hoping for a best case situation.

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.  She regularly presents key updates on Russia.

Illustration: Pixabay