Indian Strategic Studies: 07/01/25

1 July 2025

India’s Digital Divide and the Consequent Welfare Bias

Prachi Bansal

India’s push for digital IDs and algorithms is creating a hidden layer of inequality. The Aadhaar system, which forms the basis for effective and transparent delivery of several government welfare schemes, has become “more a barrier than an enabler,” especially for women in the informal sector.

About 36 percent of 200 migrant women workers interviewed for a study said they faced biometric authentication failures during pregnancy-related hospital visits. What will be the human cost if the future of welfare schemes is direct benefit transfers enabled by authentication mechanisms, biometrics and artificial intelligence?

Algorithmic bias is not new. Several years ago, a celebrated book focused on the severe gender and racial biases embedded in Google’s autosuggestions. Most illustrations in the book continue to be valid today. For instance, a Google Images search for the term “beautiful” throws up not paintings or a mountain but hundreds of women’s faces. The women are young, light-skinned, and slim.

A second example is how ChatGPT generates different letters of recommendation for men and women students with identical scholarly achievements. Men are described as “ambitious,” “driven,” and “leaders” while women are “compassionate,” “supportive,” and “team players.” Similarly, Amazon scrapped an AI hiring tool that downgraded applicants with the word “women’s” (for example, “women’s chess club”) in their resume.

Even digital mapping platforms such as Google Maps and Wikipedia reflect stark geographic inequalities, with significant under-representation of the Global South. Despite high population densities, regions such as South Asia and Africa remain digitally marginalized.

The examples cited above are technology-specific but hit home when digital governance is used as the primary mechanism for welfare delivery.

How The IMF Finances Itself And Why It Matters For The Global Economy – OpEd

Julie Kozac and Bernard Lauwers

The IMF may be best known for lending to crisis-hit countries. But what about its own finances? How does it finance its critical functions and cover its operational expenses?

Let’s remember that the IMF is not only a global financial firefighter. It also provides policy advice and technical support to help members create the right economic conditions and institutions for maintaining economic and financial stability, boosting growth, jobs, and living standards.

Fulfilling this mandate is made possible by a unique mechanism for generating and deploying resources. Think of it as a credit union for countries—with a lending capacity of nearly $1 trillion.

Credit union for countries

Consider how a credit union works. Not only do members put in money to earn interest on their deposits, but they can also tap this pool of resources by taking out a loan.

The IMF works in a similar way. Its 191 member countries are assigned individual “quotas” based broadly on their relative positions in the world economy. These quotas are the primary building blocks of the Fund’s financial structure. They determine the maximum financial contribution of each member, and they also help define how much a country can borrow from the Fund.

It’s a model that benefits borrowers and creditors alike. In exchange for providing resources for IMF lending, member countries receive an interest-bearing, liquid, and secure claim on the IMF. Importantly, that claim counts as part of members’ foreign exchange reserves.

This also means that, unlike many other international organizations, the IMF does not rely on annual fees or grants from budget appropriations by its members.

Did AI Almost Start World War III? – OpEd

Jeffrey A. Tucker

Recall that the Covid fiasco went into overdrive when Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London generated a wildly incorrect estimate of the fatality rate of the virus from China. He had two forecasts, one without lockdowns (death everywhere) and one with (not terrible). The idea was to inspire the replication of the CCP’s extreme methods of people control in the West.

That model, first shared in classified realms, flipped the narrative. Once select advisors – Deborah Birx and Anthony Fauci among them – presented it to Trump, he went from opposing lockdowns to getting in front of the seemingly inevitable.

Before long, every Gates-funded NGO was pushing more such models that proved the point. Masses of people observed the models as if they were an accurate reflection of reality. Major media reported on them daily.

As the fiasco dragged on, so did data fakery. The PCR tests were generating false positives, giving the impression of an unfolding calamity even though medically significant infections were highly limited. Infections and even exposures were redefined as cases, for the first time in epidemiological history.Then came the subsidized “deaths from Covid” that clearly generated waves of misclassification that underscore the overestimation of the fatality rate.

It’s awesome and terrifying once you add it all up. Bad models and bad data created a killer pandemic of uncertain gravity that was later supposedly solved by shots tested with bad data and whose efficacy was further demonstrated by awful models and data.

There is surely a lesson here. And yet the romance with bad models and bad data is not entirely over.

There is evidence that a very similar scenario unfolded with regard to the claim that Iran was constructing a nuclear weapon, resulting in a hellfire of bombs and death in both Iran and Israel.

The Uncertainty in the Aftermath of the U.S. Bombing in Iran

Brian Michael Jenkins

The U.S. bombing of Iranian nuclear sites Sunday had a concrete strategic objective: thwart Iran's ability to enrich nuclear material and potentially build nuclear weapons. It was intended to make the world a safer place.

At the moment, however, the world remains a dangerous place. This is the case despite a ceasefire between Iran and Israel, and a retaliatory missile strike that was intentionally telegraphed by Iran in order to de-escalate.

Iran will adjust its strategy, not its strategic objective. Its goals remain to acquire nuclear weapons, destroy Israel, and dominate the Middle East. That fight does not end with this round. How Iran will truly respond is still an open question.

The Iranian regime's paramount objective is its survival. (Though he reversed course, President Trump overtly mentioned the possibility of regime change in Iran.) Although Iran's military capabilities have been reduced by Israeli actions, they have not been eliminated. If it seeks to avenge the bombing, it also has other options that it has utilized in the recent past.

The US strike on Iran’s nuclear sites: preliminary thoughts on the outcomes

Herbert Lin

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (left) and Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, talked Sunday about the US strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.

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On June 21, 2025, the United States executed a major military strike against Iran, targeting three of its most critical nuclear facilities: Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. The Fordow facility, deeply buried beneath a mountain near the city of Qom, has long been considered Iran’s most secure uranium enrichment site. Its depth has been estimated at 80 to 90 meters underground, with a great deal of reinforced concrete to protect it from aerial bombardment. Natanz also has a less well-protected enrichment facility; it was the target of the Stuxnet cyberattack about 15 years ago.

The US operation, called “Operation Midnight Hammer,” involved a coordinated assault using B-2 Spirit bombers and a US Navy submarine. According to Pentagon briefings, seven B-2 bombers each carried two GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs), 30,000-pound “bunker-buster” bombs designed to penetrate up to 200 feet of reinforced earth or concrete. In a 25-minute window, a dozen GBU-57 bombs were dropped on Fordow and two on Natanz. The submarine launched more than two dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles against surface infrastructure targets in Isfahan.

Russian Mobilization Falls Short Ahead of Putin’s Summer Offensive

Following Ukraine’s successful “Operation Spiderweb” strike on Russian airfields on June 1, the Kremlin dropped its pretense of seriously pursuing peace talks, ramping up retaliatory strikes in Kyiv, Odesa, and other cities.

The Kremlin is counting on its summer offensive to achieve Ukrainian capitulation or, at a minimum, favorable conditions for a ceasefire.

Independent investigations into Russian mobilization contradict Russian President Vladimir Putin’s claims that more Russians are willing to fight in Ukraine, as recruitment slowed in the first half of 2025.

Russia continues its barrage of drone strikes on Ukraine. On June 24, Russian forces launched an attack on the city of Dnipro, killing 16 and injuring at least 279 civilians. The strike damaged infrastructure across the city, including educational and medical facilities, administrative buildings, and residences (Ukrainska Pravda, June 24). On the night of June 10, Russia carried out massive strikes on Kyiv and Odesa. In Odesa, the drone struck a maternity hospital, killing at least three people (Ukrinform, June 10). In Kyiv, a drone hit a multi-story building,

injuring civilians (Nastoyashee Vremya, June 10). Pro-war Russian Telegram channel “Rybar” claimed the Kyiv strike was “the most large-scale” yet, declaring that it damaged the Ukrainian “military-industrial complex” (Telegram/@rybar, June 10). Rybar claimed that the targets “were large industrial enterprises: the Kyiv tank armor plant and workshops of the Artem plant … the Kyiv ship repair plant and other industrial zones in many areas of the city,” as well as infrastructure in Kyiv, Dnipro, and Borispol (Telegram/@rybar, June 10).

Preceding these attacks, on June 1, Ukraine conducted a large-scale strike called “Operation Spiderweb” on Russian air bases. U.S. experts estimated that this drone attack hit up to 20 Russian military aircraft, destroying 10 (Reuters, June 5; Ukrainska Pravda, June 7). Reports indicate that Moscow will likely require years to replace the damaged aircraft, and German military specialists estimate that “Operation Spiderweb” has damaged around 10 percent of Russia’s strategic bomber fleet (Reuters, June 7). In response, the Kremlin threatened retaliatory strikes while continuing its nightly shelling of Ukrainian cities and ramping up its summer offensive in eastern Ukraine (see EDM, June 9).

How Hamas’s Degradation Opened Space for Protests

The March 2025 anti-Hamas protests in Gaza reflected a moment enabled by Hamas’s temporary inability to suppress opposition due to wartime losses. The degradation of its Qassam Brigades, many of whom also serve in internal policing roles, weakened the group’s control over the territory and created an opportunity for public anger over wartime mistreatment to surface.

The protests showcased Hamas’s reliance on coercion and force to maintain power rather than popular legitimacy. The group’s return to targeted repression underscores that future unrest will depend less on public sentiment than on Hamas’s fluctuating capacity to suppress it.

On March 25, thousands of residents across the Gaza Strip took to the streets, demonstrating against Hamas, the Islamist militant group that has governed Gaza since 2007.

The scale and intensity of the protests were unheard of, with slogans like “Hamas are terrorists” and “Hamas, get out!” echoing from Beit Lahia in the north to Rafah in the south (Asharq al-Awsat, March 27; YouTube/واقفين مع جيشنا, March 29). Notably, the protestors were not necessarily calling for peace or rejecting Hamas’s strategy of “resistance,” understood to mean violent confrontation with Israel, including acts of terrorism. Rather, Gazans rallied to condemn Hamas’s failure to shield the territory’s population from the catastrophic consequences of the war it launched on October 7, 2023.

Might Unmakes Right

In his first months back in office, U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to use military force to seize Greenland and the Panama Canal, suggested that the United States could take ownership of Gaza after the expulsion of two million Palestinians, and demanded that Ukraine give up territory to Russia in exchange for a cease-fire.

These acts and statements might appear to be just a handful of examples of Trump’s typical wide-ranging and hyperbolic bluster. But in fact, they all form part of a cohesive assault on a long-standing principle of international law: that states are prohibited from threatening or using military force against other states to resolve disputes.

Before the twentieth century, legal theorists believed not only that countries could wage war to seize others’ land and resources but also that in some circumstances, they should. War was considered legal, the primary way to enforce national rights and resolve disputes between states. That all changed in 1928, when nearly every country in the world at the time joined the Kellogg-Briand Pact, agreeing that wars of aggression should be illegal and territorial conquest prohibited.

The 1945 UN Charter reaffirmed and expanded that commitment, putting at its core a prohibition on the “threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of another state.” Having discovered that merely agreeing to prohibit war was not by itself enough, states then went to extraordinary lengths to design frameworks and institutions to cement this essential rule, leading to the establishment of a new legal order that elevated economic tools over military might to ensure peace.

Five takeaways from Nato's big summit on hiking defence spending

For the Netherlands this was the biggest security operation in its history; for Nato's 32 member states the Hague summit was historic too.

There were unexpected moments of levity in among the momentous decisions over the looming threat from Russia and raising defence spending to levels not seen since the Cold War.

Here is what we learned from a whirlwind two days in The Hague.

Big spike in defence spending

The main takeaway is the allies' commitment to a 5% defence spending target, to be reached within a decade. It's a remarkable jump from the current 2% guideline, which currently isn't even met by eight Nato members out of 32.

Only 3.5% of that figure is meant to be achieved entirely through core defence spending on troops and weapons – while the remaining 1.5% can be put towards "defence-related expenditure".

And that's a suitably broad concept that can apply to spending even only loosely linked to defence: as long as it is used to "protect our critical infrastructure, defend our networks, ensure our civil preparedness and resilience, unleash innovation, and strengthen our defence industrial base".

Reaching that 3.5% core defence spending target will still be a significant ask for many Nato countries, many of which currently hover around the 2% line.

Plans to reach the 5% figure will have to be submitted annually and will have to follow a "credible, incremental path". A review will take place in 2029.

When Iran's supreme leader emerges from hiding he will find a very different nation

After spending nearly two weeks in a secret bunker somewhere in Iran during his country's war with Israel, the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 86, might want to use the opportunity of the ceasefire to venture out.

He is believed to be holed up, incommunicado, for the fear of being assassinated by Israel. Even top government officials apparently have had no contact with him.

He would be well advised to be cautious, despite the fragile ceasefire that the US President Donald Trump and the Emir of Qatar brokered. Though President Trump reportedly told Israel not to kill Iran's supreme leader, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not rule it out.

When – or indeed if – he does emerge from hiding, he will see a landscape of death and destruction. He will no doubt still appear on state TV claiming victory in the conflict. He will plot to restore his image. But he will face new realities – even a new era.

The war has left the country significantly weakened and him a diminished man.

Murmurs of dissent at the top

During the war, Israel quickly took control of much of Iran's airspace, and attacked its military infrastructure. Top commanders of the Revolutionary Guard and the army were swiftly killed.

The extent of the damage to the military is still unclear and disputed, but the repeated bombings of the army and revolutionary guard bases and installations suggests substantial degradation of Iran's military power. Militarisation had long consumed a vast amount of the nation's resources.

Iran's known nuclear facilities that earned the country nearly two decades of US and international sanctions, with an estimated cost of hundreds of billions of dollars, are now damaged from the air strikes, although the full extent of this has been hard to assess.

Iran is not Iraq

A lot of American citizens currently have strong opinions about Iran and its future. But how many of them know the first thing about Iran’s past (or basic demographic, political and religious facts about its present for that matter)? What follows is a quick review of a few of the above I find most germane today. Before we start, feel free to test the state of your Iran knowledge with this quiz!

In a clip posted June 17th, 2025, Tucker Carlson asked Texas Senator Ted Cruz what Iran’s population was. Cruz refused to respond, with his defenders later objecting that this was a “gotcha” question. But Carlson’s point was that someone like Cruz,

who is in a position of power and supporting American military involvement in Israel’s offensive against Iran, should know basic facts about that nation. As it happens, Iran’s population is about 90 million; more than Turkey or Germany, and far more than the 27 million Iraqis who endured US occupation starting in 2003. In addition, Iran’s area is about 2.4 times that of Cruz’s home state of Texas.

These are clearly relevant details when considering any military or diplomatic entanglement, even for the most powerful nation in the history of the world. Another crucial and germane fact is that Americans are, in many ways, a deeply parochial people who take only the most cursory interest in the rest of the world despite our nation’s legion military commitments and our complex economic entanglements. A stark illustration of this reality is that more than two decades after the Iranian Revolution major news outlets were still erroneously referring to Iran as an Arab nation.

Did Artificial Intelligence Almost Take America to War Against Iran?

Brandon J. Weichert

Back in 2015, global surveillance firm Palantir contracted with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an international nuclear watchdog group, to help the IAEA in its mission to monitor Iran’s nuclear weapons development program. At the core of this mission was an artificial intelligence construct codenamed “Mosaic.”

The idea was to have a more foolproof enforcement mechanism for the IAEA’s oversight of the Obama administration’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that was enacted in 2015. Rather than having scores of analysts physically poring over hundreds, if not thousands, of satellite imagery and assessments on targets, like Iran’s various nuclear weapons facilities, the IAEA wanted to streamline the process.

Palantir came forward with a product that would allow them to do just that. The $50 million Mosaic AI-powered software would sift through more than 400 million data points to forecast Iran’s nuclear trajectories.

Originally designed for counterterrorism and intelligence operations, this predictive artificial intelligence system operates not by collecting data points from the targets it is tracking, but instead makes inferences based on data analyses of satellite imagery, trade logs, metadata, and social media posts about the target. It’s a fascinating technology and if there is one company that would absolutely make such a program work, it is Palantir—which, not coincidentally, is also a top contractor of the Central Intelligence Agency.

A variation of the same program has been used by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) in its ongoing counterterrorism campaign against Iranian-backed terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon. The Mosaic program was in fact derived from this older system sold to the IDF by Palantir.

Burkina Faso: The World’s Disinformation Lab Is An International Security Disaster – Analysis

Published by the Foreign Policy Research Institute

(FPRI) — Burkina Faso is many things. The country is considered to be the epicenter of global terrorism today. It is ranked number one on the Global Terrorism Index Scale (2024), marking the first time in the thirteen years since the database’s inception that Iraq or Afghanistan have not topped the index. The country has been rocked by jihadist attacks on major towns like Djibo, with jihadists using drones and anti-aircraft guns to fight off government forces.

However, the regime’s propaganda forces paint Burkina Faso in a very different light. All appears well in the digitally-constructed alternate reality of President Ibrahim Traoré. In deepfake videos seen by millions worldwide, the country’s president is beloved by international stars such as Justin Bieber and Beyonce. Never mind that these stars have likely never heard of Burkina Faso, nor know anything about the country’s junta president. Traoré’s alternate reality represents an unsettling new world, one in which government-dominated social media attempts to balance the reality of societal collapse.

Traoré sees himself, or at least portrays himself publicly, as a visionary leader walking in the footsteps of Africa’s post-colonial generation. He pitches himself as an anti-Western, pro-Russian, pan-Africanist leader in the style of Thomas Sankara. Like junta leaders in neighboring Mali and Niger, Traoré is countering the Western-backed failure of democratic governance in Africa. While his approach reflects legitimate grievances with France, the United States, and others, the consequences of Traoré’s style of disinformation will have long-term effects on the political health of the Sahel, if not Africa more generally.

While the Sahelian country’s neighbors have experienced similar disinformation campaigns and problematic responses to governance failures, Burkina Faso is a particularly problematic case given the scope of violence, loss of state control, and the sheer level of disinformation emanating from state sources.

Russia Won't Sit Out a U.S.-China Asia-Padcific War

Garrett Campbell

Contrary to the popular assessments of the Sino-Russian strategic partnership, Chinese and Russian national interests primarily converge in the Asia Pacific and Arctic, not in Europe and Ukraine. For the last two decades,

the United States has not paid adequate attention to this convergence at our peril. Overall assessments by the U.S. national security community, think-tanks, and academia of the strategic partnership have almost universally fallen short and downplayed the Russia-China convergence.[1] This is a mistake. While establishing its sphere of influence over Europe will remain Russia’s priority, Russia could go to war to support China in the event of a U.S.-China conflict in the Asia Pacific.

It is true that China has done much to support Russia’s war in Ukraine. While it has avoided direct involvement, it remains Russia’s primary enabler. Albeit China does not want to undermine its own economic interests in Europe. Russia’s position in the Asia Pacific is significantly different than that of China in Europe; thus, there is less risk in how it pursues its strategic interests, and that may be fundamentally preparing Russia to elevate the Sino-Russian entente to a military alliance in the Asia Pacific.

President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s elites bet their legacy not only on the forceful realignment of the international system, but on the country’s future economic prosperity anchored in the Sino-Russian relationship, including the collaborative development and use of the Arctic and Russia’s Northern Sea Route. As such, Putin has implemented a series of Russian maritime doctrine and Arctic policy changes,

undertaken force structure and alignment changes involving a geographic reprioritization, and empowered Russian elites to participate in supporting the Sino-Russian strategic partnership involving these mutually important regions. These actions convey the importance Putin places on the pursuit of Russian national interests and suggest he may be slowly preparing Russia to support its most important treaty partner in the event of a U.S.-China conflict in the region.

Can AI Win the War in Ukraine?

James S. Fay

Today, a reader can’t open a newspaper or magazine without reading about AI's wonders and how it will transform society. AI is expected to usher in unexpected solutions to the energy crisis, accelerate business productivity, help transform medicine by suggesting new drugs and therapies, reconfigure transportation and the workforce, and put an intelligent robot in everyone’s living room.

Many AI prophets claim that AI is so advanced that it is poised to take over the world.

But can AI solve real-world problems in the unpredictable realm of war and geopolitics? For example, does AI have a creative solution to reverse the Russian invasion of Ukraine?

The author posed two questions to ChatGPT, one of the more popular AI systems in the U.S.

“What are the most efficient ways for Ukraine to win the war with Russia?” and

“What would top strategists advise Ukraine to help it win its war with Russia?”

The AI answer to the first question was less than two pages long and included seven suggestions:

1. Sustain and expand Western Military Support;

2. Prioritize Strategic Defense and Counteroffensives;

3. Focus on Technological and Asymmetric Advantages;

4. Emphasize diplomatic Maneuvering and Global Coalition Building;

5. Focus on Economic Resilience and Mobilization;

6. Engage in Information and Psychological Warfare;

7. Focus on Strategic Goals and Post-war Planning.

Air power is not enough

Peter Caddick–Adams

At first sight, the skies over Iran remind one of a piece of dystopian science fiction. Perhaps H.G. Wells’ The War in the Air of 1908, or Nevil Shute’s What Happened to the Corbetts, written exactly thirty years later. Both plots revolve around hostile forces commanding the skies and raining down destruction on defenceless cities. It was the Italian Giulio Douhet (1869-1930) who really picked up on the potential of the aeroplane, and is thus considered the father of modern airpower doctrine. In his seminal volume, Command of the Air (1921), he advocated that skyborne operations alone were capable of breaking a nation’s will to fight.

Today we find the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) are ruling the heavens over their deadly Shia opponent, via Operation “Rising Lion”, which now appears to have been years in the planning. Pundits are discussing Tehran’s possible defeat and regime change, achieved solely by the IDF’s deft use of drones,

its aging fleet of 320 F-15 and F-16 fighters, newer squadrons of 36 F-35-I stealth strike aircraft, given extended range by KC-707 and newer KC-46 and air-to-air refuelling tankers, and directed by its five EL/W-2085 airborne early warning and control machines. Many top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) air force and army commanders, the modern equivalent of the Waffen-SS in the Ayatollah’s regime, have been assassinated by drone or smart munitions, with their immediate replacements also targeted. Damage was reported to the Kermanshah underground holding facility in the Zagros Mountains, near the Iraqi border, where the IRGC Aerospace Force store and launch site their ballistic missiles.

Other attacks hit include the Tabriz air base, home to three squadrons of the Iranian Air Force’s MiG-29s and F-5s. Known in the trade as SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defence), fully two-thirds of Iran’s protective systems of tracked and wheeled gun, surface to air missile, and radar devices, around 120 units,

Artificial Intelligence, Cloud Computing can Provide Big Cybersecurity Boost

Joe Wingo

After years in which the U.S. military has primarily focused its “zero trust” approach to cybersecurity on protecting information technology systems from attack, it is now expanding focus to include protecting operational technology (OT) systems.

The DoD is working with the Operational Technology Cybersecurity Coalition (OTCC), a diverse group of leading industrial control systems and OT cybersecurity vendors, to solicit input from the industry for recommendations on how to apply zero trust to the department’s OT systems. These include energy management systems supporting military installations and infrastructure control systems supporting DoD water treatment facilities.

Zero trust cybersecurity helps safeguard DoD networks and operations by dramatically decreasing risks, improving network visibility and implementing a strict “never trust, always verify” posture.

In a letter last year to the Senate Armed Services Committee, the OTCC executive director applauded the committee’s legislation directing the DoD to address these issues and noted the importance of private and public collaboration..

With the DoD expected to share its zero trust strategy for OT later this year, the department has an opportunity to rethink its traditional approach to protecting OT through a “build a moat” strategy, virtually separating OT systems from other infrastructure. It also needs to leverage cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities to increase protection while cutting costs. Any strategy for maximizing the defense of OT networks while managing and cutting costs requires the integration of AI and machine learning capabilities and cloud computing.

The threat to operational technologies

The OT threat isn’t new. In 2010, the highly publicized Stuxnet attack on equipment associated with the Iranian nuclear program showed how devastating these attacks can be.

Maxar launching AI-powered ‘predictive intelligence’ to spot crises before they happen

PATRICK TUCKER

A satellite imaging company that played a key role in revealing Russian forces massing on Ukraine’s border prior to invasion launched a new product Wednesday that uses AI and satellite data to provide “predictive intelligence” on hundreds of sites around the world.

Maxar’s new product, “Sentry”, provides a way for multiple satellite companies to collaborate and share data in order to keep more sensors on emerging developments.

Maxar described Sentry as AI-powered software that can function as its own mini intelligence agency, bringing together data from not only high-resolution imaging satellites but also other intelligence sources, potentially including synthetic aperture radar satellites that use microwave pulses to “see” through clouds or at night, electro-optical satellites that can measure things like weather patterns and vegetation. Sentry can also “orchestrate” satellite data collection—meaning task multiple satellite constellations to go and collect at a specific time and place—to ensure important developments don’t go unnoticed.

The company is already using some pieces of the Sentry system to help U.S. government agencies track things like illicit smuggling at sea and monitor key areas of interest like shipyards, airfields, and urban centers. “These capabilities enabled rapid identification of aircraft, ships, vehicles and railcars, object counts and classification—laying the groundwork for identifying trends and anomalies,” a Maxar official told Defense One in an email.

Many satellite companies are pushing AI analysis of satellite data (and getting contracts for data and analysis.) But Maxar chief product officer Peter Wilczynski told Defense One that Sentry can make the data those companies provide more valuable by combining it with what Maxar collects and then scheduling observations over key spots.

Ukraine’s New Generals Battle the Old System

David Kirichenko

Successful generalship is harder to identify than it appears; even the greatest commanders face critics in their own age, which often continues even after they are dead. Principled and decisive officers are easier to spot, and Ukraine certainly has one of those in Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi.

When Russia struck an army training center on June 1, killing and wounding more than 70 men, he resigned, saying he had worked for “an army in which commanders are personally responsible for people’s lives. An army where no one is responsible for a defeat is dying from within.”

The decision stunned many Ukrainians, and not just because of Drapatyi’s seniority — he was ground forces commander. The highly decorated 42-year-old is the standard-bearer for a younger generation of army officers who joined the military after Ukraine’s independence and have spent most of their careers fighting Russians. Just 48 hours later, on June 3, a government possibly embarrassed by the fuss and aware of his popularity reappointed him to the lesser but more combat-focused role of joint forces commander.

The turmoil has led to questions once again about the division between the new leaders and an older generation, including commander-in-chief General Oleksandr Syrskyi, who, like many other senior officers, was Soviet-trained. Relations between Syrskyi and Drapatyi are said to be poor, with each taking an opposed position on how to fight the war.

But the strains are more than personal. The point was underlined in May when Major Oleksandr Shyrshyn, commander of 47 Separate Mechanized Brigade, gave a televised interview criticizing the way the army was fighting, and the often needless casualties he said were suffered. He blamed “clueless generalship” and “stupid missions” given to his unit during the fighting in Kursk.

If Iranian regime collapses or is toppled, 'what's next?'

In a startling turn of events in the Israel-Iran war, six hours after Iran attacked the Al Udeid Air Base— the largest U.S. combat airfield outside of the U.S., and home of the CENTCOM Forward Headquarters — President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire in the 12-day war, quickly taking effect over the subsequent 18 hours. Defying predictions that the Iranian response to the U.S. attack on three nuclear facilities could start an escalatory cycle, the ceasefire appears to be holding. For now.

While the bombing may have ceased, calls for regime change have not. President Trump has backtracked on his comments, but other influential voices have not. John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, said Tuesday that regime change must still happen, “…because this is about the regime itself… Until the regime itself is gone, there is no foundation for peace and security in the Middle East.” These sentiments are echoed by many others to include, as expected, Reza Pahlavi, exiled son of the deposed shah.

Yet for many Iranians, regime change would represent a profound betrayal of their long-held democratic aspirations through peaceful protests. It also raises several uncomfortable but necessary questions: What person or what organizations are ready to govern the day after, and is there a viable roadmap for what comes next?

The answer, according to leading Iran scholars and analysts, is bleak.

“Absolutely no one,” says Hamid Dabashi, professor of Iranian Studies at Columbia University.

“The monarchists and the Mojahedin are positively despised by the overwhelming majority of the Iranian population with no grassroots support,” he adds. “Despite a significant opposition to the ruling regime, it is still widely and passionately popular among many others.”

The vacuum left by the regime’s collapse would not be filled by democratic forces, but likely by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), the military organization dedicated to regime control and survival, or violent power struggles.

The myth of Iran’s invincibility has been shattered, and the fallout could be far-reaching

For over three decades, Iran built a web of proxy networks to push its battles far beyond its borders – keeping enemies at bay, as Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei tightened his grip on power. Direct strikes on Iran remained inconceivable.

That image of invincibility crumbled in the space of hours on June 13, when Israel launched a surprise, unprecedented attack deep inside Iran, shattering Tehran’s sense of security and unraveling its carefully cultivated aura of strength.

Its strikes took out top military leaders and some of Iran’s most prominent nuclear scientists, including a few as they slept at home with their families. The human toll was significant, with 627 killed, including at least 49 women and 13 children, according to Hossein Kermanpour, head of the information center at the Ministry of Health. The US joined Israel’s campaign on Sunday, striking three nuclear sites before declaring a ceasefire between Israel and Iran the day after.

Many in Iran and abroad now fear the country’s leadership – its pride and defenses wounded – may tighten its grip at home while adopting a much more hawkish stance in both domestic and foreign policy.

Israel and the US had floated regime change as a potential outcome of their attacks on Iran, which they hoped would result in a state more friendly to them. Their failure to bring this about has prompted the regime to claim victory.

Iran’s leadership has shown resilience, replacing those it lost and carrying out a harsh crackdown on those it sees as being complicit in Israel’s assault.

Signs also point to a regime that is much more paranoid, and likely to rule with a tighter fist at home in fear of cooperation with its enemies.

How Trump Surprised Hawks and Doves

President Trump may be a second-term president now, but he hasn’t lost his penchant for surprising critics and supporters alike. No one could be sure what he would do about the Israel-Iran war. Had he played a role in setting it up, by duping the Iranians into believing he wanted to strike a “deal” to arrest their nuclear-weapons program? Or was he negotiating in good faith and blindsided by Israel? Would he involve America in the war or not? And if he did, would regime change in Tehran be his goal?

For a week debate raged over these questions, with rival camps on social media deriving their most desired or most feared conclusions from contradictory statements the president had made. In the end, however, his actions were consistent with his own record. He has said since he first entered politics that Iran must never obtain nuclear weapons.

And he hasn’t been shy about using force, including against Iran when he ordered the attack that killed Qasem Soleimani in his first term. He bombed Syria in 2017 and had bombed Yemen as recently as this spring. What’s characteristic of Trump’s use of force, however, is that it usually doesn’t involve a prolonged campaign. (An exception is the effort against ISIS during his first term.)

Trump bombed Iranian nuclear facilities on Saturday evening, and by Monday evening was announcing a ceasefire between Iran and Israel. He ended the war almost as soon as he got America into it, a feat that confounds hawks and doves alike. The former wish the war had been longer, the outcome more certain,

and the conclusion the end of the ayatollahs’ regime. The latter wish Trump had never allowed the war to happen—assuming he had the power to stop it—or that he’d kept America out of it. Now the raging debate online is over who won the policy battle. Is a two-day war (for us) consisting of one bombing sortie actually a war? It defies the grandiose claims of both interventionists and non-interventionists, who were more alike than not in assuming that regime change was in the offing and the stakes were much the same as those on the table in the 2003 debate over the Iraq War.

Will the Houthis Survive If Iran Cuts Them Off?

Michael Rubin

The Houthis, a Zaydi Shi’ite tribal group, from the mountains of northern Yemen in and around the town of Sa’dah, have controlled Yemen’s capital and broad swaths of northern Yemen for more than a decade. They impose themselves on the territory they control not by winning hearts and minds but, rather, by force of arms. To accomplish this,

they smuggle weaponry through the Red Sea port of Hudaydah and the Al-Mazyunah Free Zone along the Omani border. They also divert international assistance passing through Hudaydah, utilizing it for patronage and to reward their rank-and-file while starving Yemenis they deem disloyal.

The Islamic Republic’s investment in the Houthis is expensive. Arms shipments and logistics cost money that the regime no longer has. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps abandoned long-time ally Bashar al-Assad. They are struggling to defend Hezbollah and can do little to stop Israel’s operations against Hamas. As the regime needs to attend to its own internal security, the Houthis will likely face a reduction, if not a cut-off, in Iranian assistance.

If they cannot live off Iranian assistance and their ability to raise taxes or customs duties is limited, especially if they lose control over Hudaydah, what comes next for the Houthis?

It is wishful thinking to believe the Houthis will simply fade away; they crave both power and money. At the very least, the group’s leaders will need to raise funds to pay their rank-and-file. They may shroud themselves in the trappings of government, but they are essentially a criminal gang. But even criminal gangs need to make payroll.

The Trump administration may hope that the retraction of Iranian power will stabilize the region, but the Houthis will not simply disappear; rather, they will seek other ways to fill their coffers.

Vishwa Shastra: India and the

In Vishwa Shastra, Dhruva Jaishankar provides a comprehensive overview of India's interactions with the world—from ancient times to the present day.

He describes a long tradition of Indian statecraft and strategic thinking on international affairs, charts early India's relations with a vast geography from the Mediterranean and Africa to Southeast and Northeast Asia, and captures the costs and consequences of European colonialism.

Jaishankar also describes India's territorial, economic and governance challenges upon Independence and the origins of India's rivalries with Pakistan and China. Speaking to a wide audience that includes policymakers,

scholars and especially students, Vishwa Shastra offers both rich historical context and forward-looking strategies for India. Highlighting India's transition from Cold War non-alignment to post-Cold War realignment, Jaishankar outlines India's strategic objectives: bolstering national power, securing the neighbourhood,...

On Character: Choices That Define a Life

From the bestselling author of Team of Teams and My Share of the Task, reflections on character, and who we choose to be.

“Reputation is what men and women think of us;

character is what God and angels know of us.”

How to measure a life? After a career of service, retired four-star general Stanley McChrystal had much to contemplate. He pondered his successes and failures, his beliefs and aspirations, and asked himself, Who am I, really? And more importantly, who have I become? When I die, how will I be measured?

In the end, McChrystal came to a conclusion as simple as it was profound: the reality of who we are cannot be recorded in dates or accomplishments. It is found in our character—the most accurate, and last full measure, of who we choose to be.

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