India’s Semiconductor Mission: The Story So Far

Konark Bhandari

Source Link

This program focuses on five sets of imperatives: data, strategic technologies, emerging technologies, digital public infrastructure, and strategic partnerships.Learn More

India’s efforts to build a semiconductor ecosystem since its independence have been uneven, with several well-intentioned but false starts. In December 2021, however, India renewed its attempt at incubating a respectable semiconductor network. This time, it is going well and without major hiccups.

The Indian Semiconductor Mission (ISM) was established as the nodal agency under the federal government’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) to vet and screen investments and implement semiconductor schemes in the country. In less than four years, it has already approved ten projects to galvanize India’s semiconductor ecosystem. These projects range from the massive, $10 billion fab investment announced by Tata Electronics Private Limited to the more than $2.75 billion cumulative investment from Micron Technology in setting up an assembly, testing, marking, and packaging (ATMP) plant. Other projects include an outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) plant in Assam; two manufacturing facilities in Sanand, Gujarat; and a semiconductor plant in Uttar Pradesh.

On August 12, 2025, four new projects were cleared, including a separate packaging plant in Odisha, a semiconductor manufacturing unit in Andhra Pradesh, and the expansion of an existing manufacturing facility in Mohali, Punjab. Though estimates suggest that a proportion of the original corpus of approximately $10 billion has been availed, the exact number is unclear.

Four years after the ISM’s launch, it appears that the Indian semiconductor ecosystem has the green shoots to grow. This article looks at the main features of India’s semiconductor journey so far.

Notable Contrast Between India’s Approach and China’s

Water War Looms for Asia's Top Nuclear Powers

Amira El-Fekki‎

Source Link

India is sounding the alarm over China's plan to build the world's largest hydropower dam on the Brahmaputra River, warning it could sharply reduce water flows into its northeast, Reuters reported.

Newsweek has reached out to the Indian and Chinese Ministries of Water Resources for comment.

Why It Matters

Tensions over China's Brahmaputra mega-dam raise stakes between the two nuclear-armed neighbors. The river flows through areas where China and India have disputed territory—Arunachal Pradesh. The move has stoked fears in New Delhi that its longtime strategic rival could use its control of the river as leverage.

The mega dam will expand China's green energy capacity, aligning with President Xi Jinping's 2060 carbon-neutral target, even as it remains the world's top greenhouse gas emitter. The project has sparked environmental and geopolitical concerns over its effects on a biodiverse river system that millions rely on downstream in India and Bangladesh.

What To Know

Officials told Reuters the project risks cutting dry season supplies by as much as 85 percent, raising fears Beijing could one day wield water as a weapon.

India's External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar pressed China on the Brahmaputra dam during a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi last week, part of Wang's two-day official visit to India at the invitation of National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, the ministry said in a statement.

In July, China's Premier Li Qiang announced that construction had officially begun on what is set to become the world's largest hydropower dam on the Brahmaputra (also known as the Yarlung Tsangpo) River. China has defended its sovereignty rights regarding the construction of the Medog Hydropower Station.

All iPhone 17 Models Made In India

Source Link

In order to increase local production in India, Apple plans to build the iPhone 17 at five Indian plants.

Next month, Apple will introduce the new iPhone 17 series. The iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Air, iPhone 17, iPhone Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max will all be included. All four of these iPhones are reportedly going to be made in India. For the first time, Apple will manufacture every model in its series in India. According to certain sources, iPhones manufactured in India will be on sale in the US on the first day.

Five plants will be used for production.

In order to encourage domestic manufacturing in India, Apple plans to build five iPhone 17 facilities there. This model will also be manufactured at Tata Group’s Hosur facility in Tamil Nadu and Foxconn’s recently opened Bengaluru plant, in addition to the currently operating plants. As a result, Apple will manufacture its new model in India and market it internationally for the first time. Let us tell you that the American company has been boosting its production in India as part of a long-term strategy to lessen its reliance on China.

Foxconn, a Taiwanese corporation, is one of Apple’s main Indian contractors. The Tata Group will now contribute significantly to Apple’s manufacturing. The iPhone 17 series is solely being assembled by the Tata Group, an Indian firm. In 2023, the Karnataka plant of Wistron Corp was acquired by the Tata Group. In addition, the business owns a portion of Pegatron’s Chennai facility. According to reports, the Tata Group plans to produce over half of its iPhones in India within the next two years.

When Wanderlust Becomes Propaganda: Why Visiting Afghanistan Under the Taliban Is Wrong

Swapnarka Arnan

Source Link

A tour agency from Afghanistan has gone viral for producing darkly comic promotional videos that parody hostage situations. In one clip, armed men seem to be holding a foreigner captive, but then reveal it’s a prank. The “hostage” cheerfully shouts, “Welcome to Afghanistan!” before a montage shows them enjoying local culture, food, and landscapes.

A growing number of social media influencers are visiting Taliban-controlled Afghanistan and showcasing the country as a hidden travel gem. Their videos highlight scenic mountains, busy markets, and “authentic cultural experiences.”

The issue isn’t displaying Afghanistan’s beauty; the land, its rich history, and its people have much to share. The real issue is what these influencers ignore, which is the harsh reality of life under a regime that enforces gender apartheid, crushes dissent, and operates as an authoritarian state.

Every cheerful selfie and vlog about how misunderstood Afghanistan is risks sanitizing the image of a theocratic dictatorship. The Taliban are not a charming cultural curiosity; their regime has stopped girls from getting a secondary education, limited how women can engage in public life, enforced strict dress codes, and persecuted journalists and minorities.

In fact, the situation for women in Afghanistan is so grim that the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Taliban leaders for their persecution of women and girls.

When influencers film themselves walking freely in Kabul, they overlook the fact that millions of Afghan women cannot travel across their own country freely, let alone travel abroad.

“What we’re seeing instead is a curated, sanitized version of the country that conveniently erases the brutal realities faced by Afghan women under Taliban rule,” said renowned Afghan activist and scholar Orzala Nemat in an interview with NBC News.

The effects go beyond perception.

Will Beijing’s Taliban Gamble Work?

Muhammad Shoaib and Syed Basim Raza

Source Link

From left: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Afghanistan’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, and Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar at a trilateral meeting in Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 20, 2025.Credit: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Pakistan

Kabul hosted the sixth China-Pakistan-Afghanistan Trilateral Foreign Ministers’ Dialogue on August 20, the first of its kind since the Afghan Taliban’s return to power. The dialogue was attended by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, and Afghanistan’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. The meeting came at a crucial time when Pakistan was expressing concerns over cross-border terror attacks from Afghan soil.

Beijing framed the moment in terms of its agenda of a prosperity-for-security bargain. China wants to ease trade, cooperate on resource extraction, and, above all, extend the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) into Afghanistan. Chinese officials are betting that economic incentives will tip the scales against terrorism. Islamabad, by contrast, came with a security-first agenda, reiterating demands for concrete, tangible actions against cross-border militancy.

Can Beijing’s economic inducements really press the Afghan Taliban to curb terrorism – or is China making a costly mistake?

China has long believed that economic integration can reshape security outcomes, whether abroad or at home, and this constitutes the core tenet of its Afghanistan policy. In Kabul, Wang’s pitch for the Afghan Taliban was focused on prosperity, and its centerpiece was the extension of CPEC into Afghanistan, linking Kabul to promising transit revenues, infrastructure, and connectivity under the umbrella of the Belt and Road Initiative. China has shown a readiness to invest in Afghanistan’s mineral wealth, which can provide the regime with an economic lifeline. It has also lowered trade barriers for Afghan agricultural products such as pine nuts and pomegranates.

Resurgence of Jamaat-e-Islami Shifts Bangladesh Politics to the Right

Mubashar Hasan

Source Link

Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Dr. Shafiqur Rahman addresses a rally in Rangpur, Bangladesh, on July 4, 2025.Credit: X/Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami

Since the fall of the Sheikh Hasina government in August 2024, the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the largest and most organized Islamist political party in Bangladesh, has significantly expanded its influence.

The party was severely repressed by Hasina’s government. However, in the post-Hasina period, the JI has gained ground. According to local journalist sources, the JI has emerged as a key powerbroker, having placed its members in important leadership positions in public universities and key state institutions

The JI has broken away from its long-time strategic political ally, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), and is in an alliance with the National Citizen Party (NCP), which was formed recently by student leaders who led the anti-Hasina protests. The two parties have taken positions different from the BNP and have sought to influence Yunus’s reform agenda in their favor. For example, the JI and NCP took to the streets in May to build pressure on the Muhammad Yunus-led interim government to ban the Awami League, the party of Sheikh Hasina. Yunus subsequently bowed to their demand and suspended the AL.

So why is the JI gaining ground in Bangladesh, and what does it mean for local and global politics?

Under Hasina’s government, the JI faced severe persecution for over 15 years. Most of its leaders, including Ghulam Azam, Motiur Rahman Nizami, Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, and Muhammad Kamaruzzaman, were either hanged through a locally established and highly controversial international crimes tribunal (ICT), or died in prison. These leaders were charged as war criminals by Hasina’s ICT for their role in supporting the Pakistani army in committing atrocities and war crimes against Bangladeshis during the 1971 war of independence. International human rights organizations, however, have severely criticized the ICT for serious procedural flaws. In addition, hundreds of Jamaat leaders and activists were either put in jail or extrajudicially murdered.

After Chinese ships ram each other, concern over dangerous encounters in South China Sea

Colin Clark 

Source Link

SYDNEY — As China has again ramped up its aggressive actions against Philippine vessels in the South China Sea, the recent collision of a Peoples Liberation Army Navy vessel with one from the Chinese Coast Guard illustrates how dangerous these encounters are becoming.

The coast guard vessel’s bow was smashed and the fate of several sailors who were on the bow moments before the Aug. 11 incident remain publicly unaccounted for by Chinese authorities.

“It looked to me as if the CCG vessel abruptly cut back into the wake of the Philippine vessel, which then put it directly in the path of the PLA Navy warship,” China analyst Euan Graham with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute wrote in an email to Breaking Defense. “Whatever the exact circumstances, China ended up wearing the consequences of its own dangerous seamanship. Close marking a much smaller Philippines vessel in this way could easily have ended in Philippine sailors being seriously injured or killed, painting China as the obvious aggressor.

“It shows how close we are to an incident that triggers a wider diplomatic and military crisis,” he said.

Instead of expressing concern, China has blamed the Philippines for the incident, despite video evidence showing the Philippine Coast Guard ship trying to evade being rammed or sprayed with a powerful water cannon by the Chinese Coast Guard ship.

“The key takeaway from this unprecedented collision was that clearly there might have been some problems in the coordination between the PLAN and CCG,” said Collin Koh, a senior fellow and coordinator of maritime affairs at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies who closely follows China’s maritime activities. “Immediately after the collision, the DDG 164 [Chinese naval vessel] did not stop to aid the CCG 3104 [Coast Guard vessel] but went on to chase after the [Philippine Coast Guard ship] Suluan. There could be something to be said about the internal working dynamics between the CCG and PLAN.”

Resilience Is Deterrence: Why Taiwan’s Cyber Weakness Is a Strategic Risk

Jason Hsu & Joseph Saunders

Source Link

Taiwan’s democratic system, technological prowess, and strategic location have made it an essential actor in geopolitics. The island produces nearly 90 percent of the world’s highly advanced semiconductors, and its proximity to key shipping lanes in the Indo-Pacific makes it a critical node in global trade. Unfortunately, Taiwan’s importance also renders it vulnerable.

China’s aggressive approach to Taiwan incorporates gray-zone tactics, military signaling, disinformation, and economic coercion. But Taiwan is increasingly under assault in cyberspace as well. In 2024, the island faced an average of 2.4 million cyberattacks per day. These ranged from probes of government systems to intrusions into energy infrastructure and logistics networks. Although few of these attacks made global headlines, they represent a steady campaign of digital attrition. Should Beijing escalate toward conflict, these systems will likely be China’s first targets. Disabling would both weaken Taiwan’s defense capabilities and paralyze its society without expending a single missile.

The threat of cyber warfare is already shaping how modern conflicts unfold. The Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 began with a barrage of cyberattacks designed to degrade Ukraine’s command and control infrastructure and isolate Kyiv from international support. These attacks, which accompanied kinetic operations, offered a playbook for future cyber-enhanced engagements that Beijing is studying closely.

The Vulnerabilities Within

Taiwan’s digital infrastructure is advanced yet fragile. The island imports over 90 percent of the fossil fuels it consumes, and more than half its electricity comes from coal and liquefied natural gas. Taiwan’s power generation depends on highly centralized and digitized industrial control systems, such as supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) and distributed control system (DCS) networks, which are vulnerable to sabotage. Cyberattacks on Taiwan’s energy grid, especially in conjunction with kinetic strikes on facilities, could cause blackouts in major cities and cripple emergency services.

Thinker, Lawyer, Soldier, Spy: The Makers of Xi Jinping’s Grand Strategy

Nadège Rolland

Source Link

It is wrong to assume that Xi Jinping is the sole creator of China’s grand strategy. His vision for China as a great power on the world stage is in fact a composite of ideas and concepts put forward by different thinkers linked to military and national-security circles, as well as by international-relations and legal scholars, sometimes decades before Xi took power. It is important for outside observers to familiarise themselves with these individuals and their ideas. This article offers an introduction to key individuals who have helped to shape Xi’s grand strategy.

The Quad’s Role Amid China-US Tech Competition

Kashish Parpiani

Source Link

In July 2025, the Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting concluded with announcements on strengthening maritime and transnational security, economic security, cooperation on critical and emerging technologies, and humanitarian assistance across the Indo-Pacific region.

A significant takeaway of the convening was the launch of the Quad Critical Minerals Initiative to strengthen cooperation on securing and diversifying critical mineral supply chains.

The joint statement by the foreign ministers of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States underscored concerns over “abrupt constriction and future reliability of key supply chains, specifically for critical minerals.” They raised concerns about dependence on “any one country for processing and refining critical minerals and derivative goods production,” which may lead to “economic coercion, price manipulation, and supply chain disruptions.”

This development came amid global manufacturers raising alarms over China’s April 2025 decision to mandate licenses for export of rare earth alloys, mixtures, and magnets. China’s action followed its trade tensions with the U.S. – at the time, the Trump administration had mandated export licenses for a wider range of chips used in artificial intelligence (AI) applications and limited China’s access to chip-designing software.

Amid China’s bilateral trade and tech tensions with the United States, its decision to restrict rare earth exports impacted global supply chains and manufacturing (unlike China’s December 2024 export ban on gallium, germanium, and antimony for the U.S. alone). In addition, the move highlighted Beijing’s willingness to leverage its dominance in production and refining of critical minerals.

Such instances of the China-U.S. tech rivalry resulting in implications for the world have raised the imperatives for deeper tech cooperation among Quad members.

The first Trump administration (2017-21) used export controls to limit the flow of tech components to China, barred the use of federal funds to purchase Chinese tech equipment, and indicted Chinese tech companies for espionage activities.

China, Japan, and Shifting Narratives of War

Lewis Eves

Source Link

The recent 80th anniversary of Japan’s surrender at the end of World War II inspired multiple publications on how Japan remembers its wartime history. However, there has been less said about the countries that Japan fought and their historical narratives of the war, nor how these countries’ narratives align with Japan’s understanding of its wartime history.

In particular, China’s understanding of its war against Japan has changed significantly over the decades. Alongside Japan’s changing historical narratives of the war, this has caused a divergence in historical memory that fuels tensions between the two countries – and makes hostility more likely.

China’s Narratives of the War

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has encouraged two distinctive historical narratives of the war. The CCP’s governing legitimacy is closely linked with World War II; the Chinese Civil War (1945-49), in which the CCP defeated their political rivals to establish control over China, was born out of World War II. While the CCP did fight against the Japanese invaders, they focused on developing their powerbase while the Kuomintang or Nationalists (who served as China’s wartime government) bore the brunt of China’s war effort. Accordingly, weakened by the war against Japan, the Nationalists were less able to resist communist forces.

The Maoist narrative of the war was dominant in China from the formation of the People’s Republic in 1949 until the early 1980s. It was rooted in communist ideology and blamed the war on a militaristic international bourgeois elite who tricked the Japanese people into a war against China.

At the same time, the Maoist narrative portrayed China’s wartime Nationalist government as incompetent in resisting Japan’s invasion and highlighted the efforts of the CCP’s resistance, particularly those of the Eighth Route Army led by Mao Zedong. This is despite historical records from the war indicating that, out of 23 battles and over 40,000 skirmishes between China and Japan, the CCP’s forces only participated in one and 200 of these, respectively.

China achieves invisibility tech breakthrough for early warning aircraft

Stephen Chen

Source Link

Chinese air force scientists have developed a revolutionary radar technology capable of rendering its airborne early warning platforms nearly undetectable to enemy electronic surveillance.

Airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft – long considered indispensable yet vulnerable command nodes – have historically been high-value targets. Their powerful radar emissions, while essential for managing the battlespace, make them visible from hundreds of kilometres away.

But the Chinese scientists said they found a way to make AEW&C signals exceptionally resistant to interception and geolocation.

This method assigns each antenna a minutely varied frequency, akin to a hundred singers harmonising the same melody yet each subtly diverging in pitch. This renders the signal chaotic at a distance, obscuring directional origin.

To an adversary trying to track the platform by listening to its radio emissions, the signal could behave like the phantom of the opera – fluctuating, scattering and morphing beyond recognition.

At the heart of this innovation lies a new class of radar system known as frequency diverse array (FDA) technology, which engineers describe as a “paradigm shift” from traditional phased array radars.

Unlike conventional systems that steer beams by adjusting the phase of signals across an antenna array, FDA introduces minute, time-varying frequency offsets between individual radiating elements.

This subtle manipulation transforms the radar wavefront into a dynamic, space-time-frequency entity, a signal that is similar to those produced by an electronic jammer.

'Powerful optics': China's Xi to welcome Putin, Modi in grand show of solidarity

Laurie Chen

Source Link

The summit will feature Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's first visit to China in more than seven years as the two neighbours work on further defusing tensions roiled by deadly border clashes in 2020.

Modi last shared the same stage with Xi and Putin at last year's BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, even as Western leaders turned their backs on the Russian leader amid the war in Ukraine. Russian embassy officials in New Delhi last week said Moscow hopes trilateral talks with China and India will take place soon.

"Xi will want to use the summit as an opportunity to showcase what a post-American-led international order begins to look like and that all White House efforts since January to counter China, Iran, Russia, and now India have not had the intended effect," said Eric Olander, editor-in-chief of The China-Global South Project, a research agency.

"Just look at how much BRICS has rattled (U.S. President) Donald Trump, which is precisely what these groups are designed to do."

This year's summit will be the largest since the SCO was founded in 2001, a Chinese foreign ministry official said last week, calling the bloc an "important force in building a new type of international relations".

The security-focused bloc, which began as a group of six Eurasian nations, has expanded to 10 permanent members and 16 dialogue and observer countries in recent years. Its remit has also enlarged from security and counter-terrorism to economic and military cooperation.

'FUZZY' IMPLEMENTATION

Analysts say expansion is high on the agenda for many countries attending, but agree the bloc has not delivered substantial cooperation outcomes over the years and that China values the optics of Global South solidarity against the United States at a time of erratic policymaking and geopolitical flux.

The History of U.S.-Iranian Irregular Warfare

Lumpy Lumbaca 

Source Link

The relationship between the United States and Iran is far more intricate than a conventional bilateral conflict. Dubbed the “twilight war,” U.S.-Iranian relations is replete with examples of Irregular Warfare (IW), including events of the recent past like the U.S.-Russia-Iran proxy war in Syria, the Yemeni proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, Iranian support to Hamas for October 7th, Iran’s assassination plot of the Saudi ambassador to the United States, and the U.S. targeting of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani in 2020. For the United States, leveraging Irregular Warfare helps implement an approach meant to “restor[e] maximum pressure on the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), denying Iran all paths to a nuclear weapon, and countering Iran’s malign influence abroad”—such as Iran’s own IW campaign in the Middle East. A historical review of U.S.-Iran relations and military actions shows this trend is not new, but instead demonstrates its continued role in shaping today’s strategic environment.

From Shah to Ayatollah: The Iranian Revolution and Changes in US-Iran Relations

In 1949, the United States established the Voice of America (VOA), which began broadcasting in Iran that year, promoting “liberal developmentalism” centered on modernization, improved technical capacity, political pluralism, and American music in order to contain Soviet influence and promote Westernization in Iran. In 1953, U.S. and British intelligence agencies supported a coup to overthrow democratically elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh. The CIA supported this subversion to shield the British-owned Anglo-Persian Oil Company and mitigate wider economic risks after Mossadegh nationalized Iranian oil and resisted Western interests.

The coup restored the Western-friendly monarchy under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Deeply unpopular among Iranians, the Shah relied on U.S. support to maintain power. In 1954, the Shah signed the Consortium Agreement that granted U.S., British, and French oil companies 40 percent ownership of Iran’s oil industry for 25 years. From 1957, the United States provided Iran support for nuclear, military, economic, and governance programs.

How Ukraine Uses Net-Firing Drones To Snag Russian UAVs

Source Link

In the dense Serebryanskiy forest in eastern Ukraine's Luhansk region, Ukrainian drone operators have equipped small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with net launchers that can intercept Russian drones flying above the battlefield.

The unorthodox defense has helped neutralize Russian attacks and offers infantry life-saving protection, according to soldiers from a unit that spoke to RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service.

The forest is located in the final sliver of Luhansk that is still under Ukrainian control.

Soldiers from the Pomsta brigade, whose name contains the word that means "revenge" in Ukrainian, said the net-firing system helps defend against relentless Russian drone attacks.

"A net is the most effective way to down a drone," said one soldier who goes by the call sign Armani. "Our crew downed 100 drones in five weeks."

Video footage shared by the soldiers shows the nets halting drones poised above wounded Ukrainian infantry, preventing attacks and stopping reconnaissance of their positions.

"This video shows a [drone] used to save a wounded soldier by taking down an enemy drone hovering over him. In the next video, a [Russian] drone over another soldier is taken down. So, the [Ukrainian] drone operator saved two lives," Armani said.

This ad hoc tactic is one of numerous innovations in response to intensifying drone strikes across Ukraine. Armani said he hopes the low-cost solution will cause tactical setbacks and financial strain for Russian units.

U.S. and Japan at Odds Over Terms of $550 Billion Investment

River Akira Davis

Source Link

The United States and Japan will announce details of their trade deal later this week, a pact that calls on the Japanese government to make $550 billion in investment available to be directed by President Trump, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Monday.

Japan agreed to the investment, which it said would be financed through government-backed loans and guarantees, as part of a trade deal it reached with the United States last month. In exchange, the Trump administration agreed to a 15 percent tariff on Japanese imports, a rate lower than it had previously threatened to impose.

Mr. Lutnick, speaking on Fox News, said the agreement would call for the Japanese money to be “at the hand of Donald Trump, and he can go invest it” in areas that are important to American economic security such as rare earth minerals, semiconductors and antibiotic drugs.

The comments by Mr. Lutnick reiterated the Trump administration’s claim that it will have final say over what kind of projects Japan’s pledged spending will fund. Mr. Trump has also said the United States will receive virtually all the profits from those investments.

But Japanese officials have stressed that the investments in the United States will be determined by whether they also benefit Japan. They also maintain that profits are to be allocated according to each side’s committed risk and financial contribution.

Neither government has released documents detailing what they agreed to last month, leaving each side to offer, on certain points, different public explanations of what they agreed to.

The divergence underscores the continuing uncertainty raised by the rollout of Mr. Trump’s trade agenda, which aims to induce companies to return manufacturing to the United States. After raising U.S. tariffs to their highest level in a century, Mr. Trump said he would negotiate individual pacts with dozens of countries. He has so far announced deals with a handful of trading partners, including Japan, South Korea and the European Union. Most remain handshake agreements.

Fintech On The Front Line: We Need More Innovation, More Resilience

David G.W. Birch,

Source Link

In mid-2025, the 12-day war between Israel and Iran featured an unprecedented cyber campaign against the Islamic Republic’s financial system. Previous state-sponsored hacks aimed to steal data, ransom assets or disrupt operations. Israel did something far more radical: It destroyed digital assets and banking records to undermine the regime. While Israel’s success has undoubtedly been noticed by a US administration looking for new tools to confront what they see as a clear and present threat, it has surely also been noticed by central banks and regulators who have talked with ensuring resilience in payment systems.

Resilience Is More Than Bunkers

Wars are not only about soldiers and bombs and tanks and things. They are also about money, and attacks on the financial infrastructure of an enemy can be as effective as kinetic assaults. One of my favorite examples highlights the rise of the City of London in England’s ascent to global power. In 1587 it was City financiers who “cornered" bills of exchange drawn on Genoan banks so effectively that they were able to disrupt the build-up of resources for Phillip II's Great Armada, demonstrating how sophisticated economic warfare had become by the 1580s.

Well, four centuries on, in June of this year, an Israeli hacking group known as “Predatory Sparrow” infiltrated the Iranian Bank Sepah’s systems and destroyed critical data leading to a shutdown of customer services, failures at connected banks (including Kosar Bank and Ansar Bank, both linked to Iran’s military) and disruption in the retail payments network. The following day the group attacked an Iranian crypto exchange called Nobitex and stole $90 in cryptocurrency. Rather interestingly, instead of making off with the loot, the hackers sent the proceeds to addresses with no owners, effectively destroying the value and making recovery impossible, in order to emphasize the political, rather than financial, nature of the raid.

Putin’s hybrid war against Europe continues to escalate

Maksym Beznosiuk

Source Link

While international attention focuses on faltering US-led efforts to broker a peace deal and end the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin’s broader hybrid war against Europe continues to escalate. This campaign of unconventional warfare has been gaining pace for a number of years and poses significant security challenges that require greater coordination among European governments.

The European Union’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, highlighted the scale of the danger in a July statement condemning what she called “Russia’s persistent hybrid campaigns” against EU member states. According to Kallas, the list of Russian hybrid warfare activities in Europe includes cyber attacks, sabotage, disruption of critical infrastructure, physical attacks, information manipulation and interference, and other covert or coercive actions.

The Putin regime has spent more than a decade refining its hybrid warfare playbook. Many of the tactics currently being utilized against EU countries were first developed during the initial stage of Russia’s war in Ukraine, beginning in 2014. This allowed the Kremlin to maintain a degree of plausible deniability while actively working to destabilize and weaken the Ukrainian state from within. Since the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Kremlin’s hybrid war against Europe has also entered a new and more intensive phase.

As the world watches the Russian invasion of Ukraine unfold, UkraineAlert delivers the best Atlantic Council expert insight and analysis on Ukraine twice a week directly to your inbox.

European intelligence officials told the Associated Press in July that the risk of serious injury or death is rising across Europe amid claims that Russia is recruiting untrained saboteurs via the internet to set fires near homes and businesses, plant explosives, and build bombs. Russia has reportedly been forced to rely increasingly on amateurs as hundreds of Moscow’s own spies have been expelled from European countries in recent years amid growing tensions between Russia and the West.

Russia currently stands accused of committing a variety of increasingly ambitious acts of aggression inside the European Union. In Poland, a massive fire that destroyed over 1,400 shops and service outlets in a Warsaw shopping center has been linked to Russian intelligence, prompting the closure of Russia’s Krakow consulate in May 2025.

What if Europe had to fight tonight – without the Americans?

Julian Werner

Source Link

As the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal from NATO increases, Europe faces not just a political crisis but a military emergency. No longer shielded by American power, it may have to stand alone against a weakened, yet aggressive Russia – forced to fight, whether it is ready or not. What would war in Europe look like without the United States? Could Europe still find a way to fight on its own terms? It must – and it can.

Fighting without the tools to win

From British Paratroopers to Poland’s GROM, from Eurofighters to German howitzers, Europe fields some of the finest professional forces and most sophisticated weapon systems; the problem is, they just don’t have enough of them. It is not that Europeans do not know how to fight. The problem is, what do they actually have to fight with? For years, defence budgets and industries have been allowed to wither away. Without the United States, European NATO members face crippling shortfalls in trained personnel, ammunition stocks, and critical military assets. Although this has already impeded European operations in the past, it would prove fatal in a peer-to-peer conflict.

Without U.S. stockpiles and equipment depots, Europe would face an immediate logistical challenge from the very outbreak of hostilities. Ammunition shortages would be catastrophic. The war in Ukraine has demonstrated that European stockpiles cannot sustain modern, high-intensity combat. Stocks of artillery shells, precision munitions, and armoured vehicle replacements would be exhausted within weeks, with no immediate means of replenishment.

Dwindling reserves and slow production

Unlike the United States, which maintains vast prepositioned stockpiles, European nations have allowed their war reserves to dwindle. Decades of underinvestment and fragmentation across national borders have meant Europe’s defence industries are too slow and unresponsive to meet wartime demand. Peacetime procurement cycles stretch across years, not weeks. The very munitions that define NATO’s battlefield superiority – smart bombs, guided rockets, and cruise missiles – are produced too slowly and in far too small quantities. In a war with Russia, Europe’s current production capacity would be overwhelmed within days.

The financial crisis theory of everything

Sam Freedman

Source Link

Last month there was a fascinating poll from More in Common asking people to pick the main reason Britain is “on the wrong track”. As you can see from the chart below the results were fairly polarised. Voters from centre and centre-left parties were most likely to choose Brexit; on the right Tony Blair’s election came top. I suspect if the decision to allow high levels of non-EU migration post-Brexit had been an option that would have been chosen by most Reform voters.

Obviously polls like this shouldn’t be taken too seriously. People answer quickly and will default to a decision they disliked (like Brexit). But it was, nevertheless, surprising to see such a low score for “the 2008 financial crash”. For many of us working in policy it is axiomatic that the financial crisis was the moment when everything got worse, not just here but around the world. The UK and major European economies, in particular, have never fully recovered. Productivity growth hasn’t come close to pre-crisis levels.

But it’s not just the lingering economic effects. All of the crises, screw-ups, and bad decisions that have happened since 2008, with the exception of covid, were at least partly caused by the financial crisis. Clearly for most people the crash is now a distant historical event which is remembered, if thought about at all, as a one-off moment of panic, with frazzled bankers yelling at computers, that was resolved with massive state intervention. In reality it changed everything from the geopolitical landscape to electoral politics.

The Wrong War

James Farwell & Jahara Matisek

Source Link

Rethinking U.S. Strategy Against the Houthis

Since January 2024, the United States, Britain, and Israel have launched airstrikes against Yemen’s Houthi rebels in response to their attacks on commercial shipping and U.S. military aircraft near the Red Sea. One U.S. aircraft carrier narrowly avoided a missile strike—though an F-18 jet was lost in the maneuver—and the Houthis have sunk two cargo vessels, thus far disrupting 15% of global maritime trade that transits this critical corridor.

Major shipping companies have rerouted, avoiding the Red Sea entirely, while Europe lacks the naval capacity to secure these waters on its own. Airstrikes have failed to deter the Houthis, and with the group resuming attacks in July, it seems evident that President Trump’s peace deal with them in May is in tatters. The U.S. must now pursue a broader strategy, targeting Houthi enablers like Iran and China, revitalizing diplomacy, and preparing a coordinated military response if necessary. Most importantly, President Trump must punish the Houthis for welching on the peace deal and to signal new repercussions unless they respect their agreement.

The Houthis, a Zaydi Shiite movement, emerged in the 1990s amid persecution by former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. They rose to prominence in Yemen’s 2004 north-south conflict, championing anti-corruption and social justice. But the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq radicalized them, inspiring their infamous slogan: “God is great, death to the U.S., death to Israel, curse the Jews, victory for Islam.” Backed by Hezbollah and supplied by Iran, the Houthis seized Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, in 2014 and demanded greater political power.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE intervened in 2015, hoping to dislodge them from southern Yemen. But their campaign failed, producing famine, civilian casualties, and accusations of war crimes. The U.S., implicated through arms and intelligence support, became a lightning rod for Houthi propaganda, bolstering their narrative of foreign oppression and resistance.

Securing the Cloud in an Age of Escalating Cyber Threats

Drew Firment, Matthew Lloyd Davies

Source Link

As cloud environments become increasingly complex and attackers become more sophisticated, organizations must rethink their approach to securing infrastructure. Recent cyberattacks in Singapore serve as a critical wake-up call. In a recent report, Rubrick found that nearly 20% of organizations in Singapore experienced more than 25 cyberattacks in 2024, averaging at least one attack every two weeks.

With 92% of IT and security leaders in Singapore managing hybrid cloud environments, and nearly half reporting that most of their workloads are now hosted in the cloud, the traditional perimeter-based defense model is no longer sufficient. Threat actors are exploiting this complexity. To stay ahead, organizations must shift their focus: Stop securing the perimeter and start protecting data at its source, whether it lives on-premises or in the cloud. US organizations, in particular, should take note of Singapore's example and rethink their cloud security strategies before it's too late.

Prioritize Detection Across a Wide Attack Surface

With the rise of cloud adoption, hybrid work models, and software-as-a-service (SaaS) sprawl, cyberattacks continue to accelerate, leaving many security teams unsure of where to begin in terms of cyber protection. The reality is, you can't catch everything, which makes cyber defenses an essential priority with the rise of these attacks. First and foremost, start by focusing on the threats that cause the most damage. Phishing, malware, and insider threats remain the leading causes of real-world breaches.

From there, make a shift toward behavior-based detection. When you understand what "normal" looks like for your users and systems, anomalies like odd logins or unusual file movements will stand out more clearly when evaluating flagged alerts. Most importantly, you will need visibility across your ecosystem: cloud environments, on-premises, endpoints, and everything in between. It's not about getting bogged down by every alert, but about knowing where to look and recognizing what truly matters.

How Can the U.S. Government Safeguard Commercial Satellites from Threats?

Clayton Swope

Source Link

Though the Founding Fathers could not have anticipated today’s global security landscape, they did navigate a complex threat environment with similarities to the twenty-first century. The young United States emerged in a world where state and nonstate actors posed security risks to U.S. commercial and civilian interests both domestically and abroad, leaving a long-lasting impact on U.S. defense policymaking. In the centuries since, in peacetime and war, the United States has repeatedly demonstrated its resolve to protect and safeguard its national equities—its people, territory, economic interests, and national infrastructure—using its combined military power and civil capabilities. There should be no doubt that those imperatives to protect and defend extend into space, no more or less than they extend into other areas beyond U.S. national borders, such as the high seas.

As of 2025, there are around 10,000 active satellites orbiting the Earth, with the preponderance privately owned. Moreover, over 7,000 satellites are owned and operated by a single U.S. company—SpaceX. Over the next five years, the number of satellites in orbit will likely skyrocket, with tens of thousands of additional satellites—mainly for satellite communications—launched primarily by companies from the United States and China. As the number of satellites in orbits grows, so do the threats they face. The sharp growth in the number of satellites owned and operated by the private sector creates challenges as to how the U.S. government can best protect and defend private sector equities in space.

Fortunately, the United States government has many tools able to help protect U.S. interests in space from foreign and domestic threats that originate from nation-state and nonstate actors. Several agencies and departments, including the military, already perform central roles in those efforts, working to protect space-related elements of critical national infrastructure from physical and cyber threats. Law enforcement and judicial organizations at the federal, state, and local levels, intelligence agencies, and the military have responsibilities to help protect space systems and functions from threats.1 Private sector operators of space systems share in the responsibility to help protect themselves, particularly by mitigating their vulnerabilities to cyber threats.

PREPARING FOR THE CYBER BATTLESPACE

Keith Brawner, Ph.D. 

Source Link

The Institute for Creative Technologies is helping the Army make the most of AI in future warfare.

Just as steam engines and electricity once transformed industry, artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing warfare—reshaping training, decision-making and cyber operations. The challenge, though, isn’t just in developing and deploying AI, it’s also in preparing our personnel to effectively work alongside it.

The conflict of the future will continue to be fought with weapons, but it will also require data, algorithms and intelligent automation, as well as the people who use them. The Army must prepare for a battlespace where AI-driven cyberattacks, battlefield decision-making and AI-based wargaming tactics are the norm—and they must prepare Soldiers and support staff for its use through immersive, personalized and, yes, AI-enabled training programs and tools.

Founded in 1999, and sponsored by the U.S. Army, the Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT), at the University of Southern California (USC), is a Department of Defense University Affiliated Research Center that is researching new simulations and learning technologies across all branches of service, including AI in all its forms. As the Army program manager for ICT, I have urged our labs to focus on AI almost exclusively over the past year—because it’s what the military urgently needs to prepare for the future of warfare. They needed no encouragement, as AI and machine learning are now functionally part of every operational software system and every development environment within the Army. In fact, it was recently reported that roughly 30% of Microsoft’s code is AI written and their largest products are cloud services for AI items. Microsoft expects 95% of all code to be AI generated by 2030.

THE NEED FOR AI EDUCATION IN THE MILITARY

AI literacy is not optional—it’s a mission-critical necessity. We’re not just competing for technological superiority; we’re ensuring our warfighters can wield these tools effectively. Many Soldiers and officers have only a surface-level understanding of AI, yet they will soon depend on it for everything from logistics to battlefield decision-making. Incorporating AI into military education curricula will ensure that future personnel possess the knowledge to effectively utilize their own tools and mitigate AI-enabled threats in both cyber and physical domains.

Restructuring the British Army: A Two-Division Model

Lee Pilgrim

Source Link

The British Army faces a pivotal moment as it navigates the evolving demands of modern warfare within the framework of the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) expected in spring 2025. The SDR places NATO at the core of the UK’s defence posture, requiring the Army to maintain credible, deployable forces capable of deterring peer adversaries, particularly in high-threat regions like the High North and the Baltics, while supporting operations in the Middle East and Africa. This essay proposes a restructured British Army organised around two divisions, one tracked and one wheeled, each comprising three brigades, with each brigade containing three all-arms battle groups. These battle groups would serve as the primary deployable fighting units, with brigades and divisions acting as resource providers. The tracked division would sustain two armoured battle groups, one in the High North on a three-year accompanied posting and one in the Baltics on six-month rotations, while the wheeled division would provide support and manoeuvre for the tracked division and enable operations in the Middle East and Africa. This essay examines the equipment forecast, the deployment of divisional and brigade-level assets, and the cultural and structural challenges of this transformation, concluding with a proposed timeline for implementation. This essay specifically leaves out 16AABCT and associated light infantry (including UKSF and Royal Marines).

Proposed Structure: A Two-Division Model

The proposed structure realigns the British Army into two deployable divisions: a tracked Heavy Division and a wheeled Expeditionary Division. Each division would consist of three brigades, with each brigade comprising three all-arms battle groups, totalling 18 battle groups across the Army. This structure departs from the current model, where the 3rd (UK) Division is the primary warfighting formation, and the 1st (UK) Division focuses on lighter roles. The new model ensures both divisions are optimised for combined arms manoeuvre, with battle groups as the primary tactical units, supported by brigade and divisional enablers.

The Heavy Division (Tracked)