Donald Trump’s Price Tag on the US-India Relationship

Muhib Rahman, and Nazmus Sakib

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​​Donald Trump’s tariffs on India signal that Washington, far from abandoning New Delhi, wants to see more effort and less hedging.

When the State Department finally placed the “Foreign Terrorist Organization” label on the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) and its suicide outfit, the Majeed Brigade, on August 11, most observers filed it under routine counterterrorism. BLA militants have spent years in violent struggle with the Pakistani state. Their actions have included the murder of Chinese teachers in Karachi, hijacking Pakistan’s Jaffar Express, and turning Gwadar—the centerpiece of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor—into a terror zone. The US move thus can be seen as a long-overdue legal housekeeping.

However, the terror tag was rolled out the same week the White House doubled tariffs on Indian exports and tied any relief to New Delhi’s procurement of cheap Russian oil. This is hardly a coincidence, especially because Pakistani Authorities have long been claiming India’s backing of BLA terrorist activities in Pakistan.

The FTO designation, therefore, marks the opening chord of a new American play in South Asia. The United States is no longer treating India as a privileged partner exempt from cost, nor Pakistan as a mere appendage to Afghan policy. Instead, it is introducing conditionality as the organizing principle of its regional strategy.

Pakistan’s Narrow Window of Opportunity

The FTO designation establishes a more transparent, pragmatic channel for US-Pakistan cooperation, including force protection near foreign projects and intelligence sharing on insurgent financing. It also comes as US officials and businesses eye Balochistan’s buried riches—copper, lithium, and the rare-earth elements that power green tech and precision missiles.

Quadcopters Have Become the Taliban’s New Weapon – and Pakistan Is Not Ready

Hammad Waleed, Muhammad Shoaib 

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Pakistani terrorist groups have started using small drones to terrorize local populations and target the already-stretched security forces, which are, so far, extremely vulnerable to this style of warfare and need a comprehensive recalibration of policy choices.

Introduction

Pakistan’s northwestern flank, which includes parts of the southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province (including former FATA) and Balochistan, has experienced a serious uptick in militant activities targeting Pakistani state infrastructure and personnel. Terror groups, especially the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), are using advanced and sophisticated drone technology. Unlike a few early episodes, they are not using drones only for psychological operations by recording terror attacks. In recent days, they have employed drones to attack Pakistani military assets deployed to secure the area from cross-border terrorism emanating from Afghanistan.

A New Age of Terror

Last week, The Khorasan Diary reported that three Pakistan Army personnel lost their lives, including a captain-ranking officer, when terrorists attacked a military post in South Waziristan – a region subject to counter-terror operations for nearly two decades. They used quadcopters to drop explosive ordnance that killed the army personnel. Around the same time, militants reportedly carried out seven drone attacks in a single day. Reuters reported eight attacks targeting police and security forces in Bannu (KP) and adjacent areas.

Terror attacks in KP are not new, but the evolving tactics symbolize a more lethal underpinning: the permeation of commercially available small drones and their retrofitting for militant activities. The four-prop drones can fly hundreds of meters into the air, cross land obstructions with ease, and carry out attacks from a distance – allowing the activator to remain in safety. At a time when state militaries are still in the initial phase of operationalizing dual-use drones and manufacturing advanced unmanned systems that employ artificial intelligence, non-state actors have also wielded them. Off-the-shelf availability, cost-effectiveness, and feasible retrofitting are making small drones the go-to weapon for these actors – even worse, for jihadi outfits.

These American mercenaries are revered in China. Their relatives are among the few US invitees to Xi’s WWII military parade

Brad Lendon

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A one-year contract to live and work in China, flying, repairing and making airplanes. Pay is as much as $16,725 a month with 30 days off a year. Housing is included, and you’ll get an extra $700 a month for food. And there’s an extra $11,000 for every Japanese airplane you destroy – no limit.

That’s the deal – in inflation-adjusted 2025 dollars – that a few hundred Americans took in 1941 to become the heroes, and some would even say the saviors, of China.

Those American pilots, mechanics and support personnel became members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG), later known as the Flying Tigers.

The group’s warplanes featured the gaping, tooth-filled mouth of a shark on their nose, a fearsome symbol still used by some US military aircraft to this day.

The symbolic fierceness was backed up by AVG pilots in combat. The Flying Tigers are credited with destroying as many as 497 Japanese planes while losing only 73.

Today, despite US-China tensions, those American mercenaries are still revered in China.

“China always remembers the contribution and sacrifice made to it by the United States and the American people during the World War II,” says an entry on the Flying Tigers memorial page of China’s state-run newspaper People’s Daily Online.

The bond is such that the daughter and granddaughter of the Flying Tigers’ founder are among the few Americans invited to Wednesday’s military parade in Beijing commemorating the end of World War II.

The formation of the Flying Tigers

In the late 1930s, China had been invaded by the armies of Imperial Japan and was struggling to withstand its better equipped and unified foe. Japan was virtually unopposed in the air, able to bomb Chinese cities at will.

US Ally Opens New Base at China Choke Point

Micah McCartney

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The Philippines has opened a new base in its far northern Batanes province, in the middle of the strategic Luzon Strait frequented by Chinese navy ships.

Why It Matters

The Philippines is part of the so-called first island chain, a string of Pacific allies the Pentagon views as critical to containing China's military in the event of a conflict. Since last year, the U.S. has deployed missile systems to the northern Philippines that put parts of China—and any ships passing through the narrow strait—in range.

Manila is locked in a territorial dispute over China's expansive patrols within the Philippines' maritime zones, and the presence of the U.S. missiles has further inflamed tensions, with Manila resisting Beijing's demands to remove them, insisting their deployment is not aimed at any country in particular.

U.S. troops fly a CH-47 Chinook aircraft over Itbayat Island, Batanes, Philippines during an exfiltration mission during Exercise Balikatan 25 on April 30, 2025. Spc. Charles Clark/U.S. Army

What To Know

On Thursday, Batanes Governor Ronald Aguto Jr. joined the Philippine navy's Northern Luzon Command in a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new base in Mahato, on Batan Island.

The site "will serve as a hub for territorial defense, maritime domain awareness, and humanitarian assistance and disaster response," the command said in a statement posted to social media.

"More than a military facility, it is envisioned as a whole-of-nation platform, open for use by maritime agencies such as the Philippine Coast Guard and Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, as well as local fisherfolk, to enhance coordination, safety, and rapid response in the Philippine seas," the statement added.

Xi Jinping Unveils Vision For New Global Order

Brendan Cole

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Members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) should cooperate further in economics and security to move away from the Western-led world order, China's President Xi Jinping has said.

Xi's address to members of the Eurasian bloc on Monday delivered a statement of intent about the rise of the so-called Global South.

"We should advocate for equal and orderly multi-polarization of the world," he said.

Steve Tsang, author of the forthcoming book, China's Global Strategy under Xi Jinping, told Newsweek that Xi's comments showed how he was working "to transform the existing international order into a Sino-centric one."

The SCO is a Eurasian bloc established in 2001, which has expanded to include economic heavyweights like India to become a counterweight to the western G7 (Group of Seven) countries.

Xi's comments about closer economic and security cooperation among members chime with the vision of his ally, Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has repeatedly called for a pivot away from the U.S.-led global order.

China has been trying to present itself as a peacemaker amid trade tensions with the United States, Russia's war in Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas conflict.

What To Know

Xi addressed more than 20 world leaders during the SCO summit held in China's northern port city of Tianjin.

Can the U.S. Break China's Hold on Critical Minerals?

Maggie Miller 

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Last month the U.S. opened its first rare earth mine in 70 years, Ramaco’s Brook Mine in Wyoming, a move the Trump administration says will help break China’s grip on critical minerals. But with China producing 90% of rare earth elements and dominating processing, experts warn progress will be slow, costly, and uncertain. Will enough progress be made before Trump leaves office to continue the momentum?

On this episode of The Miller Report: Real Clear Journalism we are joined by investigative journalist James Varney to discuss whether the U.S. can make a meaningful difference in the critical mineral industry, “undermapped” mineral reserves, and if there is bipartisan momentum. His full investigation can be found here.

Is NATO Sticking to Its New Defense Spending Goals?

Wilson Beaver and Adam Kurzweil

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As far as defense spending commitments go, NATO countries can be divided into four groups.

For decades, European countries have relied on the United States for NATO’s defense. Now, the status quo may be shifting—marking the beginning of a defense policy realignment toward a strong and capable Europe, and away from an alliance that freerides on American security guarantees.

In June, following pressure from President Trump, NATO countries formally committed to spending 5 percent of GDP on defense by 2035: 3.5 percent on “core” defense spending and 1.5 percent on “non-core” defense spending on bolstering critical infrastructure and civil preparedness.

Trump values Europe and wants to see it secure and prosperous. Recently, he has made several statements about his commitment to the future of Western civilization—a goal highlighted by his trip to the Vatican for Pope Francis’s funeral and his visit to Paris for the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral.

The United States needs to pivot to the Indo-Pacific. That means its European allies must shoulder the main responsibility for Europe’s conventional defense—but America remains committed to NATO and will provide certain strategic enablers.

Luckily, Europe isn’t an impoverished region incapable of defending itself—the EU’s nominal GDP was roughly nine times larger than Russia’s in 2024, even without accounting for Britain, Turkey, and other non-EU NATO allies’ resources. If the Europeans get serious about military spending, they should be more than capable of defending themselves.

Some NATO countries are already pulling their weight or have announced plans to meet the new deadline well ahead of time. Others have announced detailed plans to increase defense spending by the 2035 deadline. Some have more vague plans to follow through on their commitment, though they still plan to reach the new goal by 2035. In last place is Spain, which refused the new target altogether. NATO allies can be divided into the following four categories:

The case for the em dash

John Geracitano

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I’ve relied on the em dash for years. It’s not just punctuation—it’s a stylistic choice that adds clarity and emphasis. Yet lately, every time I use one, reviewers strip it out and swap it with a comma.

The reason? ChatGPT. Because the AI leans heavily on em dashes, some assume their presence signals machine-written text. But that’s a mistake. We cannot let algorithms dictate the rules of style. Writers deserve the freedom to use established, legitimate tools without suspicion. The em dash is part of our language’s history, not a glitch to be corrected. To let AI reshape writing etiquette is to hand over authority that belongs to human authors and editors.

The em dash is a punctuation mark with well-entrenched roots and a legacy to match. Although medieval scribes used long strokes to indicate pauses or breaks in thought, the em dash emerged as a standard during the 15th-century printing revolution. And they became popularized by authors like Laurence Sterne and Emily Dickinson in the 18th and 19th centuries. Dickinson used them to convey emotion, hesitation, and for rhythm. So much so, they were called “Dickinson Dashes.”

Around this time, printers began delineating dash lengths, and thus came the various options: em, en, and the hyphen.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, typewriters made these variations tricky. There was no em dash key—just the hyphen. Two hyphens then became the accepted em dash, which was formalized in the digital era, in which word processors automatically convert two hyphens to an em dash.

While there are different standards and styles for spacing and usage, the em dash is a significant form of punctuation. It has a rich history—one more deserving than I offer here. But alas, sometimes knowing just a little about a topic is sufficient. However, here is a great Substack article about the em dash by Thao Thai.

To dash or not to dash?

America Is Cutting Off the Five Eyes. The Results Could Be Catastrophic.

Peter Suciu

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If Tulsi Gabbard’s directive is maintained, the United States could find itself in a world where its most trusted partners primarily discuss security in venues that do not include America.

The White House did not acknowledge the exact exchange that President Donald Trump had in his high-level meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska earlier this month.

While it’s not surprising that the details were not released to the public at this point, some of America’s closest allies also remain largely in the dark—and have expressed frustrations about the lack of communication to the Trump administration.

According to a recent report from CBS News, the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, “issued a directive weeks ago to the US intelligence community” that its information regarding the peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine no longer be shared with the so-called “Five Eyes”—the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand—which have historically cooperated closely on intelligence matters. Information related to the peace talks was classified as “NOFORN,” meaning that it could not be shared with any foreign nationals, friend or foe.

“This is a siren, not a memo,” warned geopolitical analyst Irina Tsukerman, president of threat assessment firm Scarab Rising. “Seal Russia–Ukraine diplomacy inside a NOFORN box, and you do not just trim a distribution list. You redraw the security map. Allies hear a slammed door. Rivals hear an invitation.”

Tsukerman further suggested the decision to wall off information about Russia–Ukraine negotiations from the Five Eyes would not be perceived as a bureaucratic adjustment, but as an insult.

“The Five Eyes alliance was built on the premise that the English-speaking democracies share more with each other than with anyone else,” she warned. “When Washington suddenly redraws the lines and stamps the most critical issue in European security ‘NOFORN,’ it signals to friends and adversaries alike that America no longer treats even its closest allies as part of the inner circle.”

Don’t Abandon AUKUS The Case for Recommitting to—and Revitalizing––the Alliance

Gary Roughead, Marise Payne, Nicholas Carter, and James Mattis

Sourec Link

In June, the U.S. Department of Defense announced it would spend the summer conducting a review of AUKUS: the security partnership established in 2021 among Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The review—designed to determine whether the AUKUS agreement is aligned with U.S. President Donald Trump’s priorities—has sparked angst among stakeholders in all three countries. The second Trump administration, after all, has not been shy about revamping Washington’s major partnerships.

It is not unusual for an incoming administration to review major programs and initiatives in its early days, as the Trump administration is now doing with AUKUS. Hopefully, the Pentagon will find that the alliance is more than worth the investment—and perfectly in keeping with Trump’s “America first” agenda. In an unsettled international environment, AUKUS serves each member country’s urgent national security needs and advances shared priorities. It enables a frictionless defense environment among the three countries, and is a stimulus for reforming dated yet compatible defense industrial bases. It can be a model and an incentive for strengthening relations with other allies and special partners. A vibrant AUKUS is a deterrent in the Indo-Pacific and beyond, as relevant in the Arctic and the higher reaches of the North Atlantic as it is in the western Pacific. Moreover, it helps the Australian, British, and U.S. militaries adopt the advanced technologies necessary to win in the future.

AUKUS is often seen in terms of its pillars and programs. But a focus on just its components is too superficial and narrow a perspective. Its significance, like that of all great alliances, is that it formalizes decades of entwined initiatives and enduring interests. At a time when questioning the meaning, value, and obligations of partnerships is in vogue and doubts about the United States’ reliability swirl, AUKUS can show that Washington remains dependable and prove that democratic forms of government, particularly when working together, yield strong economies and military capabilities. It can show that democracies form strong alliances. Washington should thus do more than just recommit to AUKUS. It should revitalize the pact for the decades ahead.

Joining Forces

Ukraine Pursues a Weapons Buildup More Potent Than Any Security Guarantee

Constant Méheut

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Ukraine is pursuing a multibillion-dollar arms buildup that would be funded by Europe, seeing it as the best chance of ensuring the country’s long-term survival as American assistance dries up and Western security guarantees remain uncertain.

Kyiv wants not only to sustain its army through the current war but also to make it the backbone of any postwar settlement, with the goal of deterring Russia from invading again. As Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, recently put it: “Ukraine must become a steel porcupine, undigestible for potential invaders.”

At the center of these efforts is a new NATO-backed procurement system that will channel European funds into buying U.S. weapons for Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelensky hopes the system will enable $1 billion in purchases each month, with a particular focus on acquiring U.S.-made Patriot air-defense systems to expand Kyiv’s limited arsenal.

The new system would both help replace U.S. arms donations that President Trump has ended and also increase and streamline deliveries of weapons to Ukraine over time. A first sale of cruise missiles and GPS navigation kits, worth $825 million, was announced on Thursday.

Kyiv is also betting on its booming domestic defense industry, which has already delivered drones that swarm the battlefield and is now working to produce more powerful weapons. This month, Ukraine said it had completed the development and begun production of its first domestically made long-range cruise missile.

How far this military buildup can go remains uncertain. European nations that are already grappling with budget strains may struggle to sustain the level of funding Ukraine says it needs, and Kyiv’s army must address persistent manpower shortages to become a truly deterrent force.

Will Reform win? Can Starmer turns things round? Will Reeves survive the budget?

Sam Freedman

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Thanks to subscribers for another bumper haul of excellent questions. We’ve decided to split the response in two for mangeability, so my answers are today and Dad’s will be coming on Thursday.

I’ve focused on the most popular and frequently asked questions. Sorry if I didn’t get round to answering yours, there were a lot and this post is already long.

Topics covered include:

Reform’s chances of winning the next election

Whether Starmer is capable of turning things round

Will Rachel Reeves survive the budget?

Predictions for the Welsh elections

What Labour can/should do on small boats

Why Home Secretaries seem to get radicalised by the job

Can government borrow more money (and who do they borrow it from)?

How’s Labour’s housebuilding mission going?

How are the government likely to reform special educational needs?

Would Vance be worse than Trump? Can the USA recover from where it is?

How similar is my style to Dad’s?

My media diet

Voting systems and whether I’ve changed my mind on anything in my book

Why the reaction to Enoch Powell was so different to today’s racism

Government use of X

On the right’s hatred of Blair

Report to Congress on Hypersonic Weapons

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The United States has actively pursued the development of hypersonic weapons—maneuvering weapons that fly at speeds of at least Mach 5—as a part of its conventional prompt global strike program since the early 2000s. In recent years, the United States has focused such efforts on developing hypersonic glide vehicles, which are launched from a rocket before gliding to a target, and hypersonic cruise missiles, which are powered by high-speed, air-breathing engines during flight. As former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and former Commander of U.S. Strategic Command General John Hyten has stated, these weapons could enable “responsive, long-range, strike options against distant, defended, and/or time-critical threats [such as road-mobile missiles] when other forces are unavailable, denied access, or not preferred.” Critics, on the other hand, contend that hypersonic weapons lack defined mission requirements, contribute little to U.S. military capability, and are unnecessary for deterrence.

Funding for hypersonic weapons has been relatively restrained in the past; however, both the Pentagon and Congress have shown a growing interest in pursuing the development and near-term deployment of hypersonic systems. This is due, in part, to the advances in these technologies in Russia and China, both of which have a number of hypersonic weapons programs and have likely fielded operational hypersonic glide vehicles—potentially armed with nuclear warheads. Most U.S. hypersonic weapons, in contrast to those in Russia and China, are not being designed for use with a nuclear warhead. As a result, U.S. hypersonic weapons will likely require greater accuracy and will be more technically challenging to develop than nuclear-armed Chinese and Russian systems.

The Pentagon’s FY2026 budget request for hypersonic research was $3.9 billion—down from $6.9 billion in the FY2025 request. The Missile Defense Agency additionally requested $200.6 million for hypersonic defense in FY2025, up from its $182.3 million request in FY2025. At present, the Department of Defense (DOD) has not established any programs of record for hypersonic weapons, suggesting that it may not have approved either mission requirements for the systems or long-term funding plans. Indeed, as former Principal Director for Hypersonics (Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering) Mike White has stated, DOD has not yet made a decision to acquire hypersonic weapons and is instead developing prototypes to assist in the evaluation of potential weapon system concepts and mission sets.

Tailoring Deterrence: What and Why?

Sarah Faris

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The need to adjust U.S. deterrence policy to the particular values and perceptions of the Soviet leadership was well-established during the Cold War.[1] However, the need for “tailoring” deterrence to a variety of opponents and potential opponents in the “Second Nuclear Age” was recognized soon after the Cold War. Doing so mandates adjusting U.S. deterrence strategies to a broad range of opponents via a close and ongoing understanding of their respective values, perceptions and calculations—their decision-making frameworks. This “tailoring” approach to deterrence was introduced very early in the post-Cold War period in a briefing by Professor Keith Payne at U.S. Strategic Command.[2]

This article defines deterrence “tailoring” and identifies factors that should be considered under the tailoring framework. It also addresses why tailoring is necessary—as opposed to basing deterrence planning on generic “rational actor” expectations of opponents’ behavior. As an illustration of why tailoring is necessary, this article includes several case studies discussing the ways in which leaders’ decision making can be influenced by a variety of factors, including their cultural, ideological, and religious priorities. The need to tailor U.S. deterrence strategies follows directly from this diversity in decision-making frameworks.

Tailoring

Tailoring consists of adapting deterrence strategies to opponents’ decision-making frameworks, and the context of the engagement. This means that the character of U.S. deterrence threats, how and when they are communicated, must be based on an understanding of factors driving opponents’ perceptions and decision making. Opponents’ diverse decision-making frameworks will shape how they respond, in potentially unique ways, to U.S. deterrence strategies and red lines. Consequently, understanding these frameworks, to the extent practicable, and structuring U.S. deterrence strategies accordingly, can be critical to their reliability and effectiveness.[3] The contrary approach to deterrence assumes that opponents’ responses to U.S. deterrence threats and red lines are generally predictable because their behavior will follow a generic “rational actor model” of behavior. Historical studies, however, demonstrate that this approach is prone to failure because leaderships often do not follow a generically predictable pattern of decision making and behavior.[4]

The Quad in an ‘America First’ World

Aparna Pande

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The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or the Quad, is the centerpiece of U.S. Indo-Pacific diplomacy, but contrary to the desire of American strategic planners, it is far from being the lynchpin of regional security. The Quad brings together three Asian democracies – Australia, India, and Japan – and the resident external power, the United States. It is an ad hoc nonsecurity grouping that has retained attention even though the second Trump administration views multilateralism, multilateral institutions, and security alliances with suspicion.

The United States is recalibrating its global involvement based on selective hard power considerations. The Quad, however, is not yet a hard power actor. In his confirmation hearing in January 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio delineated the second Trump administration’s policymaking priorities based on three questions: “Does it make America safer? Does it make America stronger? And does it make America more prosperous?”

The Quad has, so far, not made the U.S. safer, stronger, or more prosperous. But the administration continues to see it as important, primarily because of its potential in containing China’s rising power and influence. The Quad countries encompass over 2 billion people and together account for one-third of global gross GDP; their combined efforts would go a long way toward countering China.

Quad’s Origins

The Quad was first forged, informally, in the wake of the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami when Australia, India, Japan, and the United States coordinated to mobilize humanitarian assistance and disaster relief across the region. Three years later, in 2007, the idea of the Quad as a standing group was conceived, with late Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo pitching the concept of these four democracies working together to strengthen regional stability based on shared norms and interests.

Iskander Strike Takes Out Rare Ukrainian Neptune Cruise Missile Launcher

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Footage released by the Russian Defence Ministry has confirmed the successful use of an Iskander-M ballistic missile system to destroy one of Ukraine’s small number of indigenous Neptune cruise missile launchers. This follows a consistent trend towards the use of the Iskander-M to neutralise high value missile systems in Ukrainian service, including multiple MIM-104 Patriot long range surface-to-air missile systems. The Ukrainain launcher was located in the disputed Zaporozhye region, and reportedly saw ten accompanying personnel killed when it was destroyed. Although the Neptune system is limited by its subsonic speed and its relatively short 300 kilometre engagement range, Ukrainian government sources have recently claimed that a new variant with a 1000 kilometre engagement range has been developed, which would allow for strikes against less well defended targets deep behind Russian lines. Efforts have reportedly also been made to significantly increase production, as the number of launchers available has remained low.

The Russian Armed Forces appear to have prioritised targeting not only Ukrainain missile systems, but also defence industrial facilities contributing to its missile programs, with the targeting of four such facilities in mid-August representing a major setback to the Ukrainian Sapsan ballistic missile program. The FSB claimed that the damage to Ukraine’s military industrial complex from the attack was “colossal,” and that Ukraine had planned to use Sapsan long-range missiles for strikes deep into Russian territory. Ukraine’s defence sector has received considerable funding and support from across the Western world, and alongside the production of drones which have been used to strike targets thousands of kilometres inside Russia, cruise missile production has also been specifically singled out to receive financial backing. Ukraine’s defence sector in mid-August unveiled the Flamingo cruise missile, which reportedly has a range exceeding 3000 kilometres, allowing it to strike targets across European Russia and into Siberia. Striking both cruise missile launchers and major industrial facilities is expected to remain a key priority for the Russian Armed Forces to protect the country’s interior from attacks.

Pharmaceutical Blackout: The Hidden Threat to U.S. Security

Tim Ray & Stuart Glickman

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Imagine a crisis where U.S. citizens are abruptly cut off from lifesaving medications. Pharmacy shelves are empty. And medicine cabinets lay bare. This isn’t a far-fetched dystopia. It’s a real and growing threat. Generic drugs, which make up nearly 90% of U.S. prescriptions, depend on Chinese and Indian manufacturing for active pharmaceutical ingredients (API), finished dosage forms, or both. In the event of a possible – if not probable – trade war or geopolitical rupture, these supply chains could be severed; leaving Americans vulnerable to “pharmacological blackouts.”

Senators in June reintroduced the bipartisan RAPID Reserve Act, a legislative lifeline designed to prevent a pharmacological blackout. And as Congress reconvenes in the coming weeks, policy makers should not only advance RAPID’s call to bring critical medicine manufacturing back to U.S. shores and build strategic reserves, they should go further.

Three decades of a combination of economic forces and strategic decisions hollowed out the domestic generic drug manufacturing base. First, the consolidation within the commercial channels (retailers, wholesalers, and pharmacy benefit managers) shifted market leverage heavily toward the buyers. Increased leverage allowed these buyers to aggressively negotiate lower prices for generic drugs and erode profit margins of drug manufacturers. At the same time, Indian and Chinese manufacturers – benefiting from significantly lower production costs – entered the market. Many Western companies followed suit, either building or acquiring manufacturing facilities in India to remain cost competitive. The influx of low-cost suppliers gave the buyers even greater leverage and pushed prices and manufacturer margins even lower. We now have a system where generic drugs make up 90% of prescriptions but account for just 10% of drug revenue – leaving little financial incentive to manufacture them onshore or invest in supply chain resilience.

Market forces have created unsustainable economics and a reliance on offshore manufacturing. These market forces will not solve the very problem that they created. An active, strategic federal response is required to restore domestic manufacturing capacity and protect the public.

The AUKUS Inflection: Seizing the Opportunity to Deliver Deterrence

Abraham M. Denmark and Charles Edel

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In an era defined by accelerating great power competition, AUKUS—the trilateral security partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States—stands as perhaps the boldest strategic declaration of the twenty-first century by the United States and its allies. As originally conceived, and as affirmed by multiple administrations and supported by the major parties in all three capitals, AUKUS was intended to strengthen deterrence, inject stability into the Indo-Pacific region, and bolster allied integration.

Now, nearly four years after it was first announced, AUKUS has reached a critical juncture. Some concerns have surfaced around the initiative’s viability in the wake of reports that the Pentagon plans to review the program. But questions about the future of AUKUS go beyond a single department’s report: The scale of the project’s ambition, coupled with the stakes at play for Washington, London, and Canberra, demand a sober assessment both of the agreement’s potential and the very real challenges it has faced in implementation.

Shoring up AUKUS and ensuring its success is therefore a strategic imperative.

Considering its geopolitical impact as well as the significant resources involved, a thorough review of AUKUS by the Trump administration is necessary. Should AUKUS fail or be scrapped, the United States would become less capable in the Indo-Pacific, its defense posture and diplomatic presence would become less deeply embedded, its international credibility would be dramatically undercut, deterrence would be undermined, and propaganda from Beijing and Moscow declaring the unreliability of American commitments would gain significant credibility. On the other hand, ensuring the success of AUKUS would boost the United States’ defense industrial base, strengthen its closest allies, send a powerful deterrent message to Beijing, and help stabilize the region. Shoring up AUKUS and ensuring its success is therefore a strategic imperative.

The Countdown to Venezuela’s Digital-AI Authoritarian Future: Two Clocks in a Strategic Race

Ron MacCammon

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Venezuela is in a strategic race against time. Nicolás Maduro’s regime—with direct Chinese and Cuban support—is building a predictive authoritarian control system that fuses biometric surveillance, AI-driven analytics, and foreign advisory support to eliminate dissent before it emerges. Accelerated after the contested 2024 election, this “digital jail” aims to ensure that no fraud claims or protests disrupt the 2030 election, securing total control by 10 January 2031—the next presidential inauguration. In irregular warfare terms, it is a contest between a maturing counter-resistance architecture and a fragmented opposition with a narrowing window to act.

Two Clocks

Two clocks are ticking in Venezuela. One belongs to Nicolás Maduro, racing to complete a digital control system by the 2030 presidential election to prevent a repeat of the 2024 election’s fraud allegations, protests, and unrest.[1] This could happen earlier if rapid technological advances, substantial new funding, or some other unexpected surge of external support allows the regime to accelerate deployment, further narrowing the window for the opposition to act.

The other belongs to the Venezuelan people, who have until the day before to stop the final lock from snapping shut. In irregular warfare terms, this is a race between a maturing counter-resistance architecture and a fragmented opposition struggling to adapt. Which clock reaches zero first will determine whether Venezuela becomes the hemisphere’s first fully realized digital authoritarian state—or whether its people reclaim the possibility of democratic governance.

This contest is not hypothetical, and the timelines are not symbolic. Maduro’s side is working methodically toward a fixed operational goal: building a layered system that fuses biometric surveillance, AI-enabled analytics, and foreign advisory support to control the population’s physical and cognitive space. The 2024 election—marked by documented fraud, protests, and communication crackdowns—exposed vulnerabilities the regime is now racing to eliminate.[2]

You Can’t Spell PAI Without AI: The Issues of Cognitive Load and Tradecraft with OSINT

Kelly Ihme 

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AI is everywhere, and its presence interferes with modern intelligence operations. AI is on your phone, in your browser, embedded in applications, even on your smart watch. For most of us, AI is an additive, streamlining tasks and speeding research. For open-source intelligence professionals, AI and AI-generated material potentially impact work in two ways: cognitive load and tradecraft.

Numerous articles cover the benefits and dangers of AI, the challenges of integration across professions, and the growing need for AI literacy within the national security space. While possibilities with AI seem endless, one area needing/requiring more attention is its impact on publicly available information (PAI). There is a flood of AI-generated images, videos, and text content our adversaries intentionally post as people, places, and events to misrepresent, falsify, or completely invent those situations and persons. Not all AI content is intended to deceive. Some AI-generated content is entertainment and spreads the gamut from funny to annoying. Within the intelligence space, the spread of AI content, whether from adversary or ally, is a risk factor. The impact of AI in information operations focuses largely on harnessing the technology to assist with massive data analytics and advantages for decision makers, but one area that remains underexplored is the threat of AI to the public information that our open-source analysts rely on.

Open-Source intelligence (OSINT) “is intelligence derived exclusively from publicly or commercially available information that addresses specific intelligence priorities, requirements, or gaps.” Examples of OSINT sources include social media, public records and websites, news media, and internet images and videos. With the rise of social media, PAI is particularly valuable in gauging sentiment and monitoring events, tracking trends, establishing patterns of behavior, or gaining insight in ways that complement and enhance traditional intelligence methods. OSINT provides leaders with a clearer understanding of an operational environment that enhances decision-making. Although AI content is problematic for creative professions like photography, it also challenges our intelligence analysts and current tradecraft methods. The rise of AI-generated content, particularly photorealistic images, social media posts, and videos, clouds the public information space, adding layers of complexity and noise to PAI and increasing the cognitive load on OSINT analysts. The addition of AI content complicates cataloguing and disseminating OSINT reports to ensure intelligence customers trust those reports.

The Polluted Digital Environment

The FTC Warns Big Tech Companies Not to Apply the Digital Services Act

Mila Fiordalisi

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Trouble is brewing for the Digital Services Act (DSA), the landmark European law governing big tech platforms. On August 21, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), sent a scathing letter to a number of tech giants, including Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple. The letter's subject: The European Digital Services Act cannot be applied if it jeopardizes freedom of expression and, above all, the safety of US citizens.

The opening of the letter—signed by FTC chairman Andrew Ferguson—features a prominent reference to the First Amendment of the US Constitution, namely freedom of speech: “Online platforms have become central to public debate, and the pervasive online censorship in recent years has outraged the American people. Not only have Americans been censored and banned from platforms for expressing opinions and beliefs not shared by a small Silicon Valley elite, but the previous administration actively worked to encourage such censorship.”

The Trump Administration’s Lunge

The Trump administration intends to reverse course, and it is in this direction that the attack on “foreign powers,” the European Union and in the United Kingdom, and in particular on the Digital Services Act and the Online Safety Act, begins. The letter also indirectly references the GDPR, the European regulation on the protection of personal data, whose measures are “aimed at imposing censorship and weakening end-to-end encryption” with the result of a weakening of Americans’ freedoms, according to the letter.

Privacy and End-to-End Encryption: The Issues on the Table

In the letter, the US Antitrust Authority specifically asked the 13 companies to report “how they intend to comply with incorrect international regulatory requirements” (the deadline for scheduling a meeting was set for August 28) and recalled their “obligations towards American consumers under Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, which prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices” that could distort the market or compromise safety.

Unify Information Warfare for Joint Operations

Lieutenant Commander Brett P. Jansen, U.S. Navy

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For the first time in modern history, the Navy and the joint force have lost their assurance of tactical overmatch in most warfare domains. A heavily contested electromagnetic spectrum, unassured U.S. space control, and adversary antiship weapons that range beyond their own with sufficient magazine depth to sustain fires all threaten the joint force’s ability to dominate in a western Pacific conflict. While the Department of Defense is properly signaling industry to deliver affordable, autonomous, and unmanned kinetic mass through programs such as Replicator, lengthy delivery timelines mean the joint force must find asymmetric advantage elsewhere—perhaps even in new command structures.

Giving U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (IndoPaCom) a unified information warfare (IW) commander could offset kinetic deficiencies in a multidomain conflict with China and enable greater synchronization across the competition continuum. To do so, a joint force information warfare component commander (JFIWCC) should be established as the supported commander for operations in the information environment (OIE), with tactical control of IW forces across service components. Below the threshold of conflict, a JFIWCC would continually shape the information environment to support integrated deterrence. In conflict, a JFIWCC would focus on neutralizing disadvantages the joint force faces across time and space.

A war with China would require significant use of OIE. In some situations, OIE would be the main effort, not the supporting effort. OIE is a new term in joint doctrine; it encompasses all capabilities delivering offensive and defensive nonkinetic fires across the physical, informational, and cognitive dimensions of the information environment. These include, but are not limited to, electronic warfare, cyber, assured command and control, military deception, operational security, some space operations, public affairs, and psychological operations. Immense effort and proper authorities are required to plan, synchronize, and sequence OIE across time, space, and service components, because unlike traditional kinetic capabilities, most OIE are target-specific and timing-dependent. Therefore, to maximize OIE effects requires a higher degree of command and control than current joint force command structures provide. While the many tactical and operational IW capabilities are technical, their collective employment is operational music that requires an authoritative conductor.

Recruit–Train–Equip–Repeat Isn’t Enough Anymore: Bringing Transformation to the Army’s Generating Force

Scott Dawe and David Neuzil 

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Buckle up: This piece is going to get wonky. For those readers who particularly enjoy the minutiae of Army organizational structures, you’re welcome. For the rest of you, please accept our apologies—but since this issue affects vastly more people in the Army than are engaged on the topic, we hope you’ll stick with us. After all, it’s only 1,400 words.

If we’ve learned one thing from the Army Transformation Initiative (ATI) and the recent Army Structure (ARSTRUC) memorandum for 2028–2032, it’s that the Army recognizes it needs rapid, organizational change to meet the challenges posed by the modern battlefield. If we’ve learned a second thing, it’s also that the Army is in fact capable of this change. Units represented by what are known as MTOEs (modified tables of organizational equipment)—the vast majority of the operating force—will likely soon look nothing like they did fifteen, ten, or even five years ago. But one set of organizations left behind by all of the restructuring and modernizing efforts seems to be those operating under a different model of apportioning personnel and equipment—the TDA (table of distribution and allowances).

To put it bluntly, TDA organizations are weird—almost inexplicably so. They reflect their evolutionary and piecemeal design and redesign, with bits and bobs bolted on, ultimately taking on a Frankenstein’s monster structure all their own. It is invariably shocking when those who have grown up in brigade combat teams in the operating force arrive at a TDA organization, likely still called a brigade, and find key position grade plate differences or even entire staff sections completely absent. Even TDA organizations with the same mission set (e.g., the 197th and 198th Infantry Brigades at Fort Benning, Georgia, responsible for training 11B infantrymen and 11C indirect fire infantrymen, respectively) do not have the same structure. How we got to this mashup is mildly interesting, but where those structural changes are going will be critical.

The Current Situation

Eighty years after WWII’s end, the consensus it forged is crumbling

Naftali Bendavid

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When a U.S.-led armada sailed into Tokyo Bay 80 years ago to accept the Japanese surrender in World War II, it was just 27 days after an atomic bomb killed some 70,000 people in a single blow at Hiroshima.

It was 125 days after Adolf Hitler shot himself, ending the life of a man responsible for the slaughter of 60 million people. It was 218 days after the Red Army liberated Auschwitz, whose skeletal survivors testified to humanity’s depths.

The lessons, to many Americans, seemed self-evident: Isolationism, nationalism and authoritarianism lead to disaster. Alliances, free trade and democracy are the only way forward. And the U.S. has to take the lead.

Despite some hits, that consensus largely held — at least among policymakers — for nearly 80 years. But Donald Trump’s presidency, with its single-minded pursuit of American advantage, may signal its demise.

That dismays those who believe strongly in the war’s lessons.

“How do you navigate a complicated and dangerous world? You don’t navigate it by unraveling what has worked,” said former senator and defense secretary Chuck Hagel (R-Nebraska). “You don’t unravel a post-World War II world order that is based on institutions and rule of law and common interests. That is very dangerous. It is the biggest threat to the future of mankind.”

Hagel’s father served in the South Pacific during the Second World War, and Hagel, who earned two Purple Hearts in Vietnam and served as defense secretary under President Barack Obama, said the memory of World War II was everywhere when he grew up in small-town Nebraska.

“In the ’50s, everybody in the town was a World War II veteran,” Hagel said. “Every kid in that era had a sense of what happened and why, and how did it turn out and what was the future.”

A New Americanism Why a Nation Needs a National Story

Jill Lepore

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In 1986, the Pulitzer Prize–winning, bowtie-wearing Stanford historian Carl Degler delivered something other than the usual pipe-smoking, scotch-on-the-rocks, after-dinner disquisition that had plagued the evening program of the annual meeting of the American Historical Association for nearly all of its centurylong history. Instead, Degler, a gentle and quietly heroic man, accused his colleagues of nothing short of dereliction of duty: appalled by nationalism, they had abandoned the study of the nation.

“We can write history that implicitly denies or ignores the nation-state, but it would be a history that flew in the face of what people who live