Indian Strategic Studies: 09/29/25

29 September 2025

US, China bully India in global market. Delhi must get its own instruments of leverage Opinion

Pranay Kotasthane

China’s announcement on 15 September that Nvidia broke antitrust law is another instance of Beijing weaponising regulations for geopolitical gain. The decision of the country’s market regulator—State Administration for Market Regulation—against the American top chip maker, which had been taken as US-China trade negotiations proceeded in Madrid, illustrated how antitrust enforcement has moved beyond simple market competition issues into economic statecraft.

This episode teaches India an important lesson in the strength of evidence-based regulatory leverage. As global powers increasingly use economic coercion, India finds itself not as the swing power that it desires to be, but as a swung power buffeted by decisions made in Washington and Beijing. The way out lies in building its own instruments of leverage to inflict costs on other countries. Even if there are unintended consequences, as there will surely be, India must be ready with its own retaliatory options. One of which is strategic merger reviews.

SAMR has shown this strategy with quantifiable results. It is an antitrust regulator scrutinising mergers and acquisitions among firms with major operations in China. But it often deploys delays in approval and conditions as geopolitical tools against foreign governments, transforming even routine business deals into diplomatic levers.

The Intel-Tower Semiconductor is the most theatrical example—a $5.4 billion transaction that won the approval of nearly every regulator around the world except SAMR. Intel had to eventually walk away from the buyout, paying Tower Semiconductor a $353 million breakup fee. This was a retaliation for US semiconductor sanctions.

The Broadcom-VMware acquisition is another revealing example. The $69 billion deal was delayed specifically because of Chinese regulatory slowdowns. Final approval only arrived after favourable talks between the then US president Joe Biden and his counterpart, Xi Jinping, and conditions were imposed that assured VMware software would remain compatible for Chinese buyers.

Nevertheless, SAMR’s strategy is not entirely obstructionist. In 2023, as tensions flared high, SAMR cleared high-profile transactions such as Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard, illustrating strategic, instead of blanket, resistance, which can be leveraged with credibility intact.

India Doesn’t Want to Need China

Tanvi Madan

In August, five years after a fatal military clash between China and India, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi traveled to Tianjin to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit. The visit marked Modi’s first trip to China since relations between the Asian neighbors soured in 2020. Western analysts were struck by images of Modi holding hands and laughing with Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Several observers feared that U.S. President Donald Trump’s tirades and tariffs—he imposed a 50 percent tariff rate on India over the summer—had pushed New Delhi into Beijing’s arms.

That assertion gets both cause and effect wrong. Modi’s meeting with Xi was neither a sudden response to Trump’s bullying nor a hurried reset of India’s relationship with China. And New Delhi is certainly not in Beijing’s arms, nor is it striving alongside Beijing and Moscow to establish a new anti-Western order. India has indeed been working with China for nearly a year to return some measure of stability to bilateral relations. Those efforts, however, don’t obviate the fact that the rivalry between the two Asian giants persists.

But Trump’s pressure on India and his seeming desire to arrive at some kind of grand bargain with China will invariably affect the calculus of Indian policymakers. With concern, they will see Washington’s coercive approach toward New Delhi and the contrasting gentler posture toward Beijing as a break from recent U.S. policy, which stressed the imperative of deterring China and helped drive the United States and India closer. Indian officials will not want to be left at such a disadvantage, and that alarm could increase the extent of India’s reengagement with China. That, in turn, will have implications for American interests in the region. If Trump continues to target India, it could lead to a situation in which India opts to cooperate less with and buy less from the United States and to potentially do more with China and others—the opposite of the Trump administration’s stated desire to strengthen ties with New Delhi.

COURTING A RIVAL

The thaw in what had been an icy Chinese-Indian relationship was first evident in October 2024 at the convening of the non-Western grouping known as BRICS, when Modi and Xi had a bilateral meeting for the first time since 2019. The two sides announced that they had completed troop disengagement at the border, a key step on the path to normalizing relations. Both Beijing and New Delhi were ready to change the temperature. China had been facing strategic and economic headwinds, including flagging growth, pressure from the United States, and concern in Europe about Chinese support for Russia. India, for its part, did not want to fret about the prospect of further clashes along the border and instead wanted to focus on boosting its economic growth and bolstering Indian capabilities for the larger competition with China. And at the time, neither side knew who would next occupy the White House and how it might affect U.S. policy toward China.

Is the US really losing to China in Southeast Asia?

Susannah Patton

Over the past couple of years, a consensus among analysts and scholars has emerged: except in the Philippines, the United States is losing ground to China in Southeast Asia. Whether it’s a lack of positive US economic engagement with the region, patchy diplomatic attention, or a loss of support in Muslim-majority countries owing to US support for Israel, the story has not been a good one. The second Trump administration’s policies, especially to raise tariffs on the region’s trade-exposed economies, are only likely to worsen the US position in the region.

Yet writing in The Interpreter earlier this year, the Carnegie Endowment’s Elina Noor described the great power competition narrative in Southeast Asia as:

“a lazy, tired trope, repeated inside the region as well as beyond, that refuses to disappear despite pleas and exhortations by government leaders for greater nuance in explaining the foreign policy conduct of smaller states.”

Other scholars, such as The Asia Foundation’s Thomas Parks, have sought to set out a more comprehensive picture of Southeast Asia’s foreign policy partnerships. In his book, Southeast Asia’s Multipolar Future: Averting a New Cold War, Parks argued that the region was experiencing an “influx of external partner engagement”, to the extent that it was inaccurate to describe geopolitical competition in Southeast Asia as characterised by bipolar US-China competition.

A new Lowy Institute report, the Southeast Asia Influence Index, seeks to bring data to bear on two related questions: Is it right to describe the geopolitical dynamic in the region primarily a contest for influence between the United States and China? And secondly, to the extent there is a US-China competition in Southeast Asia, who is winning?

Drawing on the repository of data from the Asia Power Index, and other Lowy Institute research publications such as the Southeast Asia Aid Map and Global Diplomacy Index, this new project ranks the relative importance of ten external partners for each of the 11 countries of Southeast Asia, as well as the importance of Southeast Asian countries to each other. Taking in 60 diverse indicators from trade and investment to international student destinations and high-level diplomacy, the Southeast Asia Influence Index offers a bottom-up approach to measuring influence.

Especially for the region’s smallest countries, neighbourhood relationships within Southeast Asia are more important than partnerships with Indo-Pacific major powers.

Fertility Decline in China and Its National Military, Structural, and Regime Security

Michael S. Pollard, Jennifer Bouey, Agnes Xiangzhen Wang, Rakesh Pandey

The People’s Republic of China is facing a rapid change in its population’s age structure following a dramatic decline in fertility that began in the 1960s; by 2024, the fertility rate had dropped to the world’s second-lowest level—well below the replacement level. China’s population shrank in 2022, and the country is experiencing one of the fastest transitions to an aged society. To fully understand what China’s demographic trends mean for China’s future, the effectiveness of the country’s population policies, and the impact of those policies on China’s regional and global foreign security relationships, RAND is publishing a series of analyses focusing on the potential consequences of these demographic trends. This report, the first in the series, provides an introduction to China’s demographic trends through 2050 and an overview of historical population growth policies. The authors also explore the implications of these trends for China’s national security, and they propose potential policy responses.

The authors discuss issues related to military security, including military size, military quality, and international alliances. The analysis of structural security considers its effects on the economy, innovation, and the population’s well-being. The analysis of regime security focuses on the Chinese Communist Party’s drive for self-perpetuation. Potential policy responses discussed include efforts to increase the fertility rate, introduce immigration, address the rural-urban divide, seek technology solutions, and increase the retirement age. Not all of these approaches are deemed viable.

Key Findings

China’s fertility level rapidly plunged from more than six children per woman in the 1960s, to fewer than three in the 1970s, to below two in the 1990s, to close to one in the 2020s; this is the second-lowest fertility rate in the world.

Because of population change, China faces a steep labor force contraction—a 28-percent decrease by 2050 from the labor force’s peak population in 2015.

China’s old age dependency ratio (those ages 65 and older relative to the working age population) will more than double from 0.21 in 2024 to 0.52 by 2050, increasing social support pressures.

China may soon reach far into the Pacific with many uncrewed bombers

Malcolm Davis

China is clearly thinking ambitiously about long-range power projection with autonomous aircraft.

Pictures have emerged of large new Chinese uncrewed aircraft of a configuration remarkably like the United States’ B-2A Spirit and B-21 Raider bombers. This is prompting speculation that this design, too, is for a bomber.

Commercial satellite imagery captured the aircraft at China’s secretive Malan air base in Xinjiang province, reports The War Zone, referring to the type as the GJ-X. Disclosure of the design follows revelation in June of the CH-7 uncrewed aircraft, of similar dimensions, which could be a high-altitude, long-endurance aircraft for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.

While there are similarities between the designs, the GJ-X, if that’s really its designation, differs significantly from the CH-7 design.

These large uncrewed aircraft could support the Chinese military’s counter-intervention strategy, through provision of data on enemy whereabouts and activities, by conducting electromagnetic warfare and by making long-range strikes against land and maritime targets.

The design and size of both suggests long range, high endurance and stealth. That could also imply air operations as the airborne leg of China’s emerging nuclear triad.

The CH-7 and the GJ-X add to a comprehensive suite of uncrewed aircraft that China is developing. Numerous types were on display during a military parade in Beijing on 3 September. These included two fighter-like drones, similar in size to the J-10C crewed fighter and described during the parade as ‘unmanned air domination planes’.

It’s notable how fast China has gone from having no autonomous air capability to platforms such as the CH-7, GJ-X and high-performance combat drones—apparently in barely more than a decade.

The Pentagon’s Missing China Strategy

Seth G. Jones

In the mid-2010s, Pentagon officials in the United States were alarmed by the military progress China and Russia were making. Both countries were investing in cyber, space, and electronic warfare capabilities as well as precision-guided munitions and long-range, ground-based weapons. U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work was particularly concerned about China, which he determined was trying to achieve parity with the United States in military technology. China had developed the DF-21D, an antiship ballistic missile with a range of nearly 1,000 miles dubbed the “carrier killer,” which posed a threat to U.S. ships—including aircraft carriers—in the Pacific. It was time, Work and others in the Pentagon concluded, to imagine what a war in the Pacific might look like and consider how the United States would win it.

Inspired by the so-called offset strategies that the United States developed to counter the Soviets during the Cold War, Work proposed a “third offset” to counter China’s advantages in the Pacific. The U.S. military started drafting new warfighting concepts, such as the navy’s Distributed Maritime Operations, which involved spreading out forces over a large area and developing long-range weapons. The Pentagon also started identifying what weapons, systems, and equipment it would need to buy, prompting new investments in space capabilities, advanced sensors, and a variety of promising technologies, such as advanced sea mines. The third offset, as Work described it, was a “combination of technology, operational concepts, and organizational constructs—different ways of organizing our forces—to maintain our ability to project combat power into any area at the time and place of our own choosing.”

But in many ways, Work’s third offset was a decade ahead of its time. At the time, the United States was still the preeminent superpower. Neither China nor Russia possessed a significant military advantage over the United States—there was not much, in other words, for the U.S. military to offset. Although Work’s call to action inspired various initiatives, it never fully took shape with coherence or urgency.

Trump has just washed his hands of the Ukraine war

Of all of President Trump’s social media posts, it is the one he fired off on Tuesday that future historians may pick as marking the biggest turning point of the Ukraine war. As Trump tweets go – and his inimitable impromptu “communiqués” have long become an established genre of themselves – this one was an instant classic for its U-turn shock factor, the plurality of serious underlying messages it packed, its revealing effect on his critics, and the balance of its contradictions.

The Ukrainians, the president said to the surprise of the entire world, can “WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form” and indeed “maybe even go further than that”. Russia, in his newfound analysis, looks like “a paper tiger” that “has been fighting aimlessly” since 2022 and whose economy is in “BIG” trouble. Now, Trump suggested, “is the time for Ukraine to act”, while promising that he will continue to “supply weapons to NATO for NATO to do what they want with them” – before wishing “both Countries well” and “Good luck to all”.

To say that this is – for the moment – a complete transformation in presidential rhetoric on the Ukrainian war would almost be an understatement in these circumstances. Such declarations don’t just go against Trump’s long-held, oft-repeated and well-established view on the conflict, with a weak Ukraine seen as losing “badly” and a powerful Russia on an implacable course to victory. But they would have been utterly inconceivable just a few weeks ago when the mainstream foreign policy community was left aghast at Trump’s apparent validation of Russian power at the Alaska Summit, and his dim view of the Ukrainian cause.

So what is going on? There are three possibilities. The first is that Donald Trump has experienced a genuine Damascene conversion. Secondly, this might just be another impulsive, ill-informed, “nonsensical” outburst by the President, soon to be written off by some further development and twist in his perspective on the subject. Thirdly, and more likely, Tuesday’s tweet is in fact a more calculated political move signalling a change in policy but wrapped in wording designed to cushion the impact and control the narrative in his favour.

What’s in a pin? Trump dons golden F-22 during Erdogan meeting

Lee Ferran

WASHINGTON — As US President Donald Trump sat in the newly gold-adorned Oval Office with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a smaller piece of precious metal caught the eye of some observers: a pin, worn on the lapel of Trump’s jacket, that resembled a fighter jet.

Upon closer inspection, it appeared to be a golden F-22 Raptor, a miniature of the Lockheed Martin-made fifth-generation stealth fighter.

What was less clear, and remains so, is why the president chose to wear that particular pin for that particular meeting on Thursday. (A White House spokesperson gamely confirmed to Breaking Defense that it was an F-22, but declined to comment further on Trump’s wardrobe.)

The detail is particularly intriguing considering Turkey has long sought re-entry into another American fifth-generation fighter jet program: the F-35, which is also made by Lockheed Martin and is the counterpart to the air-to-air specialist F-22.

“We’re going to discuss the F-35. We’ll be discussing all of the things that you know about …,” Trump said, sitting next to Erdogan. “And I think you’ll be successful with buying the things that he’d like to buy. … We’ll have to see. We haven’t even started yet but I know he wants the F-35, and he’s wanted, and we’re talking about that very seriously.”

Israel Can No Longer Wish Palestine Away

Shira Efron

On September 21 and 22, Australia, Canada, France, the United Kingdom, and six other countries recognized a Palestinian state. Israel has responded defiantly. Following Sunday’s recognitions, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared in a Hebrew-language video statement: “It will not happen. A Palestinian state will not be established west of the Jordan.” Although Netanyahu will only make a final decision on Israel’s full response when he returns to the region after meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump, his coalition has repeatedly threatened to annex West Bank territory and collapse the Palestinian Authority entirely.

Stop the World: Armies Key to Indo-Pacific Deterrence, Says Former U.S. General

Olivia Nelson, David Wroe

Armies hold the key to credible deterrence in the Indo-Pacific because they form the backbone of regional security networks and are harder for China to neutralise, according to a former commanding general of the US Army Pacific. And for those worried about US reliability—be that in hard power or willpower—his message is clear: don’t be.

Appearing on ASPI’s Stop the World podcast, recently retired general Charles Flynn says Beijing would ultimately need to move a large land force across the Taiwan Strait to fulfil its long held ambition of controlling the democratically self-governed island.

He says the region is ‘dominated by armies’—from the Philippines and Vietnam to Japan and India—and this strategic land power network is ‘the security architecture that binds the region together’, offering an asymmetrical advantage.

‘The A2/AD (anti-access/area denial) arsenal the Chinese have designed is primarily designed to defeat our air and maritime capabilities,’ Flynn says. ‘It is not designed to find, fix and target—attack—distributed, mobile, reloadable and networked land forces.’

He argues that forward-deployed missile and artillery units—such as US HIMARS systems, Japan’s Type 12 and 88 missiles, and the Philippines’ Bramos—could present China with a formidable deterrent by denying sea lanes and bolstering allied firepower.

‘Add in Marine Corps and special operations forces capabilities, and you have a forward position of hard power that provides a deterrent effect,’ Flynn says. ‘If you’re in the right pieces of terrain—like the Luzon Strait—you can make the air and maritime components appear larger than they are.’

Flynn warns against ignoring the role of China’s land forces in the country’s military modernisation. He says Beijing’s reforms since 2015 has fused new technologies, organisational changes and increased the complexity and scale of their exercises.

‘In order to invade Taiwan, you actually have to generate an invasion force, and that is its army,’ he says. ‘They can’t achieve their objectives unless they deliver that invasion force.’

Assessing Israel’s Approach in Gaza

Douglas A. Samuelson

We summarize the general observations developed by The Dupuy Institute in a quantitative review of the outcomes of 60 insurgencies since World War II. We then apply the resulting principles to the current Israeli efforts in Gaza. This assessment looks unpromising for the Israelis and, therefore, of concern for the U.S.

Can we assess, objectively, how well Israel is conducting its counterinsurgency in Gaza?

The Dupuy Institute (TDI) published one of the very few writings that assessed counterinsurgency approaches based on quantitative data. (Lawrence, America's Modern Wars: Understanding Iraq, Afghanistan, and Vietnam ) To summarize briefly (and any misstatements or oversimplifications are entirely the responsibility of the current author), the main points were:Force ratios are critical. Counterinsurgencies tend to fail unless they employ at least four, and most often more than ten, times the force of the insurgents.

Successful counterinsurgencies require long-term involvement, typically more than 15 years, sometimes as long as 30 years. Holding territory requires more resources than taking it. Quick victories are rare, even with what seems to be overwhelming force.

Brutality toward the civilian population (including some who may appear to be civilians part of the time and become insurgent fighters at other times) tends to inflame the insurgency. Unless the counterinsurgency is willing and able to wipe out the insurgents completely, less repressive approaches generally are more effective than brutality.

Not providing a path toward peaceful addressing of grievances fuels the insurgency.

Insurgencies rallied by nationalism and/or defense of a home territory tend to succeed. Insurgencies focused on other motives, such as an ideological cause, tend to fail.

Terrain in which the insurgents have ample top cover, such as jungle or tunnels, blocking aerial surveillance of and attacks against their activities, helps the insurgents.

Pentagon contemplating eventual sunsetting of Link 16 as enthusiasm grows for optical communications

Jon Harper

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Discussions about the eventual phaseout of Link 16 tactical data links are ongoing as the Pentagon’s Space Development Agency works to build out a network for optical communications, according to a senior official involved in the effort.

Optical comms networks use lasers to transmit data between satellites and from space vehicles to terrestrial platforms. These capabilities offer some advantages over RF networks, experts say.

“As space becomes increasingly contested and congested, traditional radio frequency communications are hitting some limits. We’re facing bandwidth constraints, security vulnerabilities, plus growing susceptibility to jamming, interference. Meanwhile, our adversaries are rapidly advancing their own space-based capabilities, making secure, high-speed data transfer more critical than ever. And this goes beyond space. The collaborative, real-time partnering attributes we’ll need in the terrestrial domains will rely on connectivity — and laser comms will be a big part of that equation. It offers a crucial pathway forward promising higher data throughput, lower latency and inherent resistance to interception,” Jennifer Reeves, senior resident fellow for space studies at the Mitchell Institute, said Wednesday during a panel at AFA’s Air, Space and Cyber conference.

“We will use that network for our own purposes to backhaul data. We call those ground entry points. … We’re building out a network of those. We also have a number of test sites, and we used those in some recent demonstrations,” he said during the panel. “We use them so that we can opportunistically connect with satellites. And then we’re also working with the warfighter community to develop what we call tactical optical sites and those capabilities. So, kind of three classes of optical terminals. We’re excited because we see optical comms at an inflection point, and we see it start to scale up and start getting economies of scale. So … we’re excited about the scale that’s coming, and we’re trying to be very adaptive to that.”

SDA is creating what the Defense Department calls a Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture, which is expected to eventually include hundreds of satellites in low-Earth orbit for data transport as well as missile tracking.

Batteries are vital for The Pentagon’s drone roll-out

Silhouettes of soldiers are using drone for scouting during military operation against the backdrop of a sunset. Application of modern technology during war

As the US military looks to expand its drone capabilities, another important consideration is the batteries that will power these devices. Bruce Parkinson, Applications Engineering and Inside Sales Manager at Ultralife Corporation, explores how modern-day drone manufacturers now have more choice when selecting a power solution.

Single-use drones are typically treated as expendable and may not return from their first mission; therefore, they do not require a rechargeable battery. In the 1940s, when early versions of single-use drones were first developed, non-rechargeable battery technology was still in its infancy and alkaline chemistry had just been invented.

Alkaline batteries have a lower energy density compared to modern lithium alternatives, and, in single-use drones, the energy required for power-intensive systems like guidance, navigation and communications must be compact and efficient, so low energy density was a significant disadvantage. Alkaline batteries also did not perform as well in extreme temperatures, which was problematic for drones that operated in hot or cold climates or at high altitudes.

Today’s lithium-based non-rechargeable batteries not only address these issues, they can even power the propulsion systems of single-use drones, but this is still very rare. As in the 1940s, non-rechargeable batteries are mainly used to power radio control systems and flight stabilizers, but modern drones also feature additional sensors that require more power.

A balancing act

Every single-use drone must strike the right balance between power output, capacity and weight. Capacity refers to how much energy the battery holds — and therefore, how long the drone can operate — while power output refers to how quickly that energy can be delivered.

A higher capacity facilitates longer missions, but adds weight, which can compromise flight performance or payload allowance. On the other hand, batteries that deliver high current may be bulkier or have lower energy density.

US officials issue ‘emergency’ cybersecurity order after hackers breach at least one government agency

Sean Lyngaas

US cyber officials issued an “emergency directive” Thursday ordering federal agencies to defend their networks against an “advanced” group of hackers that have breached at least one agency in an apparent espionage campaign.

Government officials have not commented on who is behind the hacks, but private experts say they believe the hackers are state-backed and based in China. The hackers have been exploiting previously unknown flaws in software made by Cisco for several months.

“We are aware of hundreds of these devices [running the affected Cisco software] being in the federal government,” Chris Butera, a senior official at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, told reporters.

The directive will help officials understand “the full scope of the compromise across federal agencies,” Butera said.

Unit 42, a division of cyber firm Palo Alto Networks, told CNN that they believe the hackers are based in China. But a slew of other hacking groups could try to exploit the vulnerabilities now that the issue is public and a software “patch,” or fix, is available.

“As we have seen before, now that patches are available, we can expect attacks to escalate as cybercriminal groups quickly figure out how to take advantage of these vulnerabilities,” said Sam Rubin, a senior vice president at Unit 42.

The directive will set off a scramble in Washington to detect the hackers and unplug any compromised devices before the hackers can do further damage. It gives civilian agencies until the end of Friday to update software and report any compromises.

A Cisco spokesperson said the company investigated the hacks in May with “several” government agencies and has since discovered three new vulnerabilities that the hackers were exploiting. The company urged its customers to update their software in the face of the attacks.

Microsoft cuts off some services used by Israeli military unit

Natalie Sherman

Microsoft has cut off some services to a unit of Israel's Ministry of Defence after an investigation found its technology had been used to conduct mass surveillance on people in Gaza.

Brad Smith, president of the company, said using the firm's technology to conduct mass surveillance on civilians was a violation of its standard terms of service.

Mr Smith said the decision, which was prompted by an investigation published by The Guardian, would not affect other work the company does with Israel.

Microsoft's work with the Israeli government has been a controversial issue, including within the company, prompting protests by employees.

"I know many of you care about this topic," Mr Smith wrote in a message to staff that was published by the company on Thursday.

He emphasised that the review was ongoing: "I'll share more information in the coming days and weeks, when it's appropriate to do so."

Last month's investigation by the Guardian, which collaborated with Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and Hebrew-language outlet Local Call, found that a unit of the Israeli defence ministry used the expansive storage capacity of Microsoft's cloud service, Azure, to create a giant trove of calls made by ordinary Palestinians that it had intercepted.

The ability to collect, play back and analyse communications with such breadth helped to shape military operations in Gaza and the West Bank, according to their investigation.

Microsoft, which has responded to protests from staff over its work for Israel by firing some employees, said it launched its own review in response to the article.

The company said it did not access the content of its customers as part of that review but found other evidence to support elements of the article, including consumption of storage capacity in the Netherlands and use of AI services.

To ‘harmonize’ better: Air Force developing new defensive cyber campaign plan

Mark Pomerleau

AFA 2025 — The Air Force’s primary cyber unit is developing a new strategy to better synchronize the work of different groups of cyber defenders, with a particular focus on critical infrastructure and networks, according to the unit’s commander.

“Prior to this, we’ve always kind of looked at them [cybersecurity teams] in separate missions, but they’re really doing the same thing in a different way. We want to harmonize that better,” Lt. Gen. Thomas Hensley, commander of 16th Air Force, said during a panel presentation at the annual Air and Space Forces Association conference at National Harbor, Md.

Currently, cyber defense missions are undertaken by at least two different sets of teams. There are the local defenders, known as cybersecurity service providers or CSSPs, which perform persistent defense of systems. Then there are cyber protection teams, defensive teams focused on hunting adversaries within the network. They have been described as cyber SWAT teams that have specialized kits to eradicate adversary intrusions on networks.

The move for greater harmonization between the two groups, a spokesperson for the 16th said, came out of work the 16th has already done on what they called “mission thread defense.” That refers to an overarching strategy and process flow of information and focuses on protecting critical operational sequences that can span multiple systems and components — to include hardware, software, open vulnerabilities programmable logic controllers, data dependencies, sub systems and architecture.

“In the increasingly complex and competitive global security environment, mission thread defense protects our systems from any cyber threats, disruptions, and failures at any time. It ensures that essential capabilities, [such as] things that keep America safe, remain functional even under attack, protecting both our homeland and operational success by focusing on endurance and integrity of mission-critical operations,” the spokesperson said. “Mission thread defense safeguards critical operations from the beginning to the end of a mission. It enhances system resiliency, mitigates threats, and safeguards steady operations even under cyberattack or system failure.”

Massive Quantum Computing Breakthrough: Long-Lived Qubits

John Koetsier

An IBM quantum computerdpa/picture alliance via Getty Images

Paris-based quantum computing startup Alice & Bob has announced a stunning breakthrough in quantum computing: its qubits can now resist bit-flip errors for more than an hour. That’s four times longer than the company’s own previous record and millions of times longer than typical qubits, which often exist for just microseconds before de-cohering.

And that means Alice & Bob is on track to build a fault-tolerant quantum computer with 100 logical qubits by 2030.

“Being able to push the stability of our cat qubits year after year makes us confident that we will deliver on our roadmap,” Raphael Lescanne, CTO and Cofounder of Alice & Bob, said in a statement.

In the classical computing world, being able to maintain an error-free state for an hour is not a major accomplishment. Quantum computers, however, which promise massive computational advantages in fields like drug discovery, materials science, and cryptography, use quantum bits, or qubits, that are inherently fragile. They decohere, introducing errors in quantum computations. Solving error correction is one of the key challenges in quantum computing.

IBM’s Eagle superconducting quantum processor, for example, can achieve 400 milliseconds of coherence for its qubits. Other quantum computers might achieve only one to 34 milliseconds. New quantum computing architectures, like IBM’s Starling quantum computer that is scheduled to be built in 2029, solve the error correction problem via smarter detection technology, but longer-lived qbits solves the problem at the source.

“By virtually eliminating one of the two main error types, Alice & Bob’s cat qubits allow for more efficient error-correcting codes that require far fewer qubits,” the company says.

The new innovation, while reducing bit-flip errors, comes at the cost of more phase-flip errors, which the company says it can correct for more efficiently.

The billion-dollar infrastructure deals powering the AI boom

Russell Brandom

It takes a lot of computing power to run an AI product — and as the tech industry races to tap the power of AI models, there’s a parallel race underway to build the infrastructure that will power them. On a recent earnings call, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang estimated that between $3 trillion and $4 trillion will be spent on AI infrastructure by the end of the decade — with much of that money coming from AI companies. Along the way, they’re placing immense strain on power grids and pushing the industry’s building capacity to its limit.

Below, we’ve laid out everything we know about the biggest AI infrastructure projects, including major spending from Meta, Oracle, Microsoft, Google, and OpenAI. We’ll keep it updated as the boom continues and the numbers climb even higher.

Microsoft’s $1 billion investment in OpenAI

This is arguably the deal that kicked off the whole contemporary AI boom: In 2019, Microsoft made a $1 billion investment in a buzzy non-profit called OpenAI, known mostly for its association with Elon Musk. Crucially, the deal made Microsoft the exclusive cloud provider for OpenAI — and as the demands of model training became more intense, more of Microsoft’s investment started to come in the form of Azure cloud credit rather than cash.

It was a great deal for both sides: Microsoft was able to claim more Azure sales, and OpenAI got more money for its biggest single expense. In the years that followed, Microsoft would build its investment up to nearly $14 billion — a move that is set to pay off enormously when OpenAI converts into a for-profit company.

The partnership between the two companies has unwound more recently. In January, OpenAI announced it would no longer be using Microsoft’s cloud exclusively, instead giving the company a right of first refusal on future infrastructure demands but pursuing others if Azure couldn’t meet their needs. More recently, Microsoft began exploring other foundation models to power its AI products, establishing even more independence from the AI giant.

Comprehensive National Power Part 2: Seven National Development Strategies

Erik R. Quam

Executive Summary:

Since 1992, the Party has enshrined seven national development strategies in the Party Charter, embedding development of “comprehensive national power” (CNP) at the heart of its approach to governance.

In the first phase (1992–2008), three strategies focused on strengthening science and education, as well as sustainable development, based on the assessment that economic and technological competition would become the dominant aspect of international struggle.

A second phase, beginning in 2008, sought to address uneven development across the system and continue building CNP in the context of an increasingly unstable international environment.

Throughout this period, the United States has been viewed as the main adversary. This was most striking in 2013, when Xi argued that strategic competition with the United States was unavoidable and that the country needed to double down on self-reliance—a remarkable assessment to make at the height of U.S.-PRC engagement and cooperation.

The Military-Civil Fusion Development Strategy, unveiled in 2015, is perhaps the most significant of the seven. Described as essential for optimizing the other strategies and enabling the country to move to the center of the world stage, it calls for establishing a singular, national strategic system to advance simultaneous economic and national defense strength.

Who Is in Charge of Cyber Incidence Response in the Homeland?

Kelly R. M. Ihme, Patrick O'Brien Boling, Michael Zimmerman, Timothy G. McCormick

This article argues that the fragmented US cybersecurity framework—marked by the absence of a lead agency, insufficient whole-of-government coordination, and inconsistent private-sector compliance— undermines national resilience to cyber threats. Unlike existing literature that often focuses on technical vulnerabilities, this piece highlights systemic governance failures through detailed case studies of the SolarWinds, Colonial Pipeline, and Change Healthcare cyberattacks. The article identifies critical gaps in cyber incident response by drawing on incident reports, policy analysis, and expert commentary and offers actionable recommendations to strengthen national cybersecurity, making it especially relevant for policymakers and military practitioners concerned with protecting critical infrastructure.

The Weaponization of AI: The Next Stage of Terrorism and Warfare

C. Anthony Pfaff, Brennan Deveraux, Sarah Lohmann, Christopher Lowrance, Thomas W. Spahr, and Gábor Nyáry

In this episode of Conversations on Strategy, Major Brennan Deveraux interviews select authors of The Weaponization of Artificial Intelligence: The Next Stage of Terrorism and Warfare, a book written in partnership with NATO Centre of Excellence – Defence Against Terrorism (COE-DAT). The authors discuss their respective chapters, which include topics such as how terrorists use large language models, the use of artificial intelligence (AI) as a weapon, and the future of AI use in terrorism and counterterrorism.

Brennan Deveraux (Host)

You are listening to Conversations on Strategy. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the guests and are not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the US Army War College, or any other agency of the US government.

I’m your host, Major Brennan Deveraux. Today we’ll be talking about the newly released book, The Weaponization of Artificial Intelligence: The Next Stage of Terrorism and Warfare. I’m joined today by some of the book’s authors, and we’ll be exploring some of the findings and broader implications of the analysis. I have five guests with me.

The first is Dr. Tony Pfaff, the director of the Strategic Studies Institute. He was the project director and contributing author to the book. The second is Dr. Sarah Lohman, a University of Washington Information School faculty member and Army Cyber Institute visiting researcher. Her chapter of the book is entitled “National Security Impacts of Artificial Intelligence and Large Language Models.” The third is Dr. Gábor Nyáry. He’s a research professor at the National Public Service University in Hungary. His chapter was entitled “The Coming of the Techno-Terrorist Enterprise: Artificial Intelligence and the Tactical, Organizational, and Conceptual Transformation [of] the World of Violent Non-State Actors.” The fourth is Dr. Thomas Spahr, the [Francis W.] De Serio Chair of Theater and Strategic [Strategic and Theater] Intelligence at the US Army War College. His chapter is entitled “Raven Sentry: Employing AI for Indications and Warnings in Afghanistan.” Finally, Colonel Christopher Lowrance [is] an associate professor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the US Military Academy. He coauthored a chapter with Dr. Pfaff entitled “Using Artificial Intelligence to Disrupt Terrorist Operations.”

Disinformation as Ground-Shifting in Great-Power Competition

Sorin Adam Matei

Disinformation, distinct from misinformation, replaces accepted principles of objectivity and verifiability with novelty, framing, authority, self-reference, and conformity to create a new “truth paradigm.” This article introduces a novel definition and framework for understanding disinformation as a strategic tool in great-power competition. It includes a review of case studies, such as Russian disinformation campaigns during the Russia-Ukraine War and analyzes cognitive biases and social behaviors that facilitate the spread of disinformation. Policy and military practitioners will find actionable insights into countering disinformation, including its sociopsychological mechanisms and proposed targeted counterstrategies to protect the integrity of information flows in defense and security contexts.

Mobilizing for the ‘invisible war

Bryan Clark

In his recent confirmation hearing, Gen. Chris Mahoney, the nominee for vice chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, set electronic warfare as one of his top priorities if he is approved by the Senate. This was welcome news after more than a decade of dire assessments regarding the US military’s eroding proficiency and capacity for fighting in the spectrum.

But to turn bold statements into operational impact, the Pentagon will need to update its approach for the information age. Electronic warfare is no longer just jammers and decoys. It is a battle for sensemaking itself.

For Mahoney to make good on this opportunity will require more than replacing or updating aging EW aircraft like the EC-130 Compass Call, EA-18G Growler, or RC-135 Rivet Joint. Those are tactical improvements that might help once combat begins. The more important investments will be those that set the battlefield before the first shot — or prevent any shooting at all.

In 2025, intelligence sources are highly distributed, span military and commercial systems, and are of widely varying quality. Enemy forces can use publicly available data to target US troops, ships, or aircraft and exploit social media to gather intelligence on US servicemembers and operations. Paradoxically, disrupting, overwhelming, or deceiving this flood of information may be getting easier. Today nearly all information at some point moves through the airwaves, including to and from space. Electronic warfare and cyber operations are merging as the fastest way to get into an opponent’s network becomes an antenna.

With military and commercial sensors ubiquitous, an opponent like China can build a comprehensive picture during peacetime of US forces’ positions, identity, and habits, building a “pattern of life” akin to the approach used during counterinsurgency operations. When combat begins, People’s Liberation Army targeteers can quickly implement fire plans against US bases, ships, and ground units.

But this cuts both ways. US forces could mount a multi-dimensional campaign to undermine the confidence of Chinese planners and commanders. Jamming and decoys are just the start. The campaign should also include elements like radiofrequency-enabled cyber operations against PLA networks, deception operations using new force compositions and tactics, and false communications and messages.

Air Force’s AI ambitions mean simplifying its tangle of networks

LAUREN C. WILLIAMS

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md.—The Air Force is eager to use AI widely but is still struggling with the infrastructure to make it all work, said the service’s top buyer for battle-network systems.

“One of my biggest challenges is the underlying infrastructure that actually makes it all work,” said Maj. Gen. Luke Cropsey, the Air Force’s program executive officer for command, control, communications, and battle management, or C3BM, during the Air and Space Forces Association’s Air, Space & Cyber conference. “It's just the hard network of figuring out: how do you get the right infrastructure where you need it?”

Interoperability—whether data sharing or linking between systems—remains a challenge.

“With all the different configurations of stacks that are running around out there, getting to an enterprise-level capability is tough,” Cropsey told reporters. “As part of where we're trying to in our ‘26 priorities, we're actually looking at how do we build an enterprise battle network, [an] enterprise-wide set of strategies that allows us to go from however many disparate systems are out there today into some rational number of end-to-end capabilities that will allow us to get to the speed and the scale that we need.”

Technical teams are currently developing drafts of those strategies, which will fit under C3BM’s strategic framework announced in July. The Air Force released a separate network modernization document earlier this month.

“As we go into the fall timeframe, we're going to take those initial internal documents and strategies and start proliferating them out to the rest of the department to get their inputs and then ultimately out for comment to the broader industry base that provides that capability back into us, so that we have a robust strategy around what that end state looks like,” Cropsey said.

But even the best algorithms need good data and management practices to back them up.

Leadership and Our Army Profession

Gen. Gary M. Brito, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Danny R. Priester Jr., U.S. Army

25th Infantry Division and 2nd Battalion Royal Brunei Land Forces soldiers conduct a jungle field training exercise together during Pahlawan Warrior 24, 23–25 June 2024, in Tutong, Brunei. (Photo by Sgt. Jared Simmons, U.S. Army)

Troops are strongly influenced by the example and conduct of their leaders. A leader must have superior knowledge, will power, self-confidence, initiative, and disregard of self.

—Field Manual 100-5, Operations

We don’t have to look far to find many writings on leadership. Books, academic journals, doctrinal manuals, and more provide material on leadership styles, philosophies, and templates. I would argue that leading in the U.S. Army, although it shares much of what is written in the above material, has its own aimpoint: to be ready for combat.

In May 2025, the Army released Field Manual (FM) 1, The Army: A Primer to Our Profession of Arms. This article builds on and complements chapter 3 of FM 1, “A Leader.” I want to underscore the importance of leadership and its impact on unit performance, unit cohesion, and most importantly, our Army Profession.

A mentor once told me leadership is a little bit of both nature and nurture, and I believe this to be true. In other words, one may have innate leadership qualities such as charisma or empathy, while other qualities are learned and modeled over time. The “learned” qualities come from a variety of sources including formal education, mentoring, training, and more. We have a responsibility to our profession to nurture and develop leadership qualities in all our leaders, regardless of rank.

Supporting and investing in leader development has and will always be paramount to the Army’s success on the battlefield. Positive and effective leadership provides the foundation for combat-focused training—building cohesive teams, caring for soldiers and families, upholding standards, and making decisions. Effective leadership remains a central driver of change, not an afterthought, as the U.S. Army remains fully engaged with continuous transformation in response to a more volatile and interconnected global operational environment and adversaries that have shown the capacity to acquire technology quickly and cheaply.

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