Why India Is Embracing the Taliban

Happymon Jacob

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Contributor

Jacob is a visiting professor at Shiv Nadar University, the founder of the Council for Strategic and Defense Research, and editor of India’s World magazine.

Anand Prakash (left), an Indian official at the Ministry of External Affairs with Afghanistan's Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi (center) at the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) in New Delhi on Oct. 13, 2025.Anushree Fadnavis—Reuters

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The Taliban evokes bitter memories in India. The Islamists were seen as complicit in India’s worst plane hijack in 1999 and the 2008 attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul, which killed several Indian citizens, including two senior diplomats. It is for these and other reasons that the Afghan Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi’s trip to Delhi is so remarkable.

Muttaqi, who is still on the U.N. sanctions list, had to get a travel exemption to arrive in India last Thursday for a week-long visit. India referred to him as the Afghan foreign minister, allowed him to hold press conferences at the Afghan embassy premises in Delhi that are still manned by officers of the previous Western-backed government, and had its foreign minister S. Jaishankar share the stage with him. Delhi also plans to reopen its embassy in Kabul soon.

But as Muttaqi went about a public relations blitz in India and held talks with Indian officials, deadly clashes erupted along the Durand Line border between Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent days. The timing alongside Muttaqi’s visit to India—Pakistan’s arch-rival—underscores the complex India-Afghanistan-Pakistan geopolitics at play.

Why is Delhi reaching out to Kabul?

India has maintained relations with the Taliban ever since it seized power in Kabul four years ago. But a series of regional developments has led to the unprecedented change in India’s policy toward the Taliban we are seeing today. The military conflict between India and Pakistan earlier this year, China’s active and growing support for Pakistan, Russia’s lukewarm response to that war despite its historical defense ties to India, and Washington’s recent embrace of Pakistan have created a sense of unease and claustrophobia in Delhi.

Delhi has few friends or trusted partners left in a large swath of the Indian subcontinent, from the Rann of Kutch in the Gujarat border to Kashmir in the north, China to its north-east and South Asian states such as Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal, and Bhutan. Afghanistan is important in such a geopolitical context, and the Taliban appear to be willing to play ball.

Yet Delhi’s outreach to the Taliban has faced severe criticism given its human rights record. The uproar caused by the initial press conference that excluded female journalists was just one reminder of this. Notwithstanding this criticism, though, there is still a growing view within Delhi that foreign policy should be pragmatic and driven by interests rather than ethical considerations. Delhi has been consistently prioritizing cold interests over all else—engaging with the junta in Myanmar, refraining from openly criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, engaging both Iran and Israel, and getting closer toward recognizing the Taliban as Afghanistan’s official government. The new thinking in Delhi is that it should work with whoever holds power in a country. Welcoming Muttaqi to Delhi reflects this approach.

From Food Aid To Free Trade: Europe Courts India — With Caveats – Analysis

Ramesh Jaura

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Since the 1960s, India has prioritised strategic autonomy in its foreign policy, consistently avoiding alliances that could compromise its sovereignty. Western partners often overestimate their influence, overlooking India’s strong commitment to independence. For India, autonomy is not a tactic but a core principle.

In September 2025, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen unveiled an ambitious India Strategic Roadmap, which includes the world’s largest free trade agreement, a startup corridor, deeper ties to Horizon Europe, and broad security and defence cooperation.

However, the agreement included caveats. The EU warned that India’s continued purchases of discounted Russian oil and joint military exercises with Moscow would impede closer ties.

Indian leaders anticipated this response and maintained their position. The legacy of the 1960s remains relevant, when the United States used the PL-480 “Food for Peace” program to influence India during the Cold War.

The core challenge remains: India consistently defends its autonomy, while Western partners often seek alignment as a condition for partnership.

PL-480: Food as Foreign Policy

The 1954 Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act, commonly referred to as PL-480, was designed to dispose of surplus U.S. grain and foster goodwill. For India, this aid was essential.

By the late 1950s, India faced recurring droughts, rapid population growth, and stagnant farm output. U.S. wheat imports through PL-480 soared, reaching nearly 10 million tonnes annually by 1965.

Though touted as humanitarian, PL-480 quickly became a foreign policy tool.Under President Lyndon Johnson, the U.S. enforced a “short-tether” policy, authorising aid in small, conditional tranches.

Continued aid depended on India’s support for U.S.-Vietnam actions and alignment with Washington.

When Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri condemned the bombing of Hanoi in 1965, U.S. shipments slowed mid-drought.

The message was clear: food aid was contingent on political alignment.

India’s Response: Tightening Belts, Guarding Sovereignty

The PL-480 experience exposed the risks of dependence and reinforced India’s commitment to the non-aligned path envisioned by Nehru.

Non-alignment was an active assertion of independence. India engaged with major powers but consistently set its own terms.

Prime Minister Shastri made it plain: “We have to tighten our belts, but we will never sacrifice our freedom.”

An Internet Shutdown Cuts Off Iranians From One Another, and the World

Since its brief June war with Israel, Iran has throttled internet traffic and jammed GPS, making day-to-day tasks online almost impossible and prompting Iranians’ fears of greater surveillance.

Sanam Mahoozi and Erika Solomon

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Throughout its 12 days of war with Israel in June, Iran enforced a near total internet blackout on its people, saying that it was a necessary security measure to stop Israeli infiltration.

Though the authorities have since technically lifted the blackout, internet activists, tech entrepreneurs and rights monitors say that a wartime chokehold on the web remains, leaving many Iranians still in the dark.

Digital rights experts say that internet speeds have been slowed, online traffic has been curtailed and geolocation positioning services, or GPS, is jammed. The use of satellite internet tools like Starlink, which could allow users to bypass such blocks, has been criminalized.

Many Iranians once used VPNs — virtual private networks — to circumvent restrictions. But those are increasingly difficult to reach in the country.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times

The partial shutdown has left Iranians struggling to communicate with one another and the outside world. Compounding Iran’s international isolation, the United Nations recently reimposed sanctions on its nuclear program.

The internet restrictions have had profound implications for ordinary Iranians. Since the war, simple tasks like finding directions, ordering a taxi or paying for groceries online have become an hourslong saga.

Abbas, a 71-year-old businessman, eventually gave up on his phone’s online directions as he tried to find a friend’s house in the city of Karaj.

“I kept driving in circles,” said Abbas, who asked to withhold his last name out of fear of reprisal for speaking to foreign media, adding that he was not alone in his frustration. “Everybody is lost.”

Officials from Iran’s Ministry of Information and Communications Technology did not respond to requests for comment on internet restrictions. But a June article by the news agency Tasnim, which is linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, said that “internet restrictions are necessary in wartime for defense against the enemy.”

Pakistan Is Faced With The Prospect Of A Two-Front Conflict, If Not A Two-Front War

P. K. Balachandran

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For Pakistan, what was a “one-front war” with India in May, got complicated in October, with a “hot war” being fought with Afghanistan on its Western borders and a “war of words” with India in the East.

Before long, Pakistan could face a “two-front hot war” with Afghanistan and India if efforts are not quickly made to cool tempers in Pakistan and India.

Even as the Pakistan air force and ground troops were attacking bases of the Afghan Taliban and the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in Afghanistan, Pakistan accused India of aiding and abetting the Afghan Taliban and the TTP. Pakistan had, for long, been charging India of colluding with the Afghan Taliban.

Muttaqi’s Presence in India

But what provoked the latest barrage of accusations against India was the presence of the Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in India where the red carpet was rolled out for him.

India assured Muttaqi of economic aid and the upgrading of the status of the Indian mission in Kabul albeit without formal recognition. In return, Muttaqi supported India on the question of Jammu and Kashmir, angering Pakistan which disputes India’s claim to this State.

Pakistan concluded that Afghanistan and India were in cahoots and a decision was taken to deliver a punishing blow to Afghanistan that had been allegedly supporting the TTP.

Observers did not fail to notice that Pakistan conducted its first air strike against Afghanistan even as Muttaqi was talking to the Indians in New Delhi. The opening salvo was telling as it was aimed at Kabul, the Afghan capital, and the target was a TTP leader, Noor Wali Mehsud.

These Are the Chinese Warplanes Pakistan Is Using to Fight the Taliban

Brandon J. Weichert

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Prior to the past days’ clashes, Pakistan most recently displayed the excellence of Chinese warplanes in its aborted war with India in May.

A temporary ceasefire has been declared in the spiraling border war between Pakistan and Taliban-controlled Afghanistan that erupted last week. But the conflict erupted with such a ferocity out of Pakistan that it stunned the Taliban.

Responding to what Islamabad claimed were unacceptable cross-border terrorist attacks by anti-Pakistani insurgents being harbored within Afghanistan, the skilled Pakistani Air Force (PAF) struck hard against Afghanistan—in an apparent attempt to force Kabul into cooperating with Islamabad on anti-terrorism military operations in Afghanistan.

Interestingly, the PAF deployed their Chinese-made warplanes and weapons in their recent wave of airstrikes directed against targets along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border as well as against Kabul itself. China’s JF-17 Thunder was used for cross-border strikes on Taliban hideouts in neighboring Afghanistan. Prior to the past days’ clashes, Pakistan most recently displayed the excellence of Chinese warplanes in its aborted war with India in May.

Pakistan operates the J-10C “Vigorous Dragon” from China, too. Owing to their previous close ties with the United States, the PAF has older F-16s still in service, too.

What to Know About Pakistan’s Chinese-Made Warplanes

The JF-17 was developed as a joint Pakistan-China project under the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex (PAC) and Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC).

Pakistan operates three variants of the JF-17 Thunder. The Block I variant is the barebones version. The Block II possesses improved avionics and can conduct midair refueling. The most advanced variant, the Block III, includes AESA radar, advanced electronic warfare (EW) capabilities, and is believed to have stealth coatings to reduce visibility on enemy radar.

Nepal’s Political Elites Dig in Their Heels After Gen Z Uprising

Meena Bhatta

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A month has passed since the September 8-9 uprising that shook Nepal’s political establishment from its core, forcing rapid and dramatic changes. The unprecedented Gen Z movement toppled the K.P. Sharma Oli-led government, resulting in the formation of an interim government under former Chief Justice Sushila Karki. Nepal’s streets are now momentarily calm, but the nation stands at a political crossroads. Whether Nepal can transform the movement’s energy into lasting democratic stability remains a difficult question.

The interim government has announced a fresh election for March 5, 2026, but uncertainty clouds the path forward. Nepal’s two biggest political parties, the Nepali Congress (NC) and the Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist-Leninist (CPN-UML) remain internally divided and have not officially committed to the declared election. Factions within these political parties are split on whether to move ahead with elections or to push for the reinstatement of the dissolved House of Representatives, claiming its dissolution as unconstitutional.

Deepening the gridlock, Oli – the ousted prime minister who is still the CPN-UML chair – publicly rejected the legitimacy of the Karki-led interim government and declared that his party would not participate in the elections under its authority. This stance has also found resonance among dissenting voices within the NC, thus widening the political rift that now defines Nepal’s fragile transition.

These developments expose a troubling reality. Rather than engaging in genuine retrospection on what drove the young generation to the streets, party leaders seem focused on preserving their political relevance, risking a repeat of the very dysfunction that triggered the upheaval. An even more troubling possibility is electoral futility. What if the March 2026 election simply reinstates the status quo, bringing back the same political parties, the same faces, and the same patterns of governance to power? The longer these uncertainties loom, the greater the risk of undermining the credibility of the interim government and eroding public trust in the transition.

The First 48 Hours of a War With China ‘Could Be Ugly’

Andrew Latham

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MEDITERRANEAN SEA (Feb. 21, 2017) The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) transits the Mediterranean Sea in support of Operation Inherent Resolve. The George H.W. Bush Carrier Strike Group is conducting naval operations in the U.S. 6th Fleet area of operations in support of U.S. national security interests. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Daniel Gaither/Released)

Key Points and Summary – In a war with China, the U.S. must prepare to absorb a massive opening punch of over a thousand missiles and drones aimed at paralyzing its forces.

-The key to victory is not preventing this first strike but building a resilient force that can “fight hurt.”

F-15EX Eagle II’s from the 40th Flight Test Squadron, 96th Test Wing, and the 85th Test and Evaluation Squadron, 53rd Wing, both out of Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, fly in formation during aerial refueling operations with a KC-135 Stratotanker from the 370th Flight Test Squadron out of Edwards Air Force Base, California, May 14. The Eagle II’s participated in the Northern Edge 21 exercise in Alaska earlier in May. (Air Force photo by Ethan Wagner)

-This requires a radical shift to strategies like Agile Combat Employment, which disperses aircraft across many smaller bases, and developing resilient command networks.

-It also demands “magazine depth”—surging production of key munitions and operationalizing at-sea reloading—and fully integrating allied firepower.

-The goal is to survive the opening hours and win the longer campaign.

‘Disperse or Die’: The Air Force’s Survival Plan for a War With China

Developing | China expels He Weidong, Miao Hua and 7 other generals from party and military

Yuanyue Dangin BeijingandLiu Zhen

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China’s second-ranked military general has become the latest in a series of top brass to come under investigation for corruption, China’s Ministry of National Defence announced on Friday.

He Weidong, vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and a member of the 24-man Politburo, was expelled from the Communist Party and the army, the ministry said.

He is the first serving member of the present Politburo, the Communist Party’s top decision-making body, to face such an investigation.

He Weidong was vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission and a member of the 24-man Politburo. Photo: Xinhua

In a rare instance of a voluntary public release, ministry spokesman Senior Colonel Zhang Xiaogang said nine senior military officials had been investigated and punished.

“Upon investigation, it has been determined that these nine individuals seriously violated party discipline and allegedly committed grave duty-related crimes. The amounts involved are particularly huge, the nature of the offences extremely severe, and the impact is exceptionally negative,” Zhang told a regular media briefing on Friday.

In addition to He, the subjects of investigation include: Miao Hua, former member of the CMC in charge of the military’s political, ideology and personnel work; He Hongjun, Miao’s deputy and former executive; and Wang Xiubin, former executive deputy director of the CMC Joint Operations Command Centre.

Miao Hua. Photo: Handout

Lin Xiangyang, former commander of the Eastern Theatre Command; Qin Shutong, former political commissar of the army; Yuan Huazhi, former political commissar of the navy; Wang Houbin, former commander of the Rocket Force; and Wang Chunning, former commander of the People’s Armed Police Force were also being investigated.

He Weidong is the third CMC member to be removed since the existing line-up took office in 2022.

“The serious investigation and punishment of He Weidong, Miao Hua, He Hongjun, and others once again demonstrates the firm determination of the Party’s Central Committee and the Central Military Commission to carry the fight against corruption through to the end. It highlights a clear stance that there is no place for corrupted officials to hide within the military,” Zhang said.

China sacks defence minister Li Shangfu with no explanation after nearly two-month absence

An Internet Shutdown Cuts Off Iranians From One Another, and the World

Since its brief June war with Israel, Iran has throttled internet traffic and jammed GPS, making day-to-day tasks online almost impossible and prompting Iranians’ fears of greater surveillance.

Europe Is Losing the Chips Race

The Continent Needs More Cooperation With America—Not Less

Chris Miller and John Allen

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A production line of a semiconductor company, Hamburg, Germany, June 2024Fabian Bimmer / Reuters

CHRIS MILLER is a Professor at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Strategic Adviser to the GLOBSEC Geotech Center, and the author of Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology.

JOHN ALLEN is Director of the GLOBSEC Geotech Center, a Strategic Adviser to Microsoft, and a Member of the Board of Directors of Polar Semiconductor. From 2011 to 2013, he commanded U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

European leaders have grand ambitions to reduce the continent’s reliance on sensitive technologies from abroad. Today, they are debating an update to the European Chips Act, which was finalized in 2023 and allocated billions of euros to subsidize chip-making on the continent. The act was meant to increase Europe’s share of global chip manufacturing from ten to 20 percent by 2030, but it will likely fall short of that target by a wide margin.

A purely European supply chain for semiconductors—the sector that undergirds the digital economy and defense sector—is a fantasy that distracts from real opportunities. Many of

Trump meeting brings good news for Zelensky, but Kyiv’s real prize remains out of reach – for now

Analysis by Nick Paton Walsh,

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The relationship between US President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky has unquestionably improved but the real prize Kyiv seeks seems out of its reach, for now.

After nine months of extraordinary diplomatic acrobatics and verbiage, Trump still prefers to give Russian President Vladimir Putin yet another chance to talk him around, over blunt military escalation.

But there were – among the fawning compliments and the conviction an elusive peace was near – bits of good news for Ukraine. Even Trump’s final word on the matter, a Truth Social post delivered as he left for Mar-a-Lago, suggested “They should stop where they are” – a ceasefire along current battle lines, suggesting something Kyiv could very much tolerate.

“We have to stop where we are. This is important, to stop where we are, and then to speak,” Zelensky told CNN during a news conference after the meeting.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during a news conference in Lafayette Park outside the White House in Washington, DC on Friday. - Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Indeed, the day could have gone a lot worse for Ukraine.

First, Trump extolled the deadly virtues of the Tomahawks, the supply of which he said his meeting with Zelensky was all about. “That is why we are here,” he said. “Tomahawks are very dangerous… It could mean escalation – a lot of bad things could happen.” This is a threat unimaginable when Trump first came to power: the president contentedly signaling he might give the cream of his arsenal to Zelensky so Ukraine can strike deep into Russia.

Yet at the same time, Trump undermined his own threat, by immediately making the nature of the deal before Putin clear. “Hopefully we will be able to get this war over with without thinking about Tomahawks,” Trump added. “I think we are pretty close to that.”

The truth is, Trump is likely still far from the deal he called “Number 9,” a reference to the number of peace agreements around the world he claims to have had a hand in. But his new approach – of threatening real military escalation, through US technology purchased by European allies and then supplied to Ukraine – might, over time, bring closer the deal he still says Putin wants.

The threat is as psychological as it is military. The US lacks the inventory to provide the “thousands” of Tomahawks Trump said he joked with Putin on Thursday he might give Ukraine. The missiles are normally sea-launched, and so at best Ukraine would have to wait months to receive a few dozen that it would have to adapt to launch on land.

They are remarkably expensive. Their range is not much greater than the drones Ukraine currently fires nightly deep into Russia. If it used them, Kyiv would have to hit targets worth the Tomahawk’s $2 million price tag – which means hitting serious military or government infrastructure, something Trump might veto. Trump and Zelensky appeared to have agreed to leave their arrangements ambiguous: Zelensky declined to offer any details on their Tomahawk conversation, saying the US did not want escalation. Asked if he was optimistic or pessimistic on the missiles, he replied he was “realistic.”

Asia’s Trump Problem

Michael J. Green 

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The Region Lacks Leaders Who Connect With the U.S. President

South Korean President Lee Jae-myung meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C., August 2025 Brian Snyder / Reuters

MICHAEL J. GREEN is CEO of the U.S. Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and Henry A. Kissinger Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

In August, just days after U.S. President Donald Trump had welcomed Russian President Vladimir Putin to a summit in Alaska, a remarkable image emerged from the White House. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had scrambled to Washington to meet with Trump and shore up U.S. support for Ukraine’s defense against Russia’s invasion. But Zelensky was not alone: joining him at his meeting with Trump were the leaders of Finland, France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, as well as the European secretary-general of NATO and the president of the European Commission. A photo of the entire group provided a corrective of sorts to the images that had emerged of Trump and Putin greeting each other warmly in Anchorage.

The European leaders’ decision to accompany Zelensky reflected a combination of courage and pragmatism. It would have been easier to condemn Trump for welcoming Putin onto U.S. soil, or to hold a countersummit in Europe and avoid the potential domestic political embarrassment of paying homage in the Oval Office. But those options would have required the European leaders to believe that they can prevent a Russian victory in Ukraine (and guarantee their own countries’ security) without U.S. military, economic, and diplomatic power. And they know that they cannot do so.

So instead, they leveraged their strengths—Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s ideological proximity to Trump, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s relatively frequent contact with him, and Finnish President Alexander Stubb’s unique rapport with him (based in no small part on Stubb’s golfing prowess)—to charm, cajole, and push the disruptive U.S. president more or less in the right strategic direction. The result was an agreement to ship advanced U.S. weapons systems to Ukraine via NATO purchases, with Trump even considering Kyiv’s request for Tomahawk missiles.

For European leaders, this collaborative effort to spur Trump to stick with U.S. allies—and with the alliance system the United States itself had built—represented a sharp departure from his first term. Back then, European leaders played supporting parts at best: their voters disdained Trump, and their personal temperaments limited their ability to connect with him. While they struggled, the leading role of “Trump manager” within the U.S. alliance network was played by Asian leaders—most masterfully by Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister at the time. A famous photo taken at the G-7 summit in Quebec in 2018 captures Abe’s approach. In it, German Chancellor Angela Merkel appears to impatiently confront a defiant or dismissive Trump while French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minster Teresa May seem to be backing Merkel. Meanwhile, a pained Abe stands by Trump’s side, mimicking the U.S. president’s body language and perhaps looking for an opportunity to diffuse the tension.

Russia Is Arming Drones With North Korean Cluster Weapons

Though Pyongyang has largely pulled its soldiers off the front lines in Ukraine, it is expanding the types of ammunition it supplies to Russia.

A previously unknown North Korean cluster munition that was used as the warhead in a Russian drone found near Kherson, Ukraine, in September.Credit...Conflict Armament Research

John Ismay

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Russian forces are using small drones armed with North Korean cluster munitions in attacks in southern Ukraine, as North Korea expands its support for Russia’s military, according to a report published on Thursday by a weapons research group.

Independent investigators who visited Ukraine last week examined a previously unknown type of North Korean cluster munition that was fitted to a Russian drone found near the city of Kherson on Sept. 23.

Cluster munitions are a class of military ordnance that break apart in midair and scatter smaller explosive or incendiary weapons, often called bomblets, over a large area.

North Korea has supplied Russia with soldiers, artillery shells and ballistic missiles, but the use of North Korean bomblets as warheads in small Russian drones has not previously been reported.

The investigators said the bomblet had been heavily modified and attached to a “first-person-view drone.” That type of drone relays a video feed that enables a soldier to more easily direct it to a target.

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The report was published by Conflict Armament Research, an independent group based in Britain that identifies and tracks weapons and ammunition used in wars. Ukrainian government authorities have invited the researchers to the country throughout the war to analyze and document Russian military hardware.

The group has found that even the most advanced Russian munitions rely on low-tech parts made by Western firms that have been smuggled into the country despite international sanctions.

Russian servicemen learning how to use a first-person-view drone at a training range in the Rostov-on-Don region of southern Russia in 2024.Credit...Arkady Budnitsky/EPA, via Shutterstock

The report comes as President Trump has said he may send U.S.-made Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine to press Russia to negotiate an end to its three-and-a-half-year war. He is expected to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine at the White House on Friday to discuss possible Tomahawk sales, which would give Kyiv the ability to launch salvos of missiles into Moscow.

Why the U.S. Is Losing the Cognitive Competition

Renee Pruneau Novakoff

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Former Deputy Director of Intelligence for Sensitive Activities and Special Programs, Office of the Secretary of Defense

Renee Pruneau Novakoff served for over forty years in the Department of Defense and several Intelligence agencies to include NSA, CIA, ODNI, and DIA. Her last assignment was in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, providing oversight and guidance for the Defense Department’s special programs and sensitive activities to include Human intelligence, Information Operations, counter supply. Previously, Ms. Novakoff served as Joint Staff Director for Collection Management where she was responsible for leading the Defense Collection Enterprise. She also served as Joint Staff Director for Strategy, Plans and Policy. Ms. Novakoff also served as the Principal Deputy National Intelligence Manager for Russia, Europe, and Eurasia at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). Prior to that assignment she was the Acting National Intelligence Manager for Western Hemisphere.

EXPERT OPINION — In order for the U.S. to successfully compete for global influence against its adversaries and to avoid a kinetic fight, we must excel at cognitive warfare; that is military activities designed to affect attitudes and behaviors. This type of warfare is a subset of irregular warfare (IW) and combines sensitive activities to include information operations, cyber, and psychological operations to meet a goal. To develop these kinds of operations, the U.S. needs intelligence professionals who are creative and experts in their field. Additionally, the U.S. intelligence and operations sectors need to be comfortable working together. Finally, the U.S. needs decision makers who are willing to take risks and employ these methods. Without these components, the U.S. is doomed to fail in competing against its adversaries who practice cognitive warfare against us on a regular basis.

U.S. focus on IW and its subset, cognitive warfare, has been erratic. The U.S. struggles with adapting its plans to the use of cognitive warfare while our leaders have consistently called for more expertise for this type of warfare. In 1962, President Kennedy challenged West Point graduates to understand: "another type of war, new in its intensity, ancient in its origin, that would require a whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, forces which are too unconventional to be called conventional forces…" Over twenty years later, in 1987, Congress passed the Nunn-Cohen Amendment that established Special Operations Command (SOCOM) and the Defense Department’s Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict (SO/LIC) office. Another twenty years later, then Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said that DoD needed “to display a mastery of irregular warfare comparable to that which we possess in conventional combat.”

Microsoft: Russia, China increasingly using AI to escalate cyberattacks on the US

DAVID KLEPPER

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Russia, China, Iran and North Korea have sharply increased their use of artificial intelligence to deceive people online and mount cyberattacks against the United States, according to new research from Microsoft.

This July, the company identified more than 200 instances of foreign adversaries using AI to create fake content online, more than double the number from July 2024 and more than ten times the number seen in 2023.

The findings, published Thursday in Microsoft’s annual digital threats report, show how foreign adversaries are adopting new and innovative tactics in their efforts to weaponize the internet as a tool for espionage and deception.

AI’s potential said to be exploited by US foes

America’s adversaries, as well as criminal gangs and hacking companies, have exploited AI’s potential, using it to automate and improve cyberattacks, to spread inflammatory disinformation and to penetrate sensitive systems. AI can translate poorly worded phishing emails into fluent English, for example, as well as generate digital clones of senior government officials.

Government cyber operations often aim to obtain classified information, undermine supply chains, disrupt critical public services or spread disinformation. Cyber criminals on the other hand work for profit by stealing corporate secrets or using ransomware to extort payments from their victims. These gangs are responsible for the wide majority of cyberattacks in the world and in some cases have built partnerships with countries like Russia.

Putin Is Out of Options

CARL BILDT

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It is now clear that Russia’s army cannot get the job done in Ukraine, and that Donald Trump cannot force Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into submission as long as European financial support for his government holds. Whether Russian leaders realize it or not, they have no path to victory.

STOCKHOLM – The outcome of Russia’s war on Ukraine matters not just for those countries’ future, but for all of Europe. The root cause of the conflict is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s obsession with restoring his country’s status as an imperial power. Old Russia was a highly centralized empire, or what Lenin called a “prison of nations.” Indeed, it is Lenin whom Putin blames for breaking the old imperial order and allowing Ukraine to find its own path.

America’s Real Enemy Within

KORI SCHAKE

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By politicizing the US military and deploying it at home for his partisan purposes, US President Donald Trump has created a clear and present danger to American democracy. Americans would do well to remember why the country's founders worried so deeply about this very threat.

WASHINGTON, DC – Since its founding almost 250 years ago, the United States has been uniquely fortunate that its military has never once become a threat to its democracy. But that could now change because President Donald Trump is trying to use the military – and the men and women who serve in it – as a cudgel against his political adversaries, whom he describes as “the enemy from within.”

The Coming US Financial Crisis

PS editors

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While US President Donald Trump has regularly roiled markets, investors have failed to account adequately for escalating risks to the US financial system. With market participants chasing short-term profits, and regulators considering measures that would further erode financial stability, it is only a matter of time until cracks begin to appear.

Last week, after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose additional 100% tariffs on China starting next month, the US stock market tumbled, and bond yields fell. But markets have since rallied, apparently driven by the assumption that Trump will “chicken out” once again and that the US Federal Reserve will soon cut interest rates.

This pattern has become a feature of Trump’s second presidency, points out Brown University’s Şebnem Kalemli-Özcan. Investors understand “perfectly well” the risks raised by the Trump administration’s “bad economic policies.” Although the United States’ “long-term capacity to create wealth” is being systematically eroded, investors are “content to keep funding the US government at historically low yields,” because the “payoff structure rewards short-term momentum over long-term prudence.” This complacency will continue to pay – “until it doesn’t.”

The problem extends beyond risk-taking by institutional and professional investors, observes economist Dambisa Moyo. Digital platforms and mobile apps have drawn in a “surge of new retail participants” pursuing “speculative, short-term, and risk-heavy trading strategies.” If left unchecked, this frenzy could raise risks that extend beyond financial markets to include the “stability of household finances and, ultimately, the broader economy.”

Hilary J. Allen of the American University Washington College of Law points to another source of financial risk: an AI bubble. If this bubble bursts, leveraged financial institutions may be forced to engage in fire sales of many types of assets, not just tech stocks. A “crash in Ponzi-like crypto assets,” as well as stablecoin runs, is also likely. “Experts might not expect a stock-market crash to cause a financial crisis,” Allen notes, “but what if they are wrong?”

India’s Russian Oil Saga Is Indeed Ending – OpEd

M.K. Bhadrakumar

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The latest US-Indian fracas over Russian oil has been rather odd with Trump attributing to PM Modi explicitly that India has terminated its imports of Russian oil. Why would Trump bluff?

One possibility that needs to be explored is what our trade negotiators camping in DC actually conveyed to their American counterparts, which the latter would have transmitted to the White House, whereupon, Trump added, typically, a touch of swagger to it.

Americans must be emboldened by the news that our public sector oil companies have already terminated the oil purchases from Russia presumably on instructions from the government. In fact, Reuters reported quoting a White House official on Thursday that Indian refiners are already cutting Russian oil imports by 50%.

The government must clarify the state of the play instead of parrying. If the game plan is to taper off the oil purchase and switch to American supplies, which is evidently Trump’s agenda to capture the expanding Indian market and dominate our energy policies, it will willy-nilly surface.

Our style of functioning vis-a-vis Trump presidency continues to be messy. Why is it that Trump calls Pakistan’s COAS a ‘great’ man and showers praise, while derisively disposes of the UK PM Keir Starmer or Italy’s Giorgia Meloni — or attributes false statements repeatedly to Modi?

We must introspect how we landed in a cul-de-sac. Trump likes to dominate others but is selective. Quite obviously, he no longer bullies North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un. It is about time to do some soul-searching.

This is important because the present standoff is not really about Russian oil, but is about India’s future role in the American foreign policy strategies. It is linked to India’s potential rise as a great power. I heard a riveting podcast recently on international security where the renowned American author and strategic thinker Jeffrey Sachs kept referring to India as one of the 4 great powers in world politics — aside the US, China and Russia.

In this quartet, the US faces growing isolation unless it lures India to its side as a subaltern, a role that ‘Global Britain’ gladly performed in a previous era. This predicament is at the core of the US’ blatant attempt to erode India’s time-tested relations with Russia. The US is zeroing in on the two core areas of India-Russia relationship, namely, energy and defence without which the relations get hollowed out.

US Aiding Ukraine’s Long-Range Strikes Into Russia

Hudson Institute and Can Kasapoğlu

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1. Ukraine Targets Russia’s Energy Sector with US Intelligence Support

Ukraine’s missile and drone raids on energy infrastructure deep inside Russia have accelerated dramatically since August 2025, exacerbating the country’s widespread fuel shortages. Reports now indicate that Ukraine has begun to receive intelligence from the United States to support these long-range salvos, including operational planning assistance for drone systems. Despite Washington’s aid, Kyiv retains the final say in target selection.

Ukraine’s operational design targets the Kremlin’s chief source of revenue: its oil refineries and pumping systems. This approach differs starkly from Ukraine’s previous attacks on the Russian energy sector, which were smaller and predominantly targeted oil storage facilities.

More importantly, Ukraine now possesses a powerful and growing pool of strike assets. This includes the indigenous FP-1 drone, which has accounted for 60 percent of deep strikes on Russian territory, and the Flamingo missile. Ukraine has also made range-extending modifications to other long-range systems. Official images appear to show a Neptune missile with a conformal fuel tank—an extra tank fitted closely to the profile of a projectile that extends its endurance.

Reports estimate that Kyiv has knocked out 20 percent of Russia’s oil refining capacity, though only temporarily. The long-term success of Kyiv’s campaign will depend on its operational tempo, the ability of Ukraine’s defense industry to sustain its production rates, and the continuation of US intelligence support.

Will the Tomahawks Save Ukraine?

Mark F. Cancian and Chris H. Park

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Remote Visualization

Tomahawk missiles have emerged as the key discussion topic surrounding Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s third visit to the White House today. U.S. President Donald Trump has floated the idea of sending the missiles to Ukraine: “If this war doesn’t get settled, I may send Tomahawks.” He had previously said that Ukraine is in a “position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form” with the commitment to “continue to supply [U.S.] weapons to NATO.”

About a thousand Tomahawk missiles are available for transfer to Ukraine in the U.S. stockpile today. Their deployment could have a major impact on the war, but they would need to arrive in Ukraine quickly if they are to give President Trump the leverage he needs to get Russia back to the negotiating table.

Ukraine, however, competes with U.S. requirements in the Pacific, which the administration sees as a higher priority. Further, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned against the transfer in his recent phone call with President Trump and likely will do so again in the prospective summit in Budapest.

Even if President Trump defers a decision about Tomahawks, Ukraine and its supporters can raise the issue in the future.

Instrumental interdependency: the Egypt–Israel gas deal

Ellen Clarke

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Egypt’s August extension of its natural-gas import agreement with Israel was followed by escalating rhetoric on both sides and Israeli threats to derail the deal. However, pragmatism underlies the agreement’s survival.

Egypt signed a US$35 billion agreement with Israel to extend and expand natural-gas imports from Israel’s Leviathan field, offering critical relief to Egypt’s growing energy deficit. In early September, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened to derail the deal as the two states traded accusations of Camp David Accords violations. Cairo’s political rhetoric towards Israel escalated as the latter carried out airstrikes targeting Hamas leadership in Qatar and blazed Gaza City, with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi naming Israel the ‘enemy’ of the region and sending tanks to the Sinai to deter displacement of Gazans south of the strip. While these developments highlighted how the export of critical gas to Israel’s most important Arab partner is fraught with political vulnerabilities, pragmatism on both sides underlies the deal’s survival.

Egypt’s dilemma

With stagnating gas fields and soaring domestic demand, Egypt is overwhelmingly dependent on imports for its domestic energy supply. It is expected to spend upwards of US$20bn importing liquefied natural gas (LNG) and petroleum products in 2025. Roughly 60% of Egypt’s overall gas imports come from Israel, and it is therefore highly vulnerable to Israeli gas flow, having experienced deadly blackouts in 2024 partially due to the Leviathan shutdown during Iran–Israel escalations, as well as scheduled maintenance. To ease domestic unrest, Egypt was forced to accept the high prices of the LNG spot market, with Saudi Arabia and Libya stepping in to finance cargoes.

Cairo’s deep gas and security ties with Israel risk inflaming historic, civic Palestinian solidarity in Egypt and undermining domestic political stability. Palestinian activism networks had lent their structure to the Arab Spring mobilisation in 2011, and protesters saw through Sisi’s attempts to foster a public mandate for his approach to Gaza in the lead-up to the 2023 elections. Instead, they marched to Tahrir Square and called out the government’s hypocrisy as the proportion of Egypt’s gas imports from Israel grew.

America Needs an Alternative to GPS. So, Why Aren’t We Developing One?

 Anthony J. Constantini

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America’s overreliance on GPS leaves it vulnerable to jamming and spoofing. Building a terrestrial backup using 5G could secure national defense and critical infrastructure.

The Global Position System (GPS) is now embedded in practically every device Americans use, from computers to phones to cars. Millions of people use it every day for travel. Parents are increasingly using it to track their children and pets. And America’s military relies upon it for everything from missile targeting to tank transport to drone piloting.

This did not happen by accident. By and large, GPS is an extremely reliable technology. But it can also fail, is easily spoofable, and is already being surpassed by our adversaries. In 2022, a random GPS outage forced all airplanes away from a 40-mile swath near the Dallas airport; the cause remains unknown, although researchers have determined it was a complex jamming operation. In the early 2010s, Iran may have stolen an American drone via GPS spoofing. It is still unclear exactly how they did it, though Iran unquestionably engages in spoofing operations. The Russo-Ukrainian War, for its part, is rife with examples of how GPS can be blocked or spoofed.

As for being surpassed? China’s BeiDou, an alternative navigation system, is now expanding to more countries. And while China’s boasting sometimes obscures its technology’s actual capabilities, the system is likely more accurate than GPS. There are major drawbacks, obviously—namely the fact that the Chinese government likely has backdoors—but seeing how willing most governments were to set up official TikTok accounts, that fact will probably not concern most outside of Washington and Western Europe.

Building a Resilient Alternative

So what’s the solution? While making advancements to GPS is one approach, there is another: building layers of resilience by creating an American terrestrial alternative to GPS using existing 5G technologies.

Why Israel Has Not Defeated Hamas

Azeem Ibrahim

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Hamas won’t be defeated until Palestinians see a genuine path to self-determination.

After nearly a year of unrelenting bombardment and devastation in Gaza, Israel’s government insists that it is “determined to complete its victory” even after signing a ceasefire last week. Yet the facts on the ground tell a very different story. Out of the ruins of Gaza, an estimated 15,000 Hamas fighters have re-emerged, most of them fully armed and already attempting to reassert control. Reports from the enclave indicate that these men have begun hunting down suspected collaborators and executing them in the streets. Far from being eradicated, Hamas has survived, bloodied, fragmented, but unbroken.

This outcome should surprise no one. Every credible counterterrorism expert has long warned that Hamas cannot be destroyed through military means alone. The group is not merely a network of fighters or tunnels; it is an entrenched political and ideological movement with deep roots in Palestinian society. As the United States learned with Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, you can kill leaders, dismantle infrastructure, and occupy territory, but you cannot bomb away an idea.

The stated Israeli objective of total victory was always a mirage. Hamas’s command structure has certainly been degraded, but it continues to operate in cells and local militias. The Israeli campaign has devastated Gaza’s civilian population, killed tens of thousands, displaced over a million, and reduced entire neighborhoods to rubble. Yet the core conditions that gave rise to Hamas, despair, disenfranchisement, and statelessness, remain firmly in place. In fact, they are worse than ever.

It is important to recall how Hamas rose to power in the first place. In the early 2000s, the Palestinian Authority under Fatah had become synonymous with corruption, cronyism, and incompetence. After years of failed peace talks, economic decline, and Israeli settlement expansion, ordinary Palestinians lost faith in the PA’s ability to deliver even the most basic services or any credible path to statehood. Hamas capitalized on this disillusionment. It presented itself as a clean, disciplined alternative, a movement of resistance and social justice.

When Hamas won Gaza’s 2006 legislative elections, it was a protest vote against the stagnation of Fatah, not an endorsement of Islamist extremism. But once in power, Hamas followed a familiar authoritarian script. It consolidated control by force, expelled rival factions from Gaza, cancelled future elections, and built up a heavily militarized statelet. Its leaders diverted vast resources toward the construction of tunnels, rockets, and a standing army rather than the welfare of the population they governed.

Will the AI Bubble Trigger a Financial Crisis?

HILARY J. ALLEN

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Experts might not expect a stock-market crash to cause a financial crisis, but what if they are wrong? With leverage built up in so many parts of the system and asset-price movements so closely correlated, the current US financial system looks like a tinder box just waiting for a spark to land on it.

WASHINGTON, DC – OpenAI Co-Founder Sam Altman, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell have joined the chorus of people talking about an AI bubble and expressing concern that the US economy will nosedive when it bursts. But what would a post-bubble nosedive look like?

Responsible Behavior In Military AI Starts With Responsible Procurement

SIPRI and Netta Goussac

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In a tense geopolitical environment and amid an apparent artificial intelligence (AI) ‘arms race’, militaries seeking to integrate AI capabilities are grappling with two important questions. The first is how to expedite the deployment and scaling up of these novel and rapidly developing technologies, which are now seen as essential for strategic dominance. The second is how to implement commitments to responsible use of AI in the military domain.

The procurement of AI capabilities is challenging for a number of reasons, not least the shortage of AI-literate personnel in today’s militaries and the fact that suppliers of AI capabilities are diverse and include non-traditional actors such as technology start-ups. This complicates efforts to adapt procurement processes for AI and in some cases increases risk. For example, decentralizing some AI procurement decisions to individual units or commands could reduce red tape, but it could also mean the decisions are not reviewed by AI-literate officials able to see through industry hype. Opting for industry-led off-the-shelf solutions may be much quicker than having suppliers develop new systems to meet the military’s specifications. But having less control over the design, development and testing of new AI capabilities increases the risk of deploying systems that do not meet forces’ needs or are even substandard or unsafe.

Principles of responsible behaviour are relevant not only to the use of AI capabilities but also to the processes by which those capabilities are procured. How then can militaries’ efforts towards streamlining procurement be kept in step with their efforts to develop and implement principles of responsible behaviour in relation to AI in the military domain?

This essay examines why and how states must align steps to adapt procurement processes for military AI with principles of responsible behaviour.