The Terrible Price of a Single Iraqi Military Victory Over ISIS

Iraq’s victory over militants in Sunni town underlines challenges government faces

Loveday Morris

Washington Post

October 29, 2014

Militiamen stand on a destroyed bridge on Oct. 28, 2014, in Jurf al-Sakhar, an Iraqi town southwest of Baghdad which has been a flashpoint for clashes for months. (Loveday Morris/The Washington Post)

JURF AL-SAKHAR, Iraq — Iraq renamed this town on the banks of the Euphrates this week to reflect the triumph of its security forces here against Islamic State militants, who were driven out last week. Jurf al-Sakhar, or “rocky bank,” became Jurf al-Nasr, or “victory bank.”

But a visit to the Sunni settlement Tuesday laid bare the huge cost of that victory. The town is now emptied of its 80,000 residents, and building after building has been annihilated — from airstrikes, bombings and artillery fire.

After four months of battles between the Islamic State and the Iraqi army, about 10,000 pro-government Shiite militiamen were poured into the area for a final push, according to Hadi al-Amiri, who leads the Badr Brigade and coordinated the operation. Defeating the militants involved clearing out all of the residents and leaving the town near-flattened, underscoring the challenge the Shiite-led government faces in areas where demographics do not work in its favor.

Here, there was no choice but to push forward. In just over a month, the nearby highway would be packed with millions of Shiite pilgrims heading south to commemorate the death of Imam Hussein, a figure revered in Shiite Islam. Militants based in Jurf al-Sakhar had stepped up attacks in recent weeks on the holy city of Karbala, about 20 miles south and home to the Imam Hussein Shrine. Officials said clearing Jurf al-Sakhar of militants had been essential to prevent large-scale assaults during more than a month of religious events.

On Tuesday, hundreds of militiamen trundled out of Jurf al-Sakhar in trucks and buses, handing over control of the town and outlying villages and farms to Iraqi security forces. As flatbed trucks carrying field artillery waited to move out, Humvees and bomb-disposal vehicles burned in streets that the insurgents had laced with explosives. In the town center, the smell of death lingered in the air.

The Shiite forces could not remain in the area, militia commanders said. Their presence would only spark controversy and accusations of sectarian killings, they said. There already have been reports of revenge attacks in the aftermath of the Jurf al-Sakhar victory.

It was not hard to see why such reports were circulating. A convoy of trucks blaring religious music from loudspeakers drove out on a dusty road just north of the town. The men in the truck were jovial and flashed peace signs, but the decaying body of an accused insurgent hung from the back of the vehicle. A commander with the militiamen, newly recruited volunteers who joined under a religious order to take up arms in June, became angry about the body being photographed.

“They are worried that it looks bad that we are killing them,” said a Badr commander who gave his name as Abu Muslim. “But they killed us at Speicher, so we should be able to kill them,” he added, referring to what Iraqi officials allege was the execution of 700 soldiers at the Camp Speicher base in northern Iraq in June by Islamic State militants.

U.S.-Israeli Relations: Don't Call It a Crisis

Paul R. Pillar

October 29, 2014

A piece by Jeffrey Goldberg at The Atlantic bearing the title “The Crisis in U.S.-Israeli Relations is Officially Here” has elicited much comment, including fromcolleagues at The National Interest. Goldberg has performed a useful service in at least two respects. One is that his piece highlights how friction in the U.S.-Israeli relationship is primarily an epiphenomenon of an Israeli policy trajectory that is detrimental to Israel itself—no matter what U.S. officials may or may not say about the policies, publicly or privately—and not only detrimental to others. In commenting, for example, on the latest insertion of right-wing Jewish settlers into Arab areas of East Jerusalem—which many Palestinians unsurprisingly see as another step in de-Palestinianizing East Jerusalem so much that it could not become capital of a Palestinian state—Goldberg writes, “It is the Netanyahu government that appears to be disconnected from reality. Jerusalem is on the verge of exploding into a third Palestinian uprising.” He's right about the potential for a new intifada, one that could emerge spontaneously from bottled-up frustration and anger and would not need to be ordered or directed by anyone.

Another service by Gol;dberg is to portray the relationship far more realistically than one would conclude from the boilerplate that both governments routinely serve up about supposedly unshakeable ties between close, bosom-buddy allies. The fact is that the interests that this Israeli government pursues (not to be confused with fundamental, long-term interests of Israel and Israelis generally) are in sharp and substantial conflict with U.S. interests. No amount of pablum from official spokespersons can hide that fact.

For both these reasons, Goldberg's article deserves a wide readership.

The most recent expressions that reflect the true nature of the relationship are not just a matter of unnamed U.S. officials mouthing off. Goldberg notes in the third sentence of his piece that the comments he is reporting are “representative of the gloves-off manner in which American and Israeli [emphasis added] officials now talk about each other behind closed doors.” So the barbed tongues extend in both directions, but with two differences. One is that in this relationship the United States is the giver (of many billions in aid, and much political cover in international organizations) and Israel is the taker; harsh comments are far harder to justify when they are directed by an ungrateful beneficiary to its patron rather than the other way around. The other difference is that Israeli leaders insult the United States not just through anonymous comments to journalists but also publicly and openly; the current Israeli defense minister is one of the more recent and blatant practitioners of this.

One can legitimately question some of the particular accusations by the U.S. officials that Goldberg reports, not to mention the scatological and indecorous terminology employed. But to concentrate on this is to overlook the larger and far more important contours of the relationship. The most fundamental truth about the relationship is that, notwithstanding routine references to Israel as an “ally,” it is not an ally of the United States beyond being the recipient of all that U.S. material and political largesse. An ally is someone who offers something comparably significant and useful in return, particularly on security matters. That this is not true of Israel's relationship with the United States is underscored by the priority that the United States has placed, during some of its own past conflicts in the Middle East such as Operation Desert Storm, on Israel not getting involved because such involvement would be a liability, not an asset.

The core policy around which much of this Israeli government's other behavior revolves, and which defines Israel in the eyes of much of the rest of the world, is the unending occupation of conquered territory under a practice of Israel never defining its own borders and thus never permitting political rights to Palestinians under either a two-state or a one-state formula. This policy is directly contrary to U.S. interests in multiple respects, not least in that the United States through its close association with Israel shares in the resulting widespread antagonism and opprobrium.

One of the biggest and most recent U.S. foreign policy endeavors is the negotiation of an agreement to restrict and monitor Iran's nuclear program to ensure it stays peaceful. Completion of an agreement would be a major accomplishment in the interest of nonproliferation and regional stability. The Israeli “ally” has been doing everything it can to sabotage the negotiations and prevent an agreement.

It is a fallacy to think that making nice to the Israeli government will get it to back off from its opposition. It is a fallacy because that government has shown it does not want any agreement with Iran no matter what the terms, and because it is dishonest in expressing its opposition. There certainly is genuine concern in Israel about the possibility of an Iranian nuclear weapon, but that is clearly not what is behind the Israeli government's opposition because the sort of agreement that is shaping up would make it markedly less likely, in terms of both Iranian motivations and capabilities, for Iran ever to make a nuclear weapon than would be the case with no agreement. The Israeli government instead seeks to keep Iran permanently in diplomatic exile, precluding any cooperation between Iran and the United States on other issues (which would dilute Israel's claim to being the only worthwhile U.S. partner in the Middle East) and retaining the specter of Iran and a nuclear threat from it as the “real problem” in the Middle East supposedly more worthy of international attention than the occupation and unresolved plight of the Palestinians. These objectives, as well as the setback for the cause of nonproliferation that collapse of an agreement with Iran would entail, also are directly contrary to U.S. interests.

It's Time to Wake Up: Chinese Hacking Is Eroding U.S. Military Superiority

By Mackenzie Eaglen & Charles Morrison

October 22, 2014

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Countering Chinese cyber espionage must be a top priority

Earlier this month, the latest cyber-attack against J.P. Morgan garnered national headlines. And most Americans are aware of – if not affected by – last year’s Target and this year’s Home Depot data breaches.

Yet many Americans know much less about the regular and sophisticated theft of many of the U.S. military’s cutting-edge weapons systems. The cybercrime has reached the point where the FBI has warned American companies about a group of sophisticated Chinese government-backed hackers that has been working for years to steal economic and national security secrets from the U.S. government and private contractors. The notice comes after the Justice Department indicted five People’s Liberation Army officials in May for commercial espionage.

Systematic Chinese cyber espionage has resulted in significant damage to U.S. national security. However, Congress seems to be doing little to help. Part of it can surely be chalked up to what has been called “data breach fatigue.” Presumably the same mindset has infected the nation’s capital.

But the Pentagon cares about these breaches, and Congress should start paying serious attention. Last year, the Washington Post reported on a classified Defense Department report that revealed Chinese hackers have compromised the designs of more than two dozen U.S. military weapons systems. The list of impacted programs reads like a catalogue of weapons critical to current U.S. military dominance, including the stealthy F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the F/A-18 fighter jet, the Patriot missile system, the Army’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile defense system, the Navy’s Aegis ballistic missile-defense program, the V-22 Osprey, UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, and the Littoral Combat Ship. The Washington Free Beacon reports that other data stolen by the Chinese include the P-8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft and RQ-4 Global Hawk drones.

As the Chinese continue their military modernization while undermining America’s, Pentagon officials have increasingly sounded the alarm that U.S. military technological superiority is at risk. This technological superiority, in the words of Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics Frank Kendall, “is being challenged in ways that I have not seen for decades, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. Technological superiority is not assured and we cannot be complacent about our posture. This is not a future problem. It is a ‘here-now’ problem.”

Many Pentagon leaders have looked to “leap-ahead” technologies to address this growing problem, investing in “seed corn” that will eventually sprout into game-changing technologies and capabilities. Yet, alarmingly, the Chinese have also compromised many of the next-generation technologies that the U.S. military is relying upon to maintain a leg-up in its competition with China. According to the Free Beacon, compromised technologies include “know-how related to directed energy weapons, drone video systems, technical data links, satellite communications, electronic warfare systems, and electromagnetic aircraft launch systems.”

If this trend continues unabated, the consequences would be palpable for security in East Asia and beyond. The better Beijing is able to counter the U.S. military’s most advanced capabilities of both today and tomorrow, the lower the threshold will be for aggression and coercion in the region.

Russian Hackers Believed to Be Responsible for Recent Breach of White House Computers

Hackers breach some White House computers

Ellen Nakashima

Washington Post

October 29, 2014

White House officials said the hackers did not damage any of the systems when they breached the unclassified network, and to date, there is no evidence that the classified network was hacked. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

Hackers thought to be working for the Russian government breached the unclassified White House computer networks in recent weeks, sources said, resulting in temporary disruptions to some services while cybersecurity teams worked to contain the intrusion.

White House officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, said that the intruders did not damage any of the systems and that, to date, there is no evidence the classified network was hacked.

“In the course of assessing recent threats, we identified activity of concern on the unclassified Executive Office of the President network,” said one White House official. “We took immediate measures to evaluate and mitigate the activity. . . . Unfortunately, some of that resulted in the disruption of regular services to users. But people were on it and are dealing with it.”

The FBI, Secret Service and National Security Agency are all involved in the investigation. White House officials are not commenting on who was behind the intrusion or how much data, if any, was taken.

“Certainly a variety of actors find our networks to be attractive targets and seek access to sensitive information,” the White House official said. “We are still assessing the activity of concern.”

U.S. officials were alerted to the breach by an ally, sources said.

Recent reports by security firms have identified cyber-­espionage campaigns by Russian hackers thought to be working for the government. Targets have included NATO, the Ukrainian government and U.S. defense contractors. Russia is regarded by U.S. officials as being in the top tier of states with cyber-capabilities.

In the case of the White House, the nature of the target is consistent with a state-sponsored campaign, sources said.

The breach was discovered two to three weeks ago, sources said. Some staffers were asked to change their passwords. Intranet or VPN access was shut off for awhile, but the email system, apart from some minor delays, was never down, sources said.

The Deepening Divide in U.S.-China Cyber Relations

Adam Segal

October 29, 2014

Recent revelations by a group of security researchers of another China-based hacking group, reportedly more sophisticated than Unit 61398, is likely to set off the usual recriminations and denials, but have very little impact on the U.S.-China bilateral relationship. The Chinese embassy has already responded that “these kinds of reports or allegations are usually fictitious,” a response that Robert Dix, vice president of government affairs for Juniper Networks, colorfully and baldly describes as the Chinese giving “a big middle finger to anybody in the United States that’s tried to out them or point fingers in their direction.”

The report on the group, called Axiom, describes a six-year campaign against companies, journalists, civil society group, academics, and governments, and may preclude any real discussion on cyber issues between Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Barack Obama at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit next week. There was, however, very little chance that their sidebar discussion was going to lead to major progress. The differences between the two sides are deep.

An article that ran last week in thePeople’s Liberation Army Daily[Chinese] criticizing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and efforts to develop the laws of armed conflict in cyberspace shows just how deep the differences are. The focus of the piece is the Tallinn Manual on the International Law Applicable to Cyberspace. Written by a group of international experts at the invitation of NATO’sCooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence, the manual addresses many of the specific applications of law to cyberspace, including the use of force, when and how states can defend themselves, as well as questions of proportionality, distinction, and neutrality. The report was non-binding and is not the official ruling of NATO, the United States, or any other government.

The Chinese have long been skeptical about the applicability of international law to cyberspace. This article goes one step further, casting the manual as an effort to manipulate cyberspace using law. In particular, the author levels four charges:

- Post hoc justification: the manual argues that using the Internet for strategic action is permissible, and that countries can send false information to make the enemy believe that there is an ongoing error, wage psychological warfare, fabricate command issues, and steal enemy codes, signals, and passwords, all things the United States is said to have already done.

- Unilateralism: this is another example of the U.S. military using its strength to define rules that reinforce its dominance.

-Cold War thinking: NATO is an alliance designed for collective defense. Even though it is supposed to be a partnership, the United States will lead the organization into a confrontation over cyberspace.

-Bad faith: NATO says the group that researched and wrote the manual is independent, but the author of the article implies this cannot be true because of the leadership of Michael Schmitt, who teaches at the U.S. Naval War College.

There was some hope that discussions about international law might be a useful area of cooperation for the United States and China. The 2013 Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force report suggested that the U.S. State and Defense Departments “should call together a group of legal advisers from Kenya, Brazil, China, India, Tunisia, South Africa, Turkey, and other important developing cyber powers to work on these questions.” Perhaps the task force was naive in its hope that these discussions could be the basis for collaboration, but it is surely not a good sign that some in Beijing see the process as a weapon and source of greater mistrust.

The above first appeared in CFR’s blog Net Politics here.

U.S. Eyes Cyber ‘Deterrence’ To Stop Hackers

The best defense against this problem is a good offense. RCP

Agence France-Presse, 

Oct. 28 | Rob Lever

The US military is looking to flex its muscles in cyberspace as a “deterrence” to hackers eying American targets, the nation’s top cyber-warrior said Tuesday.

Admiral Mike Rogers, who heads the Pentagon’s Cyber Command as well as the National Security Agency, evoked a policy often put forward for avoiding nuclear warfare, because holding powerful weapons is seen as a deterrent.

Rogers said that as part of his role as the head of Cyber Command, he wants to send a message to potential cyber-attackers that there are consequences for their actions.

“Right now, if you are a nation-state, if you are a group, if you are an individual, my assessment is that most (hackers) come to the conclusion that it is incredibly low-risk, that there is little price to pay for the actions that they are taking,” Rogers told a cyber security conference at the US Chamber of Commerce in Washington.

“I’m not saying I agree with that but I believe most look at that and in light of that feel that they can be pretty aggressive. That’s not in our best interests in the long term as a nation to have that perception. We need to try to change that over time.”

Rogers said the US military has a “legal framework” for the use of any offensive cyber-weapons, noting that a decision to use these tools needs approval from the president and secretary of defense.

But he said US officials are in the midst of discussions on defining offensive military actions in cyberspace and how to implement them.

“What I hope we can develop over time is a set of norms and rules that get us into an area where we can get a better definition of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable (in cyberspace), and even into the idea of deterrence,” he told the conference.

The comments came the same day that security researchers, in two separate reports, said the Russian and Chinese governments are likely behind widespread cyber-espionage that has hit targets in the United States and elsewhere.

One team of researchers led by the security firm Novetta Solutions said it identified a hacker group believed to act “on behalf of a Chinese government intelligence apparatus.”

A separate report by the security firm FireEye said a long-running effort to hack into US defense contractors, Eastern European governments and European security organizations is “likely sponsored by the Russian government.”

The Chinese group, which was dubbed Axiom, “is a well-resourced, disciplined and sophisticated cyber-espionage group operating out of mainland China,” Novetta chief executive Peter LaMontagne said in a statement released with the study.

The report said the firms went beyond simply collecting information and cooperated on a “coordinated, effective remediation and disruption” of the Chinese networks.

“Novetta feels that the unified approach… provides the highest level of visibility and establishes the foundation necessary to effectively counter a threat of this nature,” the report said.

Rogers did not specifically comment on Axiom but said he is generally cautious on the use of “cyber-mercenaries” who retaliate against hackers.

Hackers Are Using Gmail Drafts To Update Their Malware And Steal Data

October 29, 2014 

http://www.fortunascorner.wordpress.com

Andy Greenberg, writing on the October 29, 2014 website Wired.com, begins by noting that “in his career-ending extramarital affair that came to light in 2012, General David Petraeus used a stealthy technique to communicate with his lover Paula Broadwell: the pair left messages for each other in the drafts folder of a shared Gmail account. Now hackers have learned this same trick,” Mr. Greenberg warns. “Only instead of a mistress, they’re sharing their lovers letters with data-sharing malware buried deep on a victim’s computer.”

“Researchers at the [cyber] security startup, Shape Security, say they’ve found a strain of malware on a client’s network that uses the new, furtive form of “command and control” — the communications channel that connects hackers to their malicious software — allowing them to send updates and instructions, and receive stolen data. Because the commands are hidden,” Mr. Greenberg writes, “in unassuming Gmail drafts that are never even sent, the hidden communications channel is particularly difficult to detect.”

“What we’re seeing here is command and control that is using a fully allowed service, and that makes it super-stealthy and very hard to identify,” said Wade Williamson, a [cyber] security researcher at Shape. “It’s stealthily passing messages back and forth without even having to press send. You never see the bullet fired.”

“Here’s how the attack worked in the case Shape observed,” Mr. Greenberg notes: “The hacker first set up an anonymous Gmail account, then infected a computer on the target’s [victim's] network with malware. (Shape declined to name the victim of the attack). After gaining control of the target machine, the hacker opened their anonymous Gmail account — on the victim’s computer…in an invisible instance of Internet Explorer — IE allows itself to be run by Windows programs so that they can seamlessly query web pages for information, so [and] the user has no idea a web page is even open on the [their] computer.”

And, the digital version of cat-and-mouse continues. V/R, RCP

“With the Gmail drafts folder open and hidden, the malware is programmed to use a Python script to retrieve commands and code that the hacker enters into that draft field. The malware responds with its own acknowledgements in Gmail draft form, along with the target data it’s programmed to exfiltrate from the victim’s network. All the communication is encoded to prevent it from being spotted by intrusion detection, or data-leak prevention. The use of a reputable web service instead of the usual IRC or HTTP protocols the hackers typically use to command their malware…also helps keep the hack hidden.”

“Williamson says the new infection is in fact a variant of a remote access Trojan (RAT) called Icoscript, first found by the German [cyber] security firm G-Data in August. At the time, G-data said that Icoscript had been infecting machines since 2012, and that its use of Yahoo Mail emails to obscure its command and control had helped to keep it from being discovered. The switch to Gmail drafts, said Williamson, could make the malware stealthier still,” Mr. Greenberg wrote.

Africa’s ‘Big Men’ and their mystery illnesses

31 Oct 2014

When dying Zambian President Michael Sata flew to London last week he was following a long line of African leaders who have sought emergency — and secret — medical treatment in foreign hospitals most of their citizens can only dream of.

With Ebola exposing the poor state of the continent’s healthcare systems, and mobile phones and social media undermining official attempts to control and suppress information, many Africans were unimpressed.

Medical tourism

After Sata’s death on Tuesday evening, websites lit up with angry comments about another ailing African head of state jumping on a plane rather than risking being patched up in one of his own hospitals.

“Sadly, his death has added to the long list of rich and influential Africans to die while on medical tourism in Europe and America,” a commentator called Striker wrote on the website of Nigerian newspaper Punch.

For those in Zambia, a vibrant and relatively stable nation of 13 million people that has recently enjoyed annual growth around seven per cent, the sense of hypocrisy is particularly acute.

Sata’s predecessor-but-one, Levy Mwanawasa, died in office in Paris six years ago after suffering a stroke in Egypt, and one of Sata’s many 2011 election promises was to improve public infrastructure, including healthcare.

“What if we had a situation where the children of our politicians were obliged to receive their care in Zambian hospitals?” Zambia Reports, an anti-government news website, asked in an editorial at the time.

“No doubt we would begin to see immediate improvements to the training, equipment, funding, and innovation of healthcare facilities throughout the country.”

With the exception of South Africa — home to top-notch hospitals and the world’s first human heart transplant in 1967 — few sub-Saharan governments are willing to let their leaders get much more than a cough sweet on home soil.

They are also loathe to tell their citizens, frequently playing down the seriousness of medical problems or denying them altogether — one reason for the “mystery” or “undisclosed illness” that claims so many of Africa’s ‘Big Men’.

Besides the health benefits, parking an ailing leader abroad far from prying eyes lets first families and the inner circle control the flow of vital information, an important weapon in the succession battles that inevitably follow in a continent of fragile democracies.

Relearning Anti-Submarine Warfare

By James R. Holmes

October 30, 2014

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Image Credit: U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Travis K. Mendoza/Released

The U.S. Navy’s post-Cold War holiday from history is drawing to a close—if it hasn’t expired already.

Welcome back to history, mariners of the world! Your post-Cold War holiday from history is drawing to a close—if it hasn’t expired already. Last week’s imbroglio between the Swedish Navy and an apparent Russian submarine in the Stockholm archipelago was only the most recent reminder of certain verities about combat at sea.

To name one, hunting submarines is hard—today as for the past century. It takes golly-gee hardware to detect, track, and target submersibles plying the deep. It takes plentiful anti-submarine craft to search the enormous volumes of water where subs may lurk. And, most of all, anti-submarine warfare takes patient, resolute, technically savvy hunters to employ this high-tech gear to good effect.

Success is hardly a foregone conclusion, even when a fleet surmounts such benchmarks. American military people tend to think of the Cold War in triumphal terms. But during the late Cold War—when Western fleets stood at the apogee of their supremacy over Warsaw Pact foes—U.S. Navy wargames involving undersea warfare typically started out the same way: the game administrators let U.S. Navy ASW units find the adversary boat. Their quarry then dove beneath the waves, there to be tracked—or not—by American aircraft, surface warships, or nuclear-powered attack boats that had a fix on the enemy’s original position.

That hostile boats would obediently let themselves be caught on the surface constituted quite an assumption, even in those halcyon days. It’s yet more suspect today, after a quarter-century of technological advances and cultural atrophy. No longer is it a given, for instance, that diesel submarines have to surface frequently, exposing themselves to radar detection. Many diesel submarines now sport “air-independent propulsion” that lets them stay in the deeps for long intervals rather than come up to periscope depth to snorkel. No Soviet boat enjoyed such marvels. And modern boats benefit not just from AIP but from better acoustic properties—quieting, in other words—and an array of other innovations.

Meanwhile, ASW skills have decayed among navies grown obsessed with projecting power shore. In the early 1990s, U.S. Navy directives bearing titles such as …From the Sea instructed seamen to turn their attention ashore. That sent a powerful bureaucratic signal. With the Soviet Navy rusting at its moorings, it appeared, no one could contest American rule of the sea. Why bother practicing to fight nonexistent foes? Instead the navy busied itself exploiting its seemingly everlasting command of the sea. Disciplines such as ASW, surface warfare, and mine warfare fell into disuse.

Grateful Britain recalls valour, sacrifices of Indian soldiers during World War-1

Tribune News Service

October 30

The British Government today thanked the contribution of Indian troops in the World War-I. The valour displayed by Indian soldiers during the war was remembered through black and white images and movie footage of the Imperial War Museum.

UK recognises that it could not have prevailed in the war (July 1914 to November 1918) without the contribution and sacrifice made by many countries. The Indian contribution to the war effort was one of the largest from the Commonwealth.

6 Victoria Cross - the highest military honour of Britain - were awarded to Indian soldiers in WW-I

Today, the UK, working closely with the United Service Institution of India (USI), remembered over 1.1 million Indian servicemen who fought in the war. There were around 70,000 fatalities.

A melange of pictures, displayed at the residence of British High Commissioner Sir James Bevan in New Delhi, today narrated the stories of valour by the Indian Army which had the distinction of having fought in almost all theatres of the war - France and Flanders, alongside the Australian and New Zealand at Gallipoli, Mesopotamia, Palestine and North Africa.

The commemoration began on August 4 with a memorial service at the Glasgow Cathedral for Commonwealth Leaders which coincided with the closing ceremony of the 2014 Commonwealth Games. The same day, an event was held at the Symphorien Military Cemetery in Mons Belgium and a candle-lit vigil was organised at Westminster Abbey.

The UK has funded a battlefield guide book which will be available through USI for those families wishing to visit battlefields in France and Flanders. 

Another coffee table book giving a pictorial overview of India and the Great War is available. War Diaries of the India Corps that fought in France and Flanders and these have been digitised and were presented to India.

Regimental War Diaries printed and bound were passed on to the regiments. A total of six Victoria Cross - the highest military honour of Britain - awarded to Indian soldiers and memorials are being prepared for presentation to the Government of India.

“How Counterinsurgency Has Changed Across the 20th and Into the 21st Century”?

by Wayne Tyrrell

October 26, 2014 

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Introduction

The straightforward approach to evaluating how counterinsurgency had evolved across the 20th and into the 21st centuries would commence by evaluating the successful approaches to some of the early insurgencies of the 1900’s. Against this we could chart a course of lessons learned, then forgotten, and later relearned. We would recognise some enhancements and adaptations to suit the emerging insurgencies at various times. This would eventually lead us to the modern counterinsurgency publications, which have emerged in the wake of what were commonly accepted as disastrous attempts to quell insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade. While this might prove to be a good history lesson, much of the enduring nature of successful counterinsurgency practice might be lost in the process.

Instead, this paper will focus on the modern doctrine crafted in the wake of Iraq and Afghanistan, its foundational basis and its adequacy to cope with a new form of globally networked and ideologically based insurgency. With scrutiny, it should become apparent that current practices have eclipsed modern doctrine and now reflect some revolutionary thinking in terms of defeating the global insurgency. This paper will suggest that modern counterinsurgency practice is fighting a new insurgency with new tactics based on old principles. In so doing we shall see how counterinsurgency has changed across the 20th and into the 21st centuries.

The Modern Doctrine

Frank Hoffman, a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Strategic Research at the National Defense University (NDU) in the US, believes that the new US field manual on Counterinsurgency (FM 3-24) is a long step forward, reflecting our current understanding of this increasingly complex mode of conflict (2007: 84). This publication, issued in 2009, establishes doctrine for tactical counterinsurgency operations at the company, battalion, and brigade level. Based on lessons learned from historic counterinsurgencies and current operations, FM3-24 defines the operational environment of counterinsurgency and covers planning for tactical operations and working with ‘Host Nation Security Forces’ (Department of the Army 2009: viii).

Of course, the US is not alone in developing counterinsurgency doctrine; the British Army publication, issued later in the same year, bears remarkable resemblance in substance[i]. It is the more comprehensive US doctrine, which has been described as probably the most influential piece of doctrine in the last twenty years (Griffin 2014), that will serve as the principal basis for this paper’s evaluation of modern counterinsurgency doctrine.

Modern Counterinsurgency Doctrine - New Concepts, or Old Lessons?

Hoffman (2007: 71) points to the inclusion of a number of ‘classical school’ examples of insurgency included in FM3-24, underpinning its foundational basis for counterinsurgency, particularly the writings of Robert Thompson and David Galula[ii]. He, like Jones and Smith (2010: 101), criticises the fact that many of the principles expressed in the manual are rooted in the ‘classical’ counterinsurgency. They assert that texts authored by Cold War theorists and practitioners, whose frame of reference was defined by wars of national liberation and the Maoist model of guerrilla warfare, are outdated and ill suited to modern insurgencies. According to this argument, today’s insurgencies, most notably in Iraq and Afghanistan, are not like those that came before, they are, variously and at once, less hierarchical, more globalised, and more focused on the media and information domain (Nagl & Burton 2010: 123). Accordingly, the reference point for evaluating whether modern counterinsurgency doctrine is a bald recitation must commence by assessing these classical schools.

The ‘Classical Schools’ of Counterinsurgency and the Population-Centric Approach

In terms of assessing the evolution of counterinsurgency, can it be said that current doctrine resembles the approaches of the early authors cited in FM 3-24? During the 1960’s a French military Officer, Galula, advocated a population-centric approach to counterinsurgency built from the bottom up (1964: 51 & 95-96), where he sets out the following strategy (1964: 59):

External Support to Insurgencies

by Bruce J. Reider

October 28, 2014 

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Abstract

This essay argues that external support to the insurgents is usually a decisive factor in determining the outcome of an insurgency. The first part of this essay looks at historical accounts of specific insurgencies and finds that external support can be a significant factor in determining the outcome. The second part of this essay reviews research on the impact of external support to insurgency, finding that the preponderance of scholars who studied multiple insurgencies came to the same conclusions regarding the importance of external support. First, external support is critical to insurgents. Second, external support can have a decisive impact on the outcome of an insurgency. Third, the presence or absence of external support may indicate the probability of insurgent success. Finally, external support might be the most important factor in an insurgency. This essay concludes that the evidence from historical analysis and scholarly research overwhelmingly demonstrates that external support is a decisive factor in determining the outcome of an insurgency and identifies the need for development of a comprehensive counterinsurgent response theory aimed at isolating the insurgent using the diplomatic, informational, military, and economic instruments of national power.

Introduction

The United States’ involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq during the previous decade sparked a renewed interest in the study of insurgency and counterinsurgency. For the most part, academics and practitioners focused their attention on revisiting the ideas developed since World War II and put forth by notable counterinsurgency experts such as David Galula, Robert Thompson, Frank Kitson, and Roger Trinquier. These individuals proposed different formulas for counterinsurgency success. The concept of protecting the population and winning “hearts and minds” espoused by Galula and Thompson has particularly influenced counterinsurgency doctrine development in the United States. To a lesser degree, Kitson’s emphasis on intelligence, information and training as the path to defeating insurgency has also been influential. Trinquier’s advocacy of treating insurgents as terrorists and using all means necessary, including torture and physical coercion, has been dismissed as unproductive, immoral and illegal. Unfortunately, none of the aforementioned counterinsurgency theorists emphasize the importance of denying external support to insurgents. Consequently, current United States’ counterinsurgency doctrine includes only cursory reference to insurgent external support, treating outside aid as minor consideration in counterinsurgency operations.

This essay argues that external support to the insurgents is usually a decisive factor in determining the outcome of an insurgency. “External support is a broad term that includes any form of support provided to an insurgent force from outside the political boundaries of the insurgency.”[1] Insurgents can receive active and passive external support. Active support is the intentional provision of sanctuary, logistics, training, political backing, and economic aid. Passive support occurs when an adjoining state is unable to deny access to insurgents. Contiguous borders can facilitate external support while geographic isolation can render external support difficult at best. A review of the literature reveals three distinct categories of writing on the subject of external support to insurgencies. The first category includes historical accounts of individual insurgencies. The second category analyzes collective groups of insurgencies to identify common characteristics. The third category specifically focuses on analyzing the impact of external support on insurgency.

The Historical Record

The first part of this essay looks at what the literature says about specific insurgencies with a focus on whether external support was a factor. A comprehensive review of every insurgency since World War II is beyond the scope of this paper therefore only a representative sample was selected. The following historical accounts illustrate how the narratives of different insurgencies vary according to the most prevalent factors affecting the outcome.

The Iranian Nuclear Agreement: The Way Ahead

By Sameer Mallya

October 28, 2014  

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The election of Hassan Rouhani as the President of Iran re-invigorated the dialogue between Iran and the P5+1 on the long drawn Iranian nuclear deadlock. Rouhani’s effective media management and his previous track record in the nuclear dialogue provided credible reasons to cheer, both in Iran as well as in the West. Talks soon resumed and started to take shape. The interim nuclear deal was signed within a few months which was considered as a credible breakthrough in the long drawn and largely inconclusive nuclear negotiations. This emboldened some to expect a comprehensive agreement between Iran and the P5+1 in the coming months.

However keeping in mind the issues to be resolved and with the deadline approaching, the enthusiasm and hope expressed by both the Iranian delegation led by the foreign minister Javad Zarif and the statements of US Secretary of State John Kerry about the likelihood of reaching a mutually acceptable agreement on the nuclear program seems to be nothing more than a hollow promise. The probability in actual sense is less likely. A practical assessment of the current situation clearly highlights that a comprehensive deal will take some more time to take shape.

The United States is demanding that Iran significantly reduce its current enrichment capacity and maintain such restrictions for up to 20 years, while Tehran insists on building up much larger industrial-scale capacity within a few years.[1] Keeping in mind the above mentioned circumstances, it is clear that a comprehensive deal will not only involve a lot of technical inputs but also require more efforts on the negotiation table.

Without a doubt, sanctions avoidance ranks very high on the priority list of Iran and the temporary respite from sanctions which has helped its economy to revive is a strong impetus to stick to the dialogues approach. [2]

Negotiations have been going slow keeping in mind the technical and political (both domestic and international) hurdles involved in the negotiation process. However despite the challenges considerable gains have also been made on the issue.

A considerable amount of literature is available attempting to analyse the various approaches each side has resorted to and which has made the prospects of an extension of the interim nuclear deal more likely.

Good Cop- Bad Cop Approach

The American version of the good cop-bad cop approach is framed such that Israel plays the bad cop by threatening to bomb what it calls an "existential threat", as nuclear scientists are mysteriously murdered with Mossad efficiency, and a nuclear programme Iran insists is peaceful is sabotaged.[3] The US poses as good cop to the world, claiming that it is trying to rein in its ally. It claims to favour dialogue and negotiations i.e. peaceful resolution of the issue.

Iran on the other hand has its own version, with the strong conservative lobby and the Supreme Leader playing the bad cop by expressing skepticism that an agreement can be reached and by maintaining their traditional full-throated hostility toward Washington and the “moderate” Iranian leadership playing the good cop favouring a pragmatic approach towards the nuclear negotiations and dialogue with the West.[4]

Bargaining chips

In case of the West, respite from economic sanctions has been used as the bargaining chip against Iran. Whereas Tehran has capitalized on the Western difficulties in dealing with the turmoil in the West Asian region to gain some leverage in the negotiations and extracting some favourable concessions from the nuclear agreement as is evident from the statements of one of the Iranian official quoting "Iran is a very influential country in the region and can help in the fight against the ISIL (IS) terrorists, but it is a two-way street. You give something, you take something." [5] Thus both sides have their own lacunae which can only be filled by the other. Thus this duel also ends up in a draw.

GETTING THE BASICS RIGHT ON INDIA-PAKISTAN TIES

G Parthasarathy

31 October 2014 

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In any situation, there should be no question of a sustained dialogue process, till Pakistan keeps its January 2004 assurance that territory under its control will not be used for terrorism against India

Just over a year ago, Mr Nawaz Sharif was swept back to power, prompting expectations that he would tackle the country’s security and economic crises, and improve relations with India. But, one year is an eternity in the politics of Pakistan! The United States is refusing to pledge additional aid beyond what was promised earlier under the Kerry-Lugar Legislation. Even ‘all-weather friend’ China has expressed disappointment that Mr Sharif’s Government has not done the requisite preparatory work for utilising the aid that Beijing had promised for development of Pakistan’s ailing power sector. The only silver lining has been increased remittances from Pakistan’s workers in the Gulf, despite calls by cricketer-turned-politician and Mr Sharif’s opponent Imran Khan for workers to halt such inward remittances.

Instead of acting circumspectly in such a situation, Pakistan has chosen to escalate tensions on its borders with Iran, Afghanistan and India. The tensions with these three neighbours, with whom Pakistan shares land boundaries, have arisen because of support to cross-border terrorism. This support is rendered by state agencies to extremist Sunni groups, ranging from the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba to the Afghan Taliban and the Jaish-e-Adl. The tensions with Iran have risen because of the support that the extremist Sunni group Jaish e-Adl receives in Pakistan’s Balochistan Province, where the Pakistan Army is simultaneously engaged in a bloody conflict against the Balochi separatists.

Tensions with Iran escalated last year, when the Jaish-e-Adl mounted cross-border ground and missile attacks in Iran, resulting in Iranian casualties. This prompted an Iranian spokesman to warn that Iranian forces would enter Pakistani territory if Pakistan “failed to act against terrorist groups operating on its soil”. More or less coinciding with this, was an incident when the Jaish-e-Adl kidnapped five Iranian border guards and moved them into Pakistan. Iran not only warned Pakistan of cross-border retaliation, but also brought repeated incursions from Pakistani soil to the notice of the UN Security Council, in writing. Ever since the pro-Saudi Nawaz Sharif, whose links with radical Sunni extremist groups is well documented, assumed power, Pakistan has moved towards rendering unstinted support to Saudi Arabia, even in the Syrian civil war. It has also unilaterally annulled the Pakistan-Iran oil pipeline project, prompting action by Iran, which has now sought compensation.

While Mr Nawaz Sharif was commencing negotiations for a peace deal with the Tehreek-e Taliban in the tribal areas of North Waziristan bordering Afghanistan, the Army chief, General Raheel Sharif, disregarded the views of the Prime Minister. He launched a massive military operation, involving over 50,000 military and paramilitary personnel, backed by artillery, tanks, helicopter gunships and fighter jets. An estimated one million Pashtun tribesmen have fled from their homes. They are now homeless and facing barriers preventing their entry to the neighbouring Provinces of Punjab and Sind. Not surprisingly, ISI ‘assets’ like the Mullah Omar-led Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani network have been quietly moved out from the battle zone, quite obviously into ISI safe houses.

Unrest is brewing amidst the displaced Pashtun tribals, as the Army is not willing and able to coordinate its operations with civilian relief agencies. One can expect that the displaced and homeless Pashtun tribals will in due course resort to terrorist violence across Pakistan. The special treatment meted out to ISI assets like Mullah Omar and the Haqqani network would have been carefully noted by the new Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai dispensation in Afghanistan, as a prelude to more serious attacks by the Afghan Taliban acting out of ISI and Army-protected safe havens in Pakistan. Pakistan’s western borders are not going to be areas of peace and stability in coming years. Unfortunately for both Mr Sharif and General Sharif, the escalating tensions with Iran, the partisan stance on Saudi Arabia-Iran rivalries and the military action in North Waziristan have invited criticism within Pakistan.

The promotion and escalation of tensions with India across the Line of Control and International Border have to be seen in this context. What better way for the Pakistan Army to divert attention from its misadventures in the west, than to revive the ‘India bogey’ in Pakistan? Such an action would also test the resolve of the Narendra Modi dispensation to deal with cross-border terror. Moreover, with the Assembly election due in Jammu & Kashmir soon, the Pakistan Army would strive to ensure that the credibility of the election is questioned, by ensuring a low turnout. Hurriyat leaders like Shabir Shah and Yasin Malik had already been commissioned to stir up discontent and discredit the Indian Army, during the floods. Three successive and successful Assembly elections in the State would erode the credibility of Pakistan’s propaganda.

India pushes for Delhi to Kathmandu bus service

Dipak K Dash

Oct 31, 2014

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TOI has learnt that New Delhi would offer an equal participatory super luxury bus service through their respective operators.

NEW DELHI: India is pushing for a direct bus service between New Delhi and Kathmandu and is even keen to fund new road projects in areas including Janakpur where Ram Janaki temple is located. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Nepal on November 25 to attend the SAARC summit and is likely travel to the country via land route. 

Before his second visit to the Himalayan nation, a top level delegation of road transport ministry visited Kathmandu to work out modalities to start the bus service between the two capitals. Sources said initially Nepal had identified 19 routes for bus service between the two countries and then shortlisted the routes to only four. Finally, it narrowed down the proposal to only Delhi-Kathmandu route.

TOI has learnt that New Delhi would offer an equal participatory super luxury bus service through their respective operators. Officials said there is now intense engagement with the intention to see the plan materializes so that an official announcement can be made during Modi's visit. 

In another move to boost ties, Nepal has referred five fresh road packages to India seeking financial assistance. Three of these road stretches are part of the Janakpur Parikrama Road, which almost circles the religious town of Janakpur. The five projects would cost about Rs 180 crore. 

After going through the project details, the road transport ministry has recommended these are feasible. It has suggested that the projects should be executed through Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) mode, which is being followed in India. Under this mechanism projects are awarded only after required land and necessary clearances are in possession. This system also eliminates delay in construction and cost overrun. 

Sources said the external affairs ministry will take the final call about the execution of these projects. 

Meanwhile, the government is likely to decide on the three road packages in Nepal where there is either no progress or very little progress so far even after these projects were awarded in 2010-11. A total of six packages totaling 605 km were awarded by Indian government during that period. 

Government officials said that external affairs ministry had sought technical advice of the road transport ministry on the "no-progress" projects. The latter has recommended that three such projects should be terminated and government should invite fresh bids on EPC mode. The ministry has also shown keen interest to take up these works by National Highways Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd, a government company established to execute road projects in border areas.

Behind India’s Pakistan quandary

SHARAT SABHARWAL

Faced with Pakistan’s firing across the LoC, India has no option but to respond. However, in general, more subtle strategies to contain and counter threats from Pakistan would be in the country’s interest

Pakistan’s annual ritual of raising the Kashmir issue and the outdated U.N. resolutions at the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) has been followed by similar statements in Pakistan, including by the Chief of Army Staff, Raheel Sharif. Young Bilawal Bhutto has vowed to wrest every inch of Kashmir from India! The National Assembly has called for a diplomatic offensive. Pakistan’s desire to internationalise the Kashmir issue has been mentioned as one of the plausible reasons for the recent ceasefire violations by it.

Left to Pakistan, the Kashmir issue would never go off the international radar screen. However, Pakistan’s efforts to internationalise it cannot succeed in the face of a mature Indian response. For starters, the international scenario has completely changed from the days when Pakistan’s theatrics on Kashmir attracted international attention. India has come a long way since then. Above all, Pakistan is not the same, both in its capacity to mobilise international opinion and the priorities of its people.

Manifestos and Kashmir issue

The ruling Pakistan Muslim League (N)’s manifesto for the May 2013 election in Pakistan contained the following paragraph on Kashmir: “Special efforts will be made to resolve the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, in accordance with the provisions of the relevant UN resolutions and the 1999 Lahore Accord and in consonance with the aspirations of the people of the territory for their inherent right of self-determination.” Significantly, this paragraph found a place in a three-page chapter on foreign policy and national security, beginning at page 80 of the 103-page document, with the first 79 pages devoted to bread-and-butter issues such as economic revival, energy security, agriculture and food security, a new framework for social change, democratic governance, science and technology, the employment challenge, speedy justice, etc.

“India’s growing power ought to be felt by its adversaries and not flaunted.”

The chapter began by acknowledging that Pakistan was at war within and isolated abroad, its independence and sovereignty stood compromised, its economic weaknesses were forcing it to go around with a begging bowl in hand; while foreign states undertook unilateral strikes on its territory, non-state actors used it as a sanctuary to pursue their own agendas, oblivious to Pakistan’s interests and the country’s social, economic and political schisms were creating grave misgivings even in the minds of its friends. It noted that Pakistan is located at an important junction of South Asia, West Asia and Central Asia. Therefore, it could be a bridge between the energy-rich Central Asia and Iran on the one side and energy-deficit countries like China and India on the other and could also become a flourishing transit economy as the shortest land route from western China to the Arabian Sea, while linking India with Afghanistan and the Central Asian Republics. The paragraph on Kashmir figured at s.no.viii among the policy objectives listed in this chapter. It was preceded and succeeded by others such as establishing cordial and cooperative ties with Pakistan’s neighbours, making foreign policy formulation the sole preserve of elected representatives, making sure that all civil and military institutions, “including those dealing with security and/or intelligence matters” act as per the directives of the federal government, and according special importance to promotion of external trade, etc.

The manifesto of the other major party, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) had similar prioritisation with the first 60 out of 74 pages devoted to empowerment for all, inclusive and equitable growth, infrastructure and a new social contract, etc. However, the following reference figured on page 73: “We support the rights of the Kashmiri people and during our current government we initiated and continued to pursue a dialogue process agenda with India, including on Kashmir. We will not allow lack of progress on one agenda to impede progress on the others. Without prejudice to the UN Security Council Resolutions, we support open and safe borders at the Line of Control [LoC] to socially unite the Kashmiri people. We note that India and China have a border dispute and yet enjoy tension free relations.”

Ties with India

This did not imply that Pakistan’s major parties were about to jettison the Kashmir issue. Far from it. However, since political parties trim the sails of their manifestos to the winds of public opinion, the two manifestos were a good indicator of the priorities of the Pakistani people and the issues agitating their mind. To be sure, a civil or military leader in Pakistan can still whip up short-term hysteria on Kashmir, especially in periods of tension with India. But in a reflection of the public mood, India was not an issue of even marginal consequence in determining the choices of voters in the May 2013 election. The manifestos were unusual in their candour and content and a departure from the influential security state narrative, which ranks confronting “enemy India” over the welfare and progress of the Pakistani people. However, what has transpired after the 2013 election is extraordinarily usual for Pakistan and India-Pakistan relations.