Over 1 billion people live in poverty hotspots

Raj M. Desai, Homi Kharas, and Selen Özdoğan

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Where a person is born is the best predictor of their lifetime prospects. Yet, “spatial” income inequality has been widening. Geographic wealth disparities have been increasing in rich and poor countries alike. Eighty percent of global economic activity is generated on 3 percent of the landmass. Countries with worsening regional inequality, in the past decade, have seen greater political polarization, conflict, and government turnover.

In recent research, we examine spatial patterns in income levels and growth across 2,894 subnational areas in the world. The map in Figure 1 shows 538 administrative areas we call poverty hotspots—areas that are classified as low income in both 2000 and 2015 using the historical income thresholds provided by the World Bank. These were home to 1.12 billion people in 2015. Although largely concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa, Central, and South Asia they are distributed across 77 countries, far more than the 31 countries classified by the World Bank as low income.

Figure 1. World’s poverty hotspots

Subnational GNI per capita (Atlas method, current US dollars) below $755 in 2000 and $1,025 in 2015

When will the COVID-19 pandemic end?

By Sarun Charumilind, Matt Craven, Jessica Lamb, Adam Sabow, and Matt Wilson

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Our November 23 update takes on the questions raised by recent news: When will vaccines be available? And is the end of COVID-19 nearer?

November 23, 2020

Since we published our first outlook, on September 21st, the COVID-19 pandemic has raged on, with more than 25 million additional cases and more than 400,000 additional deaths. While the situation looks somewhat better in parts of the Southern Hemisphere, much of Europe and North America is in the midst of a “fall wave,” with the prospect of a difficult winter ahead. Yet the past two weeks have brought renewed hope, headlined by final data from the Pfizer/BioNTech1 vaccine trial and interim data from the Moderna trial, both showing efficacy of approximately 95 percent2 ; and progress on therapeutics. Is an earlier end to the pandemic now more likely?

The short answer is that the latest developments serve mainly to reduce the uncertainty of the timeline (Exhibit 1). The positive readouts from the vaccine trials mean that the United States will most likely reach an epidemiological end to the pandemic (herd immunity) in Q3 or Q4 2021. An earlier timeline to reach herd immunity—for example, Q1/Q2 of 2021—is now less likely, as is a later timeline (2022). If we are able to pair these vaccines with more effective implementation of public-health measures and effective scale-up of new treatments and diagnostics, alongside the benefits of seasonality, we may also be able to reduce mortality enough in Q2 to enable the United States to transition toward normalcy. (See sidebar “Two endpoints” for our definitions.)

Human Rights Are Under Attack. Who Will Protect Them?

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Globally, human rights remain under attack, whether by populist movements desperate to gain power or authoritarian governments eager to maintain it. Technology has opened up new frontiers for curbing people’s ability to express and share dissenting ideas. And broad assaults are underway on institutions like the International Criminal Court, which was established not only to offer recourse for the victims of rights violations, but to establish an international human rights benchmark. Instead, respect for human rights is being replaced by a dangerous intolerance.

Around the world, populist authoritarians have built their movements by demonizing minorities. In Brazil, for instance, President Jair Bolsonaro has reveled in his provocations, calling into question women’s rights as well as those of the LGBT and indigenous communities. In Poland, incumbent President Andrzej Duda recently ran for reelection—and won—on an explicitly anti-LGBT platform.

UN Reform and Mission Planning: Too Great Expectations?

by Marc Jacquand

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Since 2017, the UN system has undergone a historic process of reform at several levels and across many entities. Several of these reforms have either directly aimed at improving the planning of UN missions or included elements that have a significant bearing on mission planning. As the focus shifts from designing to implementing these reforms, it is possible to begin reflecting on whether these aims have been met.

This paper takes stock of the various strands of UN reform and explores their impact on the planning of UN missions, drawing on the experiences of four missions that have recently started or transitioned. In addition to the peace and security, management, and development system reforms, it looks at the impact of several other recent initiatives. These include the launch of a series of independent strategic reviews of peace operations, the reinvigorated use of the secretary-general’s transition planning directives, the rollout of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment System, and the establishment of the Executive Committee.

Applying Science and Analytics to the Exploitation of Open Source Intelligence

By Dan Gouré

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Through the COVID-19 pandemic, a commonly heard phrase has been “trust the science.” The same can be said in the realm of intelligence. The more that scientific wisdom and quantitative analytic tools can be applied to the collection and analysis of raw data, the greater the likelihood that useful intelligence can be generated. This is particularly the case when it comes to exploiting the vast amounts of data available from open sources.

Publicly available information or open source intelligence (OSINT), is accessible in all countries and from every group, even so-called hard targets such as North Korea and ISIS. When proven principles from the social and behavioral sciences are applied, in combination with sophisticated computer models, artificial intelligence and machine learning, OSINT can be an extremely valuable tool supporting government and commercial decision making.

Intelligence collection is most commonly associated with spies, surveillance satellites, electronic intercepts and cyber hacking. The ability to “listen in” on the deliberations of world leaders or acquire their secret plans can be of inestimable value in peacetime, crisis or war. These capabilities are particularly useful on the battlefield when divining the adversary’s intentions and predicting their activities can produce war-winning results.

Broadband Myths: Is It a National Imperative to Achieve Ultra-Fast Download Speeds?

Doug Brake, Alexandra Bruer

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Some advocates are willing to take extreme steps to transform the U.S. broadband system, because they claim we require universal broadband networks capable of gigabit-per-second speeds. This is not true.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

All else being equal, more bandwidth is better than less, and investment that drives fiber deeper into access networks is welcome. But there is no need to radically change the competitive system that continues to expand network capacity.

Even the most data-hungry of today’s high-bandwidth applications require vastly less than a gigabit per second. While faster networks can save time for massive file transfers, there is only negligible benefit from dramatically higher speeds.

Because there are not applications that require gigabit-per-second rates, demand for additional speed drops off quickly after a certain point, even in countries with widespread fiber infrastructure.

China military watch

Malcolm Davis and Charlie Lyons Jones

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In this edition, we take a look at how the Chinese military is preparing for the future land combat environment.

Unlike China’s relatively cogent thinking on future warfare in the air, maritime, cyber and space domains, its thinking on land combat has been increasingly incoherent. Indeed, the strategic priorities the Chinese Communist Party has been setting for the military since the 1980s have required a shift in emphasis from land power to air and sea power. With the Soviet Union gone and China’s land borders largely settled (disputes with India notwithstanding), the People’s Liberation Army Ground Force (PLAGF) has struggled to find a meaningful purpose in China’s future force structure beyond sustaining the capability needed to win a limited war on the Sino-Indian border.

Some of the incoherence is best laid out by military commentators within China itself. In an article in the People’s Liberation Army Daily, Wang Ronghui seeks to explore the role armoured forces will have in future warfare. Writing with much jargon and little detail, Wang argues that the recent history of armed conflict has confirmed the armoured forces’ role as the ‘king of land warfare’ (陆战之王).

Countering Threats Below the Threshold of War

Major Juliet Skingsley

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The announcement of a significant increase in the defence budget marks a new era in how the UK military will operate – but also brings into sharp focus a much-needed examination of exactly how the military should operate under international law.

Operations in the ‘sub-threshold battlefield’ – often referred to as the ‘grey zone’, where states and non-state actors compete in a hostile manner using a variety of tactics but below the threshold of war – have always been complicated by the lack of agreed protocols by those involved. The reality is, however, that the grey zone is far from a ‘rules-free’ battlefield.

Increasingly, asymmetrical activities in the grey zone harm UK interests and undermine international security, while the rapid pace of technological developments and the proliferation of activity such as cyberattacks make the need for change in how the UK operates even more urgent.

Why Does India Lease Nuclear Submarines from Russia?

by Mark Episkopos

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Here's What You Need To Remember: New Delhi rebooted the USSR-India partnership in 2008, leasing an Akula-class submarine from President Putin. 

In the latest instance of long-standing military cooperation between Moscow and New Delhi, India is set to rent additional Russian nuclear-powered attack submarines as a stepping stone on its path to acquiring an indigenous nuclear submarine force.

History: 

A somewhat unusual arrangement, India’s willingness to lease—rather than procure or import outright— submarine technology from Russia has clear precedent in recent history. In 1986, the Soviet Union became the first state to lease a nuclear submarine. In an attempt to cultivate the Sino-Soviet defense relationship, the Kremlin inked a deal with New Delhi for the 10-year lease of a Charlie-class nuclear cruise missile submarine.

Afghan and Taliban Negotiators Agree on Peace Talks’ Procedures

By Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Fatima Faizi

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Afghan government and Taliban negotiators in Qatar have agreed to the principles and procedures that will guide the ongoing peace negotiations between them, Taliban and Afghan officials announced on Wednesday, an important move that could pave the way for talks that have been hobbled by disagreements for more than two months.

“The procedure including its preamble of the negotiation has been finalized,” Nader Nadery, a member of the government’s negotiating team, said on Twitter. Almost simultaneously, Mohammad Naeem, a spokesman for the Taliban, posted a nearly identical tweet written in Pashto.

Having resolved questions about how to conduct the talks, negotiators are likely to move on to focus on a political road map for both sides and a long-term, nationwide cease-fire.

The agreement comes after both sides were on the precipice of a breakthrough last month. Taliban and government negotiators had agreed in principle to roughly two dozen procedural points, Afghan officials said, but a concrete agreement was stonewalled by President Ashraf Ghani when he directed the government negotiating team to include at least one more condition: that the government be referred to by its formal name, the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, in the guiding documents.

How Asia can boost growth through technological leapfrogging

By Oliver Tonby, Jonathan Woetzel, Noshir Kaka, Wonsik Choi, Anand Swaminathan

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Asia’s initial response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 was partly enabled by technological foundations developed long before the crisis. Over the past decade, the region has developed and deepened its technological capabilities and infrastructure rapidly, accounting for a large share of global growth in technology company revenue start-up funding, spending on R&D, and patents filed.

There is more to come, given the potential to leapfrog in the region’s technological development based on the scale of markets and investment and the speed of adoption and intellectual property (IP) creation. However, tariff and data flow barriers, standards, export controls, and research barriers pose new risks. Moreover, Asia still needs to overcome gaps in core capabilities.

This paper is part of a series focused on the Future of Asia. This research focuses on Asian economies, describing growth in major technological indicators, exploring characteristics of growth in technological capabilities, and homing in on four major sector opportunities—with challenges in each—where Asia has significant scope for technological leapfrogging.

Will China Eliminate Poverty in 2020?

Terry Sicular

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In 2015 China announced the ambitious target of eliminating poverty by 2020. Since then China has launched an all-out, campaign-style push to meet this goal, using a “Precision Poverty Alleviation” strategy that targets individual households and monitors their progress using a nationwide poverty database. Investments of financial and human resources in this program have been considerable. Although the poverty reduction target is ambitious, it is also pragmatic. It applies only to the rural population and it is based on a low poverty line. Funding for the program, while large in absolute terms, is a small percentage of government revenue. Thus, the target is achievable. Reaching the target, however, will not mean that China has won the war on poverty. Many households will remain vulnerable to poverty, and the government’s current definition of poverty does not adequately reflect what it means to be poor in China going forward.

In 2015 China announced an ambitious and admirable policy target: to eliminate poverty by the end of 2020. Five years later, after the investment of substantial financial, human, and political resources in the fight against poverty, the deadline looms. Will China meet its target? 

China Thinks America Is Losing

By Julian Gewirtz

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The consequences of the presidency of Donald Trump will be debated for decades to come—but for the Chinese leadership, its meaning is already clear. China’s rulers believe that the past four years have shown that the United States is rapidly declining and that this deterioration has caused Washington to frantically try to suppress China’s rise. Trump’s trade war, technology bans, and determination to blame China for his own mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic have all confirmed the perception of Chinese policy elites that the United States is bent on keeping their country down.

To be sure, the idea that the United States seeks to stymie and contain China was widespread among Chinese officials long before Trump came to power. What many Americans see as disruptive effects attributable only to Trump’s presidency are, to China’s current rulers, a profound vindication of their darkest earlier assessments of U.S. policy.

China’s Coming Upheaval

By Minxin Pei

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Over the past few years, the United States’ approach to China has taken a hard-line turn, with the balance between cooperation and competition in the U.S.-Chinese relationship tilting sharply toward the latter. Most American policymakers and commentators consider this confrontational new strategy a response to China’s growing assertiveness, embodied especially in the controversial figure of Chinese President Xi Jinping. But ultimately, this ongoing tension—particularly with the added pressures of the new coronavirus outbreak and an economic downturn—is likely to expose the brittleness and insecurity that lie beneath the surface of Xi’s, and Beijing’s, assertions of solidity and strength.

The United States has limited means of influencing China’s closed political system, but the diplomatic, economic, and military pressure that Washington can bring to bear on Beijing will put Xi and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) he leads under enormous strain. Indeed, a prolonged

The China Challenge Can Help America Avert Decline

By Kurt M. Campbell and Rush Doshi

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When U.S. President-elect Joe Biden takes the oath of office—likely masked and surrounded by socially distanced officials and family—he will look out on a country that many believe is in decline. The problems that propelled President Donald Trump to office, including a collapsing middle class and toxic internal divisions, remain. And Trump will bequeath new ills to his successor: a runaway pandemic, a struggling economy, burgeoning debt, a wounded democracy, and a diminished global reputation.

“Declinism,” or the belief that the United States is sliding irreversibly from its preeminent status, is tempting. But such fatalism would be misguided. The United States still retains enviable advantages: a young population, financial dominance, abundant resources, peaceful borders, strong alliances, and an innovative economy. Moreover, as Samuel Huntington wrote in Foreign Affairs decades ago, the United States possesses an unusual capacity for self-correction, with declinists ironically playing “an indispensable role in

Ret. Gen McChrystal Fears Rise of China's Military, Asks If U.S. Is Prepared to Fight for Taiwan

BY BRENDAN COLE

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Atop retired general has warned that the U.S. underestimates China's increasing military capabilities and fears that time is running out to stop it from making a move on Taiwan.

Stanley McChrystal was the former commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan but was dismissed from his post in 2010 by then President Barack Obama after he made disparaging remarks in a Rolling Stone interview about government officials.

Last month, McChrystal was among a group of experts who briefed to President-elect Joe Biden on international security matters. In an interview with Axios, McChrystal said the U.S. had to invest more in its forces to curb the rise of China's military capacity to deter it from seizing Taiwan.

"Their ability with rocketry and whatnot has essentially changed the dynamic," McChrystal said. China has developed hypersonic missiles known as "carrier killers" which Beijing claims can hit surface vessels like aircraft carriers.

China to expand weather modification program to cover area larger than India

By James Griffiths

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Hong Kong (CNN)-China this week revealed plans to drastically expand an experimental weather modification program to cover an area of over 5.5 million square kilometers (2.1 million square miles) -- more than 1.5 times the total size of India.

According to a statement from the State Council, China will have a "developed weather modification system" by 2025, thanks to breakthroughs in fundamental research and key technologies, as well as improvements in "comprehensive prevention against safety risks."

In the next five years, the total area covered by artificial rain or snowfall will reach 5.5 million sq km, while over 580,000 sq km (224,000 sq miles) will be covered by hail suppression technologies. The statement added that the program will help with disaster relief, agricultural production, emergency responses to forest and grassland fires, and dealing with unusually high temperatures or droughts.

What China Hopes to Gain From the Present Border Standoff With India

Shivshankar Menon

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The India-China relationship has been through a crisis in 2020. The June 15th incident in the Galwan Valley, which claimed the lives of 20 Indian soldiers, and subsequent firing incidents, the first bloodshed in 45 years, followed an unprecedented build-up of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). In eastern Ladakh, the PLA moved forward into areas previously under Indian control, and has been preventing Indian patrols from accessing patrol points that they consistently visited in the past in Depsang, Hot Springs-Gogra-Kongkala, near the Galwan river and around Pangong Tso.

What China did in April-May by changing the situation on the ground, shifting the LAC, and preventing Indian patrols on territory hitherto controlled by India was a fundamental and consequential shift in behaviour, a successful salami-slicing manoeuvre. Because India’s initial response was non-strategic, we were forced to cede ground, and now face a fait accompli. 

American Interest in Global Jihad – A Google Trend Analysis

By Dr. Antoine Jardin

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Radicalisation, jihadism and terrorism-related issues were not extensively addressed during the 2020 US presidential campaign. In contrast to all previous elections since the beginning of the 21st century, these topics, along with US involvement in military conflicts in the Middle East did not play a central role in the debate between the two candidates. As president-elect Joe Biden will take office in January 2021, almost two decades after the 9/11 attacks, the fight against jihadism seems to fade away as a top priority for both the Democrat and Republican parties in Washington, D.C.

In the 2004 presidential election, the confrontation between George W. Bush and John Kerry was shaped by the response to 9/11 and the consequence of the so-called war on terror that led to two military interventions in Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003).

In 2008, Barack Obama first distinguished himself from Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic Party Primary by taking a clear stance on the conflict in Iraq, depicted as a ‘dumb war’, and by campaigning for the closure of Guantanamo detention camp in Cuba. Within the GOP, John McCain insisted on increasing the US involvement in the Middle East to defeat terrorism, proposing during one Town Hall meeting to maintain military troops in Iraq for a ‘hundred years’. Other issues were debated by both parties such as the use of waterboarding as a torture technic or favouring a legal or an extrajudicial frame to confront a ‘non-conventional enemy’.

The Can-Do Power

Samantha Power

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Ever since then U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright memorably called the United States “indispensable” more than two decades ago, both Americans and publics abroad have vigorously debated the proposition. Today, as President Donald Trump’s term comes to a close, foreign observers of the United States are more prone to use a different word: “incompetent.”

The Trump administration’s response to the most urgent problem in the world today—the coronavirus pandemic—has been worse than that of any other nation. This, in turn, has understandably tarnished perceptions of the United States: according to recent Pew Research Center polling conducted in 13 major economic powers, a median of 84 percent of respondents agreed that the United States has done a poor job of handling COVID-19—by far the most damning appraisal received by any major country or institution. Yet the mishandling of the pandemic is just the latest in a string of lapses in basic competence that have called into question U.S. capabilities among both long-standing allies and countries whose partnership Washington may seek in the years to come. A brand once synonymous with the world-changing creations of Steve Jobs, with feats of strength and ingenuity such as the Berlin airlift and the moon landing, and with the opportunity represented by the Statue of Liberty now projects chaos, polarization, and dysfunction.

Misinformation, Disinformation, Malinformation: Causes, Trends, and Their Influence on Democracy

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Disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation pollute the information space worldwide and the trend of manipulating facts continues to disrupt public communication and, consequently, democratic processes in societies. The aim of this paper is to investigate the phenomena of misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation, as well as their impact on the political sphere. In addition, the paper attempts to explain the harmful influence of misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation on public debates, democratic processes, and civil society engagement.

Table of contents

Introduction

Historical origins of misinformation, disinformation and malinformation

Information disorder - key concepts and definitions

The Dangers of Vaccine Disillusionment

By Josh Michaud and Jen Kates

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November brought some of the best news of the COVID-19 pandemic: strong evidence that novel coronavirus vaccines currently under development will work. That was never a forgone conclusion. But it is now almost certain that several different effective coronavirus vaccines will become available within the next few months.

Developing a vaccine is just the first step in a long journey toward ending the pandemic, however. Even more daunting tasks await policymakers and health workers after pharmaceutical companies ship the first doses out the door. To eliminate the risk of future outbreaks, as much as 70 percent of the world’s population will need to be immune to the coronavirus—through vaccination or infection and recovery. Given that only an estimated ten percent of the world’s population has had COVID-19 to date (with most infections concentrated in a relatively small number of countries), that leaves an extraordinarily high target for global

Covid-19: Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine judged safe for use in UK

By Michelle Roberts

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The UK has become the first country in the world to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine, paving the way for mass vaccination.

Britain's medicines regulator, the MHRA, says the jab, which offers up to 95% protection against Covid-19 illness, is safe to be rolled out.

The first doses are already on their way to the UK, with 800,000 due in the coming days, Pfizer said.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the NHS will contact people about jabs.

Elderly people in care homes and care home staff have been placed top of the priority list, followed by over-80s and health and care staff.

Can Vaccine Diplomacy Shape a New World Order?

Michael B. Greenwald, Michael A. Margolis

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The coronavirus has catalyzed many global shifts and exposed growing rifts in society. Along with increasing unrest and separation amongst its domestic population, the role of the United States as the leader in the international community has been called into question. Coinciding with more American threats for unilateral withdrawal from global partnerships is the rise of China as a viable option for geostrategic leadership. Over the past several years, China has dedicated resources to supporting emerging markets, and now competes with the United States as an alternative and often preferred geoeconomic partner for many emerging market countries. Traditionally, in the case of natural disasters and shared threats around the world, American leadership has played a central role in rebuilding communities, economies, and multilateral support initiatives. However, in the most recent iterations of its foreign policy, retrenchment and a dialing back of international goodwill have defined its administrative priorities.

The Face of Climate Insecurity: A Surge of Tropical Storms Strike Megacities in Asia and the Pacific

Laura Birkman

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The conjunction of multiple, cascading extreme weather events with precarious demographic and socioeconomic trends produces massive humanitarian disasters in the coastal megacities of the Asia-Pacific. The intensity and frequency with which tropical storms are occurring in highly vulnerable urban hotspots reveal the risk of climate change becoming a driver of instability and insecurity.

In this snapshot, Femke Remmits and Laura Birkman analyze the exposure of megacities in the Asia-Pacific region to extreme weather events and how adapting to rising sea-levels and more frequent and extreme weather events will form a major challenge to the Asia-Pacific region.

To address and adapt to expanding climate induced insecurity and risk, it is important that decision-makers, urban planners, and other relevant stakeholders are aware of and consider the indirect security risks produced by natural disasters in the world’s most densely populated areas. The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) seems well placed to take on a leadership role in this regard.

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Nagorno-Karabakh conflict killed 5,000 soldiers

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For more than six weeks, Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a bloody war, but few details emerged of the true scale of military casualties.

Azerbaijan made significant territorial gains but gave no casualty numbers, while Armenia said last month it had counted 2,425 dead soldiers.

Now Azerbaijan says 2,783 of its forces died in the Nagorno-Karabakh war and another 100 are missing in action.

It brings to over 5,000 the number of soldiers confirmed to have died.

At least 143 civilians were also killed on both sides and tens of thousands more were displaced by the fighting.

The war broke out between the two former Soviet republics in late September. The two countries had never resolved the territorial dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh, which is part of Azerbaijan but under the control of neighbouring Armenia.

The Syrian Forever War Has Created Forever Refugees

by Shelly Culbertson

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The Syrian civil war is about to turn ten years old. Fighting has ebbed into an uneasy stalemate, but Syria remains divided. The Assad regime has regained control of most territory, but the U.S.-backed Kurds control the northeast, Turkey controls much of the northern border region, and the northwest province of Idlib remains a contested space with a large concentration of Al Qaida. Internationally-sponsored negotiations to arrive at a political solution through both the United Nations Geneva process and the Russian-Iranian-Turkish Astana process have petered out.

A “no deal” resolution appears to be the most likely outcome of this complex conflict, per whispers in diplomatic circles. In other words, it is feasible that no formal agreement will take place to end Syria's war and start the peace. The status quo could freeze in place.

A no-deal outcome eliminates the prospect of most of Syria's 5.6 million refugees in neighboring countries ever returning to live in Syria—despite this month's limp conference in Damascus during which Bashar al-Assad encouraged refugees to come back. The forever wars are creating forever refugees.

Is Africa overtaking the Middle East as the new jihadist battleground?

By Frank Gardner

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In a three-year mission named Operation Newcombe they are joining a force of around 15,000 UN multinational troops, spearheaded by the French, in efforts to help stabilise a part of the continent known as the Sahel.

Mali is one of several Sahel nations currently fighting jihadist insurgencies and the violence is getting worse.

According to the Global Terrorism Index published on 25 November, the "centre of gravity" for the Islamic State group IS has moved away from the Middle East to Africa and to some extent South Asia, with total deaths by IS in sub-Saharan Africa up by 67% over last year.

"The expansion of ISIS affiliates into sub-Saharan Africa led to a surge in terrorism in many countries in the region," reports the Global Terrorism Index.

"Seven of the 10 countries with the largest increase in terrorism were in sub-Saharan Africa: Burkina Faso, Mozambique, DRC, Mali, Niger, Cameroon and Ethiopia".

Ethiopia’s Conflict in Tigray Presents Hard Decisions

STEVEN FELDSTEIN

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After several weeks of fighting, Ethiopia’s federal government seized control of the Tigray region’s capital city of Mekelle and declared victory over the ruling Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) on November 28. Yet, despite Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s apparent military success, troubling questions remain regarding what happens next—and whether peace and stability can be restored to the region.

There is little question that the TPLF leadership has carried out a strategy of provocation meant to undermine and weaken Abiy. Their disdain for him and their corresponding resentment of their diminished political stature is well known. The TPLF’s armed attack against the Ethiopian army’s northern command headquarters in early November forced Abiy’s hand. If Abiy had not responded forcefully to the TPLF’s latest incursion, not only would he have risked emboldening a key rival, but it would have signaled weakness to other groups desiring further autonomy. Unfortunately, Abiy now finds himself embroiled in a conflict that has killed hundreds—possibly thousands of people—without a clear resolution in sight.

The Internet’s Most Notorious Botnet Has an Alarming New Trick

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IN JUST THE last two months, the cybercriminal-controlled botnet known as TrickBot has become, by some measures, public enemy number one for the cybersecurity community. It's survived takedown attempts by Microsoft, a supergroup of security firms, and even US Cyber Command. Now it appears the hackers behind TrickBot are trying a new technique to infect the deepest recesses of infected machines, reaching beyond their operating systems and into their firmware.

Security firms AdvIntel and Eclypsium today revealed that they've spotted a new component of the trojan that TrickBot hackers use to infect machines. The previously undiscovered module checks victim computers for vulnerabilities that would allow the hackers to plant a backdoor in deep-seated code known as the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface, which is responsible for loading a device's operating system when it boots up. Because the UEFI sits on a chip on the computer’s motherboard outside of its hard drive, planting malicious code there would allow TrickBot to evade most antivirus detection, software updates, or even a total wipe and reinstallation of the computer's operating system. It could alternatively be used to "brick" target computers, corrupting their firmware to the degree that the motherboard would need to be replaced.

Could China Hack a U.S. Fighter Jet or Tank?

by Kris Osborn

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Here's What You Need to Know: The U.S. military is working to mitigate emerging cyberthreats.

What if an armored combat vehicle was rapidly into battle through rigorous terrain while facing enemy fire, when its navigational and targeting systems were suddenly given false, wrong or misleading information? What if its on-board data flow was instantly jammed, denied or disabled? Such a scenario, which would immediately compromise or even destroy an otherwise successful attack mission, could happen if a vehicle’s on-board serial bus were hacked by enemy cyber intruders.

This possibility is increasingly realistic given the alarming pace at which enemy cyber attackers are leveraging new technologies to innovate previously unknown or impossible methods of intrusion.

There is a critical need to increase security of a vehicle or aircraft’s data buses, which allows for the transmission of mission critical information within and between platforms.

Iran's Missiles Are Getting a Lot More Accurate

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Here's What You Need To Remember: Iran's missile strikes have become much more precise. In an attack on a U.S. airbase in retaliation for the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, the missiles specifically targeted the hangars rather than the barracks - a decision that was likely intentional.

The images paint a picture of precision: The first satellite imagery of the aftermath of the Iranian strike on Ayn al-Asad Air Base in Iraq highlights Iran's improved ability to accurately strike distant targets with its extensive missile arsenal. The pictures, released by imaging company Planet Labs on Jan. 8, show that Iran can chalk up its strike as a success even without inflicting U.S. casualties. What's more, they also show how Iran sought to skirt a delicate line in exacting public retribution while also avoiding an escalation that would lead to outright war.

What Makes China’s DF-17 Hypersonic Missile So Deadly?

by Mark Episkopos

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Here's What You Need to Know: America cannot shoot these missiles down and has no similar kind of weapon.

Beijing’s first hypersonic weapons system, the DF-17 stands as one of the most militarily consequential additions to the People’s Liberation Army’s missile roster in recent years.

The DF-17 was first unveiled in 2013. It entered service in 2019—on the heels of at least nine tests—after making its debut at China’s 70th anniversary military parade. The DF-17 is a medium-range ballistic missile that is mounted to a DF-ZF hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV). The missile boasts a reported range of up to 2,500 km, and is deployed from a mobile transport-erector launcher (TEL). U.S. intelligence sources observed in 2017 that the missile is remarkably accurate, with the purported ability to land “within meters” of intended targets during a series of field tests. Chinese state media stressed that the DF-17 is meant for conventional-only missions, but there is seemingly nothing stopping it from carrying a nuclear warhead.

JeM: Intensifying Efforts

Ajit Kumar Singh

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Four Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) terrorists were killed in an encounter with the Security Forces (SFs) on November 19, 2020, at Nagrota in Jammu District, Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). Senior Superintendent of Police, Jammu District, Shridhar Patil stated, “Around 5 am some terrorists opened fire at security forces near Ban Toll Plaza in Nagrota area. They were hiding in a vehicle”. Two SF personnel suffered injuries in the operation. However, the driver fled from the spot as security personnel approached the vehicle. A large consignment of arms and ammunition, including six AK-56 rifles, five AK-47 rifles, three pistols, 16 AK magazines, a packet of RDX, 20 Chinese hand grenades, six UBGL grenades and 20 kilograms of explosive were recovered from the encounter site.

Investigations so far have revealed that the terrorists trained in ‘commando warfare’ walked nearly 30 kilometers from the JeM camp at Shakargah in Pakistan to the Samba (Jammu and Kashmir) border and then to the ‘pick-up’ point at Jatwal. There then boarded a truck (JK01AL 1055) between 2.30 and 3 am [IST] in the night and were seen crossing the Sarore toll plaza towards Jammu at 3.44 AM. The truck then moved towards Kashmir, using the Narwal bypass route. The SFs intercepted the truck around 4.45 AM at the Ban toll plaza in the Nagrota area.

The Afghan Peace Process: Negotiating amongst smoke as a country burns

By Rory Andrews

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Abstract:

The violence that tears apart Afghanistan was not born from a simple conflict between two parties, yet the West believes that bi-lateral negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan National Government can bring some level of meaningful and lasting peace.

This piece argues that the West has entirely mishandled the peace process because of a fundamental misunderstanding of Afghan politics, history and society, which has led to a binary view of the war and an overly simplistic view of Afghanistan as a nation. Utilising extensive primary and secondary research from a number of experts in the field, this essay will help demystify the illusion of the war in Afghanistan and the peace process which has come subsequently in order to offer tentative insight into the people, tribes, groups and states which all have a stake in peace in Afghanistan and who should be included in the process.

Drawing together a wide array of perspectives, it is hoped this piece will highlight some of the major stumbling-blocks to peace, and their historical or military lineage, with the hopes that it may help broaden our understanding of why peace has eluded us for so long.