Egypt in Focus: President Sisi in Power

BY EGYPTSOURCE

OCTOBER 06, 2014

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Gaining a new president roughly five months ago, Egypt’s domestic and foreign policies are slowly beginning to take shape. An energy crisis, subsidy cuts, and a grand megaproject remain at the forefront of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s economic policy, while his foreign policy focuses on alliances with the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and mending US-Egypt relations. The following serves as a brief summary of where Egypt stands today.

I. President Sisi’s rise to power

Election: Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the military general who toppled Mohamed Morsi claimed victory in Egypt’s 2014 presidential election in June with more than ninety-six percent of vote. The elections saw a voter turnout of 47.1 percent, compared with 52 percent in the 2012 elections. The government made heavy, if not at times frantic, efforts to boost turnout, including extending voting by an extra day.

Campaign Platform: In a campaign platform which consisted mainly of television interviews, Sisi highlighted ways to increase Egypt’s economic growth, stressed the need for austerity, and emphasized the importance of security along highly nationalistic themes. Although Sisi’s ascendance to power came amid popular protests against Morsi’s de facto authoritarian rule, his election campaign made little mention of democracy.

First 100 Days: After a hundred days of presiding over Egypt, Sisi appears to enjoy strong, but certainly not overwhelming, support. He continues to focus on rebuilding the state, the economy, and security, alongside an increasing state control over public and religious spaces.

II. Economic policy

Energy: Egypt is in the midst of a serious energy crisis is evident in countrywide electricity shortages and daily power cuts. In September, much of Cairo and its surrounding governorates were plunged into darkness in awidespread blackout that lasted several hours.

Public finances: With the goal of freeing up fiscal space for expansionary social policies, the state is gradually reducing subsidies and increasing taxes.

Air Strikes Haven’t StoppedISIS From Moving On a Key Syrian City

Adam Chandler

October 6, 2014

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The three-week-long Islamic State siege of the Syrian town of Kobani is rapidly intensifying. On Monday, fighters were said to have raised the black ISIS flag over at least one building in the eastern part of the city as vicious street-to-street battles unfolded. Reporting from southern Turkey, journalist Harald Doornbas noted that a second flag had gone up just southeast of the city.

The good news is the Syrian Kurds have (so far) kept ISIS from breaching the center of the city. The bad news is everything else. Kobani, also known as Ayn al-Arab, is just six miles from the Turkish border, over which more than 100,000 civilians fled when the Islamic State attack began in late September.

The advance of the Islamic State fighters into a strategically important Syrian city is a development that U.S.-led airstrikes were supposed to preclude. But as many are suggesting, the coalition efforts to stem the Islamic State onslaught have been ineffective. This is, at least in part, because ISIS has changed its tactics.

“In Syria and Iraq, they took down many of their trademark black flags, and camouflaged armed pickup trucks,” The Wall Street Journal wrote of ISIS. “They also took cover among civilians.” The group is also said to have decentralized some of its command structure, adjusted its movements to nighttime, and eschewed the frequent use of cellphone and radio communications.

In some ways, ISIS has come to resemble the group from which it splintered, al-Qaeda, which worked more covertly. The Journal adds that the group is said to have “also eased up on enforcement of their strict interpretation of Islamic law.”

(Read More: Is the Islamic State a Terrorist Group or an Insurgency?)

“We expected that they would adapt and change their behavior and tactics once airstrikes begun,” Rear Admiral John Kirby told reporters at the Pentagon on Friday, hardly concealing his frustration with the collective mood of impatience.

While Kirby touted successes that included the targeting of oil refineries and other ISIS financial and communication operations, his comments come against the backdrop of a growing skepticism about the campaign. Late last month, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights drew attention to accounts of civilian casualties caused by the airstrikes. This report dovetailed with word of a popular backlash against the American efforts in Syria, where they are perceived as not only aiding Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, but also harming support for the moderate rebel groups fighting there.

In the meantime, not only are Islamic State forces still holding territory, they continue to advance

Iran’s Rocket and Missile Forces and Strategic Options

By Anthony H. Cordesman

OCT 6, 2014 

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Iran’s rocket and missile forces serves a wide range of Iranian strategic objectives. Iran’s forces range from relatively short-range artillery rockets that support its ground forces and limit the need for close air support to long-range missiles that can reach any target in the region, as well as the development of booster systems that might give Iran the ability to strike at targets throughout Europe and even in the US.

Iran’s rocket and missile forces are steadily evolving. While the lethality of most current systems is limited by a reliance on conventional warheads, poor accuracy, and uncertain reliability, Iran is developing improved guidance systems, attempting to improve the lethality of its conventional warheads, and has at least studied arming its missiles with nuclear warheads.

The Burke Chair at CSIS is completing a book length study of Iran’s rocket and missile programs entitled Iran’s Rocket and Missile Forces and Strategic Options. It is now available on the Burke Chair section of the CSIS web site athttp://csis.org/files/publication/141007_Iran_Rocket_Missile_forces.pdf

The study is being circulated for comment and any comments, corrections, or suggestions will be greatly appreciated. They should be sent to Anthony H. Cordesman at ACordesman@gmail.com.

The study assesses Iran’s programs in the context of the overall limits to its conventional forces, air power and air defense, and explains why Iran has placed such a heavy emphasis on artillery rockets and missiles as a way of compensating for the shortcomings in its conventional forces, as well as a way to enable its use of steadily stronger forces for irregular warfare.

At the same time, the report examines why Iran’s missile forces now have critical limits in their lethality, and Iran’s incentives for giving them nuclear and precision conventional warheads. It shows why placing clear limits on Iran’s ability to arm such missile with nuclear warheads is a critical part of any meaningful P5+1 nuclear agreement with Iran, and why the US and Iran’s neighbors must prepare suitable deterrents and defenses to deal with Iran’s efforts to give its longer-range conventionally armed missiles sufficient precision to hit critical military, civil, infrastructure, and energy facility targets.

The book provides extensive maps and figures. Key chapters include:

I. Iranian Politics and Their Impact on Iran’s Missiles and Nuclear Warhead Programs 

II. Setting The Stage: Iran’s Missile and Rocket Programs and Their Impact on the Gulf and Regional Military Balance 

Pentagon yet to decide on Syrian rebel force central to Isis offensive

Spencer Ackerman 

The Guardian,  6 October 2014

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US military officials consider raising trustworthy rebel force to destroy Isis on the ground without committing US soldiers 

Syrian soldiers inspect belonging left by gunmen after government forces recaptured Adra al-Balad city in the suburbs of Damascus. Photograph: Youseff Badawi/EPA

Two weeks after US warplanes began bombing Islamic State (Isis) positions in Syria, the Pentagon leadership has yet to make critical decisions about building the proxy rebel force central to its plan for taking territory away from the jihadist army.

US military officials consider raising a Syrian rebel force crucial for the war aim of ultimately destroying Isis without committing US soldiers and marines to another bloody Middle East ground war. But the Pentagon has yet to even assign a US officer to the task of determining which rebels are trustworthy and capable enough to comprise that force.

“No decision has been made as to who will lead the programme,” commander Elissa Smith, a Pentagon spokeswoman, confirmed to the Guardian.

Once selected for the training, the rebels will be led by Major General Michael Nagata, a special-operations veteran. The supposedly moderate Free Syrian Army is expected to form the kernel of the proxy force.

But the Pentagon, which hopes to field an initial force of nearly 5,000 to fight Isis out of its Syrian strongholds, has yet to determine which fighters amid Syria’s panoply of mostly Islamist rebel groups are eligible to receive US cash, heavy weaponry and Nagata’s expertise. Isis commands as few as 20,000 fighters, and as many as 31,000, according to public US estimates.

The Syrian rebels are the soft underbelly of the Obama administration’s strategy against Isis. Pentagon officials routinely concede that air strikes are insufficient to oust Isis from areas in Syria under its control. Yet even under optimistic conditions, the Pentagon does not expect to have units prepared to attack Isis on the ground in Syria for eight months at the earliest.

Questions remain hanging over every aspect of the Syrian rebel effort. The US wants to use “vetted” and “moderate” Syrians against Isis, but those fighters have consistently lost ground to both Isis and loyalists of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Obama has decried them as an amateurish force of uncertain capability, even after approving a CIA programme to aid some of them.

Many, including the Free Syrian Army, have ties to radical Islamist factions, as the Syrian civil war does not neatly break down into secular and religious categories. A consistent worry inside the Obama administration, one that kept the US from overtly providing weaponry for most of the war, is that US artillery and the expertise to operate it will ultimately end up in the hands of current or future adversaries. Much of Isis’s heavy weaponry comes from US stocks, captured from overwhelmed Iraqi forces.

Syrian Rebels Seize Russian Spy Station Near Israeli Border

BYJosh RoginEli Lake

10.07.14 

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When the Free Syrian Army pushed Assad’s soldiers out of a town south of Damascus, the last thing they expected to find was a Russian spy post, a few miles from the Golan Heights. 

Syrian rebels have overtaken a joint Russian-Syrian secret facility that they claim was a covert intelligence collection base. Opposition fighters say the post was used to snoop in on the communications of opposition groups -- and perhaps even the nearby Israelis. 

Free Syrian Army officials, U.S. officials, and independent experts told The Daily Beast that the evidence of Russian involvement in the facility, just a few miles from Syria’s border with Israel, if verified, would show a level of Russian involvement in the Syrian civil war that was not previously known. Free Syrian Army officials posted several videos on YouTube showing both the outside and the inside of the facility, which the FSA captured over the weekend during a battle near Al Harah, south of Damascus, next to the Golan Heights. 

The videos and accompanying photos show insignias representing a branch of Syrian intelligence and the Russian Osnaz GRU radio electronic intelligence agency. The FSA found photos and lists of senior Russian intelligence and military officials who visited the facility, pictures of Russian personnel running the base, and maps showing the location of Israeli military units. Israeli news reportsearlier this year said the Russian government had upgraded an advanced surveillance and intelligence gathering station in that area which could snoop on Israel, large parts of Jordan, and western Iraq, potentially to warn Iran in advance of an Israeli strike. Initial reports said documents from the facility suggested theRussian equipment was used to spy on Israel, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. 

U.S. defense officials told The Daily Beast the photos of the Russian

insignia first shared on blogs were legitimate. But that evidence, at the same time, may not necessarily mean the facility captured by the opposition was controlled by Russia’s military; it could just mean that Russians were working there, as advisors or partners to Syrian troops. 

Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russia’s military and intelligence services at New York University said the term “Osnaz” on the insignia just meant a special unit of any kind. “It’s the kind of unit that the Russians would have had there because Syria is not the easiest area to operate in, they are an element of the radio-technical intelligence boys who do this.” 

Firas Al Hawrani, the official spokesman for the FSA in southern Syria, told The Daily Beast Monday that FSA forces had seen about 15 Russian personnel operating in the Al Harah area before the FSA took the facility, but they left before the area fell out of regime control. 

“The Russians who were at the Al Harah mountain, the regime took them to Damascus by plane two weeks ago,” he said. 

ISIS’s Gruesome Muslim Death Toll

Dean Obeidallah

10.07.14 

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The group’s killing of Westerners gets attention. But ISIS has killed far more Muslims, and publicizing that fact would harm it more. 

Last Thursday, the United Nations released a report that could provide us with one of the keys to defeating ISIS. Unfortunately, it received almost zero media attention. 

What makes this 26-page report (PDF) so powerful is that it describes to us the gruesome circumstances in which ISIS has killed fellow Muslims. We are talking beheadings, killing of women for objecting to ISIS’ policies, and executing Sunni Muslim clerics for refusing to swear allegiance to ISIS. 

Why is this important? This information can hopefully help dissuade other Muslims from joining or financially supporting ISIS. And it may even persuade other Muslim countries to join or increase their efforts in fighting ISIS. The reason being that slaughtering fellow Muslims is seen as universally wrong across the Muslim world and as a violation of Islamic values. In fact, Al Qaeda has even publicly criticized ISIS for this very conduct. 

Now the report also details ISIS’ horrific actions against Christians, Yazidis, and other minorities. But these events—along with the grisly beheadings of American journalists and Western aid workers- have been covered extensively by our media. 

The killing of Muslims has not, and part of the reason may be because we lacked facts surrounding those events. After all, ISIS releases videos of its gruesome actions that it wants the world media to discuss but doesn’t publicize events it understands can hurt its cause. 

This report changes that. It provides us with evidence we were missing about the specifics of ISIS’ actions towards Muslims. This investigation, undertaken by UN’s Human Rights Office together with the UN’s Assistance Mission for Iraq, conducted more than 500 interviews with witnesses and visited locations across Iraq to examine how many civilians were killed in Iraq between July and September of this year. 

What did the UN find? ISIS had “carried out attacks deliberately and systematically targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure, with the intention of killing and wounding civilians.” The UN concluded that in the first eight months of 2014, at least 9,347 civilians had been killed and at least 17,386 wounded. While all these deaths are not attributable to ISIS alone, ISIS is identified as the primary actor. (The report also documents what could be considered war crimes committed by the Iraqi military.) 

Here are a few examples from the report to give you an idea of the way ISIS has methodically slaughtered Muslims: 

-On September 5, ISIS executed three Sunni women in Mosul. What was their “crime”? They refused to provide medical care to ISIS fighters.

- On September 9, ISIS executed a Sunni Imam in western Mosul for refusing to swear loyalty to ISIS.

- On August 2, a man from the Salah ad Din province was abducted and beheaded for refusing to swear allegiance to ISIS.

How ISIS Could Soon Control Close to Half of the Syrian Border with Turkey

Michael WerzMax Hoffman

October 7, 2014 

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If the city of Kobani falls, it will be both a human tragedy and a strategic setback—and a key part of a long-term solution to the Syrian conflict is likely to die with the city.

The end appears very near in Kobani (Ayn al-Arab) in northern Syria as ISIS closes in on the city from three sides. For the past two weeks, Kurdish fighters of the People’s Protection Units, or YPG (the military arm of the Democratic Union Party), have resisted an intense offensive by ISIS militants there. ISIS has now advanced to within a half-mile of this strategic city, according to theKurdish commander defending Kobani, who expects “general killing, massacres and destruction” if the city falls. The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least sixty shells hit Kobani on Friday, pounding a city that had previously been a safe haven for hundreds of thousands of people fleeing fighting in other parts of Syria, and persistent shelling hit the city through the weekend. According to the latest reports, ISIS has taken the strategic heights just west of the city and raised their flag on a building on the outskirts of town. If Kobani falls, it will be both a human tragedy and a strategic setback—and a key part of a long-term solution to the Syrian conflict is likely to die with the city.

The response from the United States, Turkey and the international coalition against ISIS has been inadequate. There were at least seven U.S. air attacks around Kobani in the week leading up to Wednesday, October 1, but there wereno reports of any strikes on Thursday. Strikes near Kobani resumed Friday andcontinued through the weekend, but did not appear to relieve the ISIS pressure on the city. At a Pentagon briefing last week, Rear Admiral John Kirbyexplained the logic of the U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria: “The initial round of strikes in Syria were really designed to get at them strategically. We were hitting command and control nodes, finance centers, training camps, oil refineries.” Kirby said that, after this initial targeting of strategic assets, the Pentagon would do “more dynamic targeting as well, of a tactical nature, getting vehicles, getting armored vehicles, convoys.”

It is past time to get tactical in Kobani. This is an instance, like the strikes to protect the Yazidis on Mt. Sinjar, where for minimal cost and without putting American lives at serious risk, the United States can act to prevent a slaughter. Beyond the moral imperative, this is an instance where tactical strikes are urgently needed to protect a strategic asset. President Barack Obama and senior administration officials have repeatedly pointed out the absence of reliable partners on the ground in Syria—the Syrian Kurdish groups, such as YPG, have the potential to help fill that gap. While the PYD (the mainly-Kurdish Democratic Union Party), which dominates the Syrian Kurdish scene, is far from perfect, it has treated the civilians under its control relatively well, has fought ISIS effectively for over a year, and entirely eschews the violent Salafi ideology that animates so many of the rebel groups in Syria. As we argued in a Center for American Progress report in July, Kurdish political and military actors will be a key part of any solution to the Syrian tragedy. While coalition aircraft hit several ISIS tanks and fighting positions Sunday, the tactical strikes must be rapidly expanded to prevent the fall of the city.

The ramifications of inadequate action are dire. First, if ISIS takes the city, they are likely to behave as they have in the past—raping, torturing and murdering residents who survive the shelling of the town. Those who are able will most likely flee to Turkey, adding to the refugee problem there and expanding the humanitarian disaster. Already, the fighting has caused UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, to say “it’s a dramatic humanitarian tragedy as we have all witnessed… the largest single outflow of Syrians in a few days, 160,000 people."

Second, if ISIS takes Kobani, they will control close to half of the Syrian border with Turkey. This will make it even harder to stem the flow of fighters and equipment to the jihadist group. It will also make it more difficult to crack down on the illicit oil sales that finance their operations and to insulate Turkey against further infiltration and potential attacks.

The Islamic State and its potential

Paul Rogers 

7 October 2014

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The aftermath of US airstrikes in Idlib, near Aleppo, Syria

Summary

This briefing is concerned with the aims and intentions of the Islamic State (IS) and whether the approach being adopted by the international coalition will have the intended effect: the destruction of the group. While this is just one part of a complex international conflict in the region, it is central to any analysis of why the movement has apparently developed so rapidly and whether it is amenable to control primarily by the application of external air power. It will consider, in particular, IS’s paramilitary competence, the level of external support for IS across the region and beyond, and the vexed question of whether it actually wants western states to go to war with it.

Developments during September

On 8 August, following the rapid expansion of IS across north-west Iraq, especially the surprise overrun of Mosul two months earlier, the United States commenced a series of airstrikes designed initially to limit the threat to displaced persons, especially the Yazidi, and also to hinder attempted IS advances towards the Kurdish administrative capital of Irbil. The air attacks were small-scale but had some impact, not least in allowing the rather disunited Peshmerga Kurdish military units to regroup and rearm.

During the latter part of August and early September the United States extended its air operations to aid Iraq Army and Shi’a militia groups in hindering IS militias from taking control of two strategic dams, the Haditha Dam on the Euphrates and the Mosul Dam on the Tigris. Both operations appeared to have worked, at least in the short-term, but elsewhere in Iraq IS continued to gain control of territory. Right at the end of September it began an attempt to take control of towns between Fallujah, a long-term centre of power, and Baghdad itself.

At the political level, Haider al-Abadi was installed as Prime Minister of Iraq in place of Nouri al-Maliki, raising hopes that a more inclusive government could be formed. It was hoped that this would help convince Sunni clans to end their support for IS, thus undercutting an important element of the Islamic State’s power. At the wider level, relations between the United States and Iran continued to improve, causing some unease in western Gulf States, especially Saudi Arabia, but also allowing US operations in Iraq to continue even as Iran supplied copious advice and specialist military help to the Iraqi armed forces. To an extent, the two states were working in parallel if not in cooperation.

During September, the Obama Administration took the decision to take the war directly to the IS heartland in northern Syria, having established a coalition of supporting states in the region. A number of these were involved, some directly, in the first substantial use of air power on 23 September, the most significant being Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Their actions were secondary to those of the United States which dominated the air operations, using a combination of sea-launched cruise missiles, F-22, F-15E, F-16 and F/A18 strike aircraft, B1B strategic bombers and drones. Shortly after this extended air war commenced, the United Kingdom committed Tornado aircraft to direct attacks in Iraq instead of just surveillance flights, and Belgian, Danish, Dutch and Australian governments began sending forces to the region, joining French strike aircraft that had already begun air attacks in Iraq but not Syria.

By the end of the month the United States had close to 2,000 military personnel in Iraq, although this may not include the total number of Special Forces. In an indication of a likely expansion of ground-based operations, a Brigade Headquarters was due to move to the country in early October, although the United States and all other western states repeatedly stated that this would not be a “boots on the ground” war, either in Iraq or Syria. President Obama made it clear in his address on 10 September that the intention was to degrade and ultimately destroy the Islamic State.

Origins and evolution of the Islamic State

U.S. Airstrikes in Iraq and Syria Have Not Impacted Strength of ISIS So Far, Report

Associated Press 

October 8, 2014 

AP ANALYSIS: US-led airstrikes produce few gains 

BAGHDAD (AP) — After two months, the U.S.-led aerial campaign in Iraq has hardly dented the core of the Islamic State group’s territory. The extremist fighters have melted into urban areas when needed to elude the threat, and they have even succeeded in taking new territory from an Iraqi army that still buckles in the face of militants. 

In neighboring Syria, days of airstrikes have been unable to stop militants on the verge of capturing a strategic town on the Turkish border. 

The limited results show the central weakness of the campaign: There is only so much that can be done from the air to defeat an extremist force that has swept over much of Iraq and Syria. The Islamic State fighters have proven elusive and flexible, able to reorganize to minimize the blows. And more importantly, there are almost no allied forces on the ground able to capitalize on the airstrikes and wrest back territory from the militants. 

The exception: Iraqi Kurdish fighters, the most effective forces in Iraq, have made some modest gains the past week. 

That only highlights how others have proven unable to do the same. The Iraqi military is undermined by corruption and command problems. A new Iraqi government has being trying to woo support from more Sunni tribesmen, whose fighters are seen as vital against the Sunni extremists, but so far there has not been a flood of support. In Syria, rebels supported by Washington are in no position to move against the extremists, and Syria’s Kurds are not as well armed as Iraq’s. 

The U.S. launched airstrikes in Iraq on Aug. 8 and in Syria on Sept. 23. Several European nations are participating in Iraq, but not in Syria, where the U.S. was joined by a coalition of Arab allies. U.S. officials have warned repeatedly that the campaign will be long — even years. 

The Pentagon press secretary, Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby, contended last week that the strikes have hampered the militants. Before the strikes, he said, “they pretty much had free rein. They don’t have that free rein anymore, because they know we’re watching from the air. … They have dispersed, whereas before they were more structurally cohesive in certain places.” 

PROGRESS IN THE NORTH 

Most of the success for the air campaign has been in rural, open areas of northern Iraq. Last week, airstrikes paved the way for the Iraqi Kurdish fighters known as peshmerga to plow into a string of towns held by the extremists near the Syrian border: Mahmoudiyah, Rabia and Zumar. The Kurdish offensive is aiming for the town of Sinjar, and if they capture it, the Kurds would secure a main road in and out of Syria that is a militant supply line. 

The early airstrikes also halted the extremists’ advance toward the Kurdish capital of Irbil and broke the Islamic State group’s grip on the strategic Mosul Dam, enabling peshmerga and Iraqi troops to recapture it. Strikes were also instrumental in breaking a siege of the northern town of Amirli, which the militants had surrounded. 

But the warplanes have largely avoided Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city and the Islamic State group’s biggest stronghold, or the nearby town of Tal Afar, apparently to avoid civilian casualties that would boost support for the group among the region’s Sunnis. That has left the extremists a virtual free hand there, which is unlikely to change anytime soon. Last week, retired Gen. John Allen, the U.S. envoy to the anti-Islamic State coalition, said operations to retake Mosul will start “within a year.” 

Gaza After Two Months – Consequences for Israel

Paul Rogers 

2 September 2014 

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Residents of Beit Hanoun in Gaza retrieve the dead from rubble. 

Introduction 

The July briefing (written on 31 July) noted that the war in Gaza, the Israeli operation Protective Edge, had already exceeded the previous major Israeli operation, Cast Lead (2008-9) in length and, by the end of that month, after 24 days of conflict, attitudes were hardening. During August the conflict continued with intermittent cease-fires but towards the end of the month an indefinite ceasefire was agreed between Hamas and the Israeli government that also involved the participation of Fatah. By 31 August there were reasonable prospects that it would hold, but there were few indications that it could lead on to any kind of lasting agreement.

This briefing reviews the positions of Hamas and Israel at the end of August, assessing the extent of the damage and the security implications for each side. It then examines some of the wider regional elements, particularly in relation to Israeli perceptions of security, and how they may change.

Developments during August

By the start of the current ceasefire the war had lasted seven weeks. In Gaza, over 2,100 people were killed and 11,000 injured. UN sources stated that the great majority of those killed and injured were civilians, including 495 children killed. On the Israeli side, 66 soldiers were killed and 450 were injured. Seven civilians were killed and 80 injured. At the time of writing (31 August) a more durable ceasefire is in place, but more broadly based negotiations have yet to start.

At the start of the current ceasefire Israel reported that all known infiltration tunnels had been destroyed, over 4,700 paramilitary targets hit and 750 terror combatants killed. Hamas denied that its paramilitary infrastructure was seriously damaged and claimed to have many thousands of rockets intact and 20-30,000 paramilitary fighters. Whatever the truth of the claims and counter-claims, the civil infrastructure in Gaza was severely damaged, with many factories and warehouses destroyed and around one-third of the entire population displaced.

In the Wake of the War

Hamas: In spite of the deaths, injuries and disruption, Hamas remains in control of Gaza and retains considerable popularity, although it has used substantial force in countering internal dissent including the summary execution of men and women deemed to have collaborated with the Israelis. It remains in an antagonistic relationship with President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in Cairo and its backing of rebels in Syria has lost it support in Damascus and Tehran. It has so far failed to get a serious easing of the blockade.

Even so, it retains support of some Western Gulf States, especially Qatar which is expected to fund post-war reconstruction. Hamas has also gained much popular support across the Middle East and the wider world for its resistance to what is seen as Israeli aggression. Its recent link with Fatah has so far survived, despite the latter’s ties to more conservative Arab states hostile to Hamas’ links to the Muslim Brotherhood and Iran.

Israel: The Netanyahu government has lost much popular support through failing to control the rocket attacks, which were still happening right up to the ceasefire. The war is now being seen in significant sectors of Israeli opinion-forming as a serious political miscalculation. Netanyahu’s personal popularity has suffered severely, although there is relief in southern Israel at the relative stability of the current ceasefire and the absence of air raid warnings.

Russia Intends to Create Space-Based Missile Launch Warning System October 9, 2014

RIA Novosti 

October 9, 2014

Russia to Create Space-Based Ballistic Missile Warning System 

Russia will create a space-based ballistic missile launch detection system, capable of detecting launches of existing and future missiles, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Thursday 

MOSCOW, October 9 (RIA Novosti) – Russia will create a space-based ballistic missile warning system capable of detecting launches of existing and test missiles, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Thursday. 

"The creation of an integrated space system is one of the key directions in which Russian nuclear deterrent forces will be developed. As a result, we will be able to detect sea and ground launches of various types of ballistic missiles, including prototypes," Shoigu said. 

According to the defense minister, the system will replace Soviet-made ballistic missile early warning systems. 

The integrated space system will comprise next-generation space vehicles and modernized space centers that would ensure control over the satellites and allow for automatic information processing. 

The Dangers of a New Containment

Thomas E. Graham

October 7, 2014 

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"There are good reasons for skepticism that the United States can contain Russia as effectively today as it once did the Soviet Union." 

The Ukraine crisis has ushered in a new era in U.S.-Russian relations. To be sure, relations had been deteriorating for some time—at least since fall 2011, when Putin announced his decision to return to the Kremlin. Stark differences between both countries over Syria and broader developments in the Arab world, Moscow's offer of asylum to NSA-leaker Edward Snowden, and Putin’s vehement accusations of U.S. interference in Russia's domestic affairs—thereby justifying a crackdown on internal dissent—have all stressed U.S.-Russian relations to the breaking point. The glimmer of hope offered by the agreement to work together to eliminate Syria's chemical weapons was quickly extinguished last fall by fundamental differences over the situation in the Ukraine.

But it was Moscow's reaction to the ouster of President Yanukovych in Ukraine—its annexation of Crimea and the destabilization of southeastern Ukraine, done with a combination of audacity and skill—that finally jolted the American political establishment into viewing Russia as a significant threat. That Russia was prepared to flout the rules of Europe's post–Cold War order to assert its interests was not particularly surprising. After all, it had already done that in the Georgian War in 2008. But no one had anticipated that Russia would act in Crimea with such exquisite skill and leave the United States appearing flat-footed, lacking an adequate response. That set Ukraine apart from Georgia.

Obama's reset is now dead. Previous failed resets were followed in short order by new attempts. Indeed, U.S.-Russian relations since the end of the Cold War have been marked by a recurring cycle of great expectations followed by deep disappointments. But this time is different. Today's estrangement runs deeper than it has during any time since the Gorbachev years. No influential forces in either Washington or Moscow are calling for improved relations; rather, political leaders and the media in both countries are actively vilifying the other side. Most bilateral contacts have been totally severed. Looking forward, both sides increasingly see each other as long-term adversaries. Unlike in the past, no new reset is just over the horizon simply awaiting a new American president.

In the absence of significant hope for constructive relations, the American political establishment has reached back to the recent past, to the Cold War era, for guidance. The talk is of an updated containment policy.[1] At the beginning of the crisis in early March, President Obama warned the Russians that if they did not move to deescalate the situation in Ukraine, the United States was "examining a whole series of steps—economic, diplomatic—that will isolate Russia and will have a negative impact on Russia’s economy and its status in the world."[2] As the crisis worsened, the administration began to make good on that threat by sharply reducing bilateral contacts with Russia, levying targeted sanctions against individuals and entities considered either responsible for Russia's actions in Ukraine or to be financially close to Putin, and trying to rally European allies behind its policy. At the end of May, Obama claimed success.

Our ability to shape world opinion helped isolate Russia right away. Because of American leadership, the world immediately condemned Russian actions; Europe and the G7 joined us to impose sanctions; NATO reinforced our commitment to Eastern European allies; the IMF is helping to stabilize Ukraine’s economy; OSCE monitors brought the eyes of the world to unstable parts of Ukraine.[3]

With those and similar remarks, Obama may not have explicitly adopted a policy of containment, but the logic of his administration's actions points in that direction. The administration continues to threaten Russia with further sanctions should Moscow not act to deescalate the crisis, but it provides no clear indication of what Russia must do for the sanctions to be lifted. It speaks as if it intends to treat Russia as a long-term adversary (or for at least as long as Putin remains in power), while limiting cooperation—as in the Cold War—to those areas it judges critical to American security and which necessitate working with Russia (e.g., implementation of the new START treaty and retaining access to the International Space Station). Moreover, its tendency to look at Russia and the Ukraine crisis solely through the prism of security in Europe—the Cold War's central battlefield—lends its Russia policy a Cold-War aura, even if Obama insists we are not witnessing a return to that era.[4]

Europe's Nightmare Could Still Come True: A NATO-Russia War over Ukraine

Dmitri Trenin

October 7, 2014

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Should the cease-fire be allowed to break down completely, the danger of a war in Ukraine will immediately reappear. Both sides must take urgent steps to avoid it. 

 

Despite numerous violations, the cease-fire in Ukraine's Donbass region is largely holding. For very different reasons, President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin of Russia have come to lead the parties of peace in their respective capitals. Economic issues clearly top the agenda in both Ukraine and Russia.

Yet, the cease-fire remains very brittle. The Donetsk airport and the city of Donetsk itself have seen some heavy fighting, with many civilian casualties. The parties of war on both sides of the front line have not given up their ambitious goals. Should the cease-fire be allowed to break down completely, the danger of a big war in Ukraine will immediately reappear.

This scenario must be absolutely barred, as it risks escalation to a full-scale military confrontation between Russia and NATO. However, mere avoidance of war is not good enough. The perilous political dynamics in Eastern Europe need to be reversed. To do that, the following immediate steps are in order.

1. Deploying OSCE military observers, in sufficient numbers and appropriately armed, along the lines of engagement in Donbass, starting with the Donetsk area, and along the Ukraine-Russia border adjacent to it;

2. Reaching an agreement between Ukraine and Russia, with the European Union's active participation, on the gas price for Ukraine, and on the associated issues, such as a schedule for the gas debt repayment, which would allow Russian gas deliveries to Ukraine this coming winter;

3. Starting a political dialogue, mediated by the OSCE, between the representatives of Ukraine and of the people of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, with a view, initially, to restoring contacts and communication between them, and eventually to agreeing on a formula for reintegration.

Ironically, but also tragically, given the number of people killed and the extent of the damage sustained, the main players in the Ukraine crisis have already achieved their most important objectives and can now well agree on a new provisional status quo.

Ukraine is more of a nation today than it has ever been since gaining independence. Its westward orientation is not in question anymore, even if it will be a very long time before Ukraine can join the European Union.

Crimea is in Russia's hands, and the very fact of Ukraine's demand to return it will securely prevent Kiev from achieving NATO membership. Not so much the dispute over territory, but the real danger of a military conflict with Moscow will keep the United States and its allies (above all Germany) from accepting Ukraine as a formal ally.

The degree of national unity achieved within most of Ukraine since the beginning of the war in the east makes the Russian language issue less topical in Ukrainian politics. In the future, linguistic differences in Ukraine will not necessarily constitute a political divide. Political processes in Ukraine are also pointing toward the emergence of a pluralistic, less-centralized polity.

Libya's Legitimacy Crisis The Danger of Picking Sides in the Post-Qaddafi Chaos

By Frederic Wehrey and Wolfram Lacher

OCTOBER 6, 2014

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A fighter from Zintan brigade watches as smoke rises after rockets fired by one of Libya's militias struck and ignited a fuel tank in Tripoli(Courtesy Reuters)

While much of the world’s attention has been fixated on the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), Libya has been tearing itself asunder. Its airports lie in smoking ruins, foreign diplomats have fled, and its once outspoken civil society has been cowed through a spate of assassinations.

Libya’s chaos has been variously portrayed as a contest between Islamists versus more secular factions; between younger “revolutionaries” versus older technocrats and military officers of Muammar al-Qaddafi’s regime; or between two rival towns in the west, Misrata and Zintan. Libya’s conflict is all these things. At its core, however, the fighting is about two centers of power -- consisting of town-, tribe-, and militia-based networks -- vying for the mantle of legitimacy in a country devoid of any workable institutions. And therein lies the conundrum. Over the past six months, these multiple factions have coalesced into two rival camps that have each staked equal claims to authority.

There are now two governments in Libya. One is in the eastern city of Tobruk, backed by the rump of the elected parliament, the House of Representatives (HOR). The other, based in the capital, Tripoli, has taken de facto control over ministries, relying on a handful of former members of the HOR’s predecessor, the General National Congress (GNC), to provide a veneer of legitimacy. Each is associated with a coalition of militia forces: those supporting the rump parliament have dubbed themselves Operation Dignity; those opposing it go by Operation Dawn. And each is flush with cash, heavy weaponry, and support from outside powers -- Egypt and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have backed Dignity, while Qatar, Sudan, and Turkey are purported to be backing Dawn. Contrary to some commentary, both sides have used force against civilians and elected institutions, and both show little sign of compromise.

Operation Dignity was born this summer as a military campaign led by Khalifa Hifter, a former general in the Libyan army, against Islamist militias in the eastern city of Benghazi -- including the notorious Ansar al Sharia, but also less radical groups such as Libya Shield One. Hifter won support from eastern tribes, federalist militias, and disaffected military units that were opposed to the dominance of a rival camp in the country’s dysfunctional legislature, the GNC. That camp, led by Misrata and other towns, as well as Islamist movements, was united by an agenda of purging the elites of the old regime and promoting the former revolutionary forces as the core of a new army. The campaign soon spread to Tripoli and the western parts of the country when Hifter forged an alliance with militia factions from the town of Zintan, which guarded Tripoli’s airport and had long tussled with militias from the nearby city of Misrata for control of the capital. 

Then, the June elections for the HOR brought losses for allies of the Misrata-led camp and a victory for established elites allied with Hifter and Zintan. Fearing that the balance of power in the capital would shift against them, Misratan and Islamist-leaning militias launched Operation Dawn -- a military campaign to evict the Zintanis from the airport and all of Tripoli. A constellation of militias from smaller towns soon joined the fray alongside the forces from Misrata. The Dawn forces pushed the Zintanis out of the capital and consolidated their control. In Benghazi, the city’s disparate Islamist militias combined their firepower to force Hifter’s forces to retreat from the city (with the exception of the city’s airport).

Management intuition for the next 50 years

The collision of technological disruption, rapid emerging-markets growth, and widespread aging is upending long-held assumptions that underpin strategy setting, decision making, and management.

September 2014 | byRichard Dobbs, Sree Ramaswamy, Elizabeth Stephenson, and S. Patrick Viguerie 

 Intuition forms over time. When McKinsey began publishing the Quarterly, in 1964, a new management environment was just beginning to take shape. On April 7 of that year, IBM announced the System/360 mainframe, a product with breakthrough flexibility and capability. Then on October 10, the opening ceremonies of the Tokyo Olympic Games, the first in history to be telecast via satellite around the planet, underscored Japan’s growing economic strength. Finally, on December 31, the last new member of the baby-boom generation was born.

Fifty years later, the forces symbolized by these three disconnected events are almost unrecognizable. Technology and connectivity have disrupted industries and transformed the lives of billions. The world’s economic center of gravity has continued shifting from West to East, with China taking center stage as a growth story. The baby boomers have begun retiring, and we now talk of a demographic drag, not a dividend, in much of the developed world and China. 

We stand today on the precipice of much bigger shifts in each of these areas, with extraordinary implications for global leaders. In the years ahead, acceleration in the scope, scale, and economic impact of technology will usher in a new age of artificial intelligence, consumer gadgetry, instant communication, and boundless information while shaking up business in unimaginable ways. At the same time, the shifting locus of economic activity and dynamism, to emerging markets and to cities within those markets, will give rise to a new class of global competitors. Growth in emerging markets will occur in tandem with the rapid aging of the world’s population—first in the West and later in the emerging markets themselves—that in turn will create a massive set of economic strains. 

Any one of these shifts, on its own, would be among the largest economic forces the global economy has ever seen. As they collide, they will produce change so significant that much of the management intuition that has served us in the past will become irrelevant. The formative experiences for many of today’s senior executives came as these forces were starting to gain steam. The world ahead will be less benign, with more discontinuity and volatility and with long-term charts no longer looking like smooth upward curves, long-held assumptions giving way, and seemingly powerful business models becoming upended. In this article, which brings together years of research by the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) and McKinsey’s Strategy Practice,1 we strive to paint a picture of the road ahead, how it differs from the one we’ve been on, and what those differences mean for senior executives as they chart a path for the years to come. 

Forces at work

In an article of this length, we can only scratch the surface of the massive forces at work.2 Nonetheless, even a brief look at three of the most important factors—emerging-markets growth, disruptive technology, and aging populations—is a useful reminder of the magnitude of change under way.

Dynamism in emerging markets

Emerging markets are going through the simultaneous industrial and urban revolutions that began in the 18th century in England and in the 19th century in the rest of today’s developed world. In 2009, for the first time in more than 200 years, emerging markets contributed more to global economic growth than developed ones did. By 2025, emerging markets will have been the world’s prime growth engine for more than 15 years, China will be home to more large companies than either the United States or Europe, and more than 45 percent of the companies on Fortune’s Global 500 list of major international players will hail from emerging markets—versus just 5 percent in the year 2000. 

How US organizations are losing the cyber war

By Ian Barker

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Cyber crime, hacking and data breaches have seldom been out of the news in 2014, but just how well are organizations coping with it?

Not very well, according to a new infographic released by security solutions company CSO that's based on the results of a survey of over 500 private and public sector executives and security experts.

Among the findings are that 77 percent of organizations have reported a security breach in the past year, with an average of 135 incidents per organization. Yet only 38 percent have a system to prioritize security spending based on risk and business impact.

Of those that detected an incident, 69 percent said they weren’t able to estimate the cost. Those that did, put the average annual loss to cyber incidents at $415,000. However, 19 percent of US companies put losses at between $50,000 and $1 million.

Among the major concerns are that most organizations don't take a strategic approach to security, supply chain risks that aren’t adequately assessed or understood, and inadequate mobile device security.

The report finds that effectively fighting cyber crime requires collaboration in order to share experience and knowledge of threats. It also needs strategic spending, particularly on security training for employees.

You can view more detail in the complete infographic below.