Army’s Wish List Against China/Russia

Posted on April 19, 2019April 19, 2019 by Denise Simon

It appears some real strategic thinking and application is happening here and that is a good thing. These lists for more reconnaissance aircraft is a good thing for sure.

Russia's Hybrid Warfare Strategy • Full Version

U.S. Army leaders revealed Tuesday that they are briefing top military commanders about new weapons being built specifically for “high-intensity conflict” against China and Russia, in a new effort to assure that they could provide vital firepower for those potential battlefields of the future.

Army Secretary Mark Esper said he wants to shift some money away from vehicles and aircraft more suited for conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and into “what I need to penetrate Russian or Chinese air defenses.”

Among the new weapons and technologies he said are critical: long-range artillery, attack and reconnaissance aircraft, air and missile defenses, and command-and-control networks. Esper said the artillery — known as Long-Range Precision Fires — could be used “to hold at bay Chinese ships.”

Army officials recently briefed Adm. Philip Davidson, commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, who oversees all U.S. military personnel in the Asia-Pacific region. This comes as the Army plans to rotate thousands of soldiers on expeditionary deployments throughout the Pacific — an expansive region often associated with Navy and Air Force military operations.

“We want to talk to [U.S. European Command] as well,” Esper said. “What we’re trying to do is go out and tell them what we’re doing.”

Last year, the Army held a series of reviews that recommended cutting or reducing nearly 200 weapons projects, freeing up $25 billion for investment in higher-priority programs. Among the projects cut are upgrades to Boeing-made CH-47 Chinook helicopters and buys of Oshkosh-made Joint Light Tactical Vehicles, the Army’s replacement for Humvees. Esper said he needs to shift money into “Future Vertical Lift,” an effort to build faster helicopters and tilt-rotor aircraft — similar to the V-22 Osprey — instead of upgrades to older, larger, and slower helicopters.

“What I don’t have right now is an attack/reconnaissance aircraft,” Esper said, Tuesday during a briefing at the Pentagon. “That’s what I need to penetrate Russian or Chinese air defenses. I’m not going to do that with a CH-47.”

The Army is evaluating prototypes built by Bell and a Lockheed Martin-Boeing team, as it determines the makeup of a new generation of military helicopters.

Army leaders plan to cut the number of Joint Light Tactical Vehicles they will buy from Oshkosh but the size of the reduction has not been finalized, Esper said. Army Undersecretary Ryan McCarthy has previously said the service plans to cut 1,900 vehicles.

“We are certainly cutting the total number. I know that much,” Esper said. “But whether it … finals out; right here today, I can’t tell you. In five years, I could maybe have a different number for you.”

The secretary said that they decision to buy Chinooks and JLTVs was made before the Trump administration’s January 2018 National Defense Strategy put the Pentagon on a path to preparing for great power competition with Russia and China. That strategy reduced the Defense Department’s priority on counterterrorism and counterinsurgency fights in Afghanistan, Iraq, and other spots like Syria, which had dominated much of the past two decades. In its wake, the Army is building new doctrine that will be evaluated over the next 12 to 18 months. The results of those wargames will determine how many soldiers and weapons are needed in the future.

“They were in many ways designed for a different conflict,” he said, of Chinooks and JLTVs. “It doesn’t mean we won’t use them in future conflicts, but now my emphasis has to be on rebuilding my armor, rebuilding my fighting vehicles, having aircraft that can penetrate Russia and Chinese air defenses, that can shoot down Russian and Chinese drones and missiles and helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. We’re in this transition period and so some folks are caught in that transition.”

Meanwhile, where is the strategic thinking when it comes to hybrid warfare?

The Pentagon wants to develop a way to detect those signs by analyzing the myriad actions in what it calls the “gray zone”–behaviors in a variety of areas that, considered separately, may or may not mean anything but when examined together could indicate malicious intent–and is putting artificial intelligence (AI) to work on the problem.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has launched a new program intended to better understand and interpret an adversary’s gray zone engagement as potential signals of pending aggression. The Collection and Monitoring via Planning for Active Situational Scenarios (COMPASS) program will incorporate AI, game theory, modeling, and estimation technologies to decipher the often subtle signs that precede a full-scale attack.

“The ultimate goal of the program is to provide theater-level operations and planning staffs with robust analytics and decision-support tools that reduce ambiguity of adversarial actors and their objectives,” said Fotis Barlos, DARPA program manager. “As we see increasingly more sophistication in gray zone activity around the world, we need to leverage advanced AI and other technologies to help commanders make more effective decisions to thwart an enemy’s complex, multi-layered disruptive activity.”

The attention to gray zone activity reflects the multi-pronged tactics used in hybrid warfare, of the type employed by Russia in Georgia in 2008 and in Ukraine since 2014. Cyber attacks to shut down the power grid, conduct digital espionage, and sow economic disruption, along with social media campaigns aimed at manipulating public opinion, coincided with the covert movement of troops and equipment into Ukraine. Not only have these tactics proved to be effective, their subtle, sometimes untraceable methods can lend a level of plausible deniability to the attacks. And NATO has said that clandestine hybrid attacks can achieve their aims before being noticed, too late for an effective response.smilelaugh

Not All of Central America is Desperate, but Is

Posted on April 19, 2019April 19, 2019 by Denise Simon

Belize and Costa Rica are thriving. Tourism for Belize is the top economic earner, then comes sugar and citrus production. The country enjoys an estimated annual growth of 2.5%. Costa Rica also has a strong economy with almost 4% annual growth and both countries have foreign investors.

So when it comes to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, they are among the poorest countries in the region. Seems those countries maintain an 85% poverty rate. The SOUTHCOM Commander, Navy Admiral Craig Faller was in the region in January for a week visit to the three countries discussing security cooperation with emphasis on training, counter-drug missions and humanitarian operations. The United States maintains flight operations that track, detect and monitor all vehicles and crafts for illicit drug trafficking.

USAID has these cockamamie work plans in the region that promotes prosperity. That includes securing borders, increasing economic and business opportunities and stopping corruption. How is that working out? Just skim this document for context.

USAID gives $181 million to Honduras annually. Guatemala receives $257 million while El Salvador accepts $118 million. But hold on that is not all. We also have this other U. S. organization called Millennium Challenge. This is yet another cockamamie operation designed to partner with countries worldwide to promote growth and lift people out of poverty while investing in future generations through education.

Under the Hillary Clinton and John Kerry State Departments, Millennium Challenge has these workshops. Read more here.

Meanwhile, people are still bailing out of Central America in these caravans and the plight of Central America is now a plight for the United States coming through our Southern border.

So, check out how the caravans are using social media and encrypted communications to mobilize.

***

How does a Central American migrant caravan form?

By MARIA VERZA and MARCOS ALEMANtoday

In this Oct. 28, 2018 file photo, migrants charge their cell phones as a caravan of Central Americans trying to reach the U.S. border halts for a rest day in San Pedro Tapanatepec, Oaxaca state, Mexico. Hundreds of Central Americans are now getting as many details as possible before leaving north towards the U.S. border. Increasingly they’re organized over Facebook and WhatsApp as they try to join together in large groups they hope will make the trip safer, and without having to hide themselves from authorities. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — “When does the next caravan leave?” ″Can I go? I’m from Guatemala.” ″What papers do I need for my kids?”

The questions pile up on the phones of hundreds of Central Americans, all with the same goal: Get as many details as possible before leaving their country.

Costly phone calls with relatives and friends in the United States to work out the route or find the best smuggler are a thing of the past for many Central Americans. Now would-be migrants create chat groups and organize using social media to leave in caravans.

“The social networks have had an empowering role in this new way of migrating,” said Abbdel Camargo, an anthropologist at the College of the Southern Border in Mexico. “They organize themselves en masse in their home countries, formed by entire families, and the networks serve them as a mechanism for safety and communication throughout the journey.”

The roots of the migrant caravan phenomenon began years ago when activists organized processions – often with a religious theme – during Holy Week to dramatize the hardships and needs of migrants. A minority of those involved wound up traveling all the way to the U.S. border.

That changed last year: On Oct. 13, hundreds of people walked out of Honduras and as the days passed and they crossed Guatemala, the group grew to more than 7,000 migrants. U.S. President Donald Trump seized on the new phenomenon to ramp up his anti-immigrant policies.

Since then, and parallel to the usual clandestine migrant flow north, smaller caravans have continued to leave the so-called Northern Triangle of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala.

And increasingly they’re organized over Facebook and WhatsApp as they try to join together in large groups they hope will make the trip safer, and without having to hide from authorities.

The most recent caravan left the bus station in San Pedro Sula in northern Honduras on April 10, and journalists from The Associated Press have been following various online migrant chats since late March.

“Anyone know anything about the caravan leaving on the 10th? They say the mother of all caravans is going,” one message said.

In this Feb. 8, 2019 file photo, 17-year-old Honduran migrant Josue Mejia Lucero, his girlfriend Milagro de Jesus Henriquez Ayala, 15, and Josue’s 3-year-old nephew Jefferson, look at cell phones as they lie in bed at the Agape World Mission shelter in Tijuana, Mexico. Hundreds of Central Americans are now getting as many details as possible before leaving north towards the U.S. border. (AP Photo/Emilio Espejel, File)

Élmer Alberto Cardona, a 27-year-old shopkeeper from Honduras, saw an announcement on Facebook just days after being deported from the U.S. to San Pedro Sula and said he didn’t think twice: He collected his three children, ages 3, 6 and 9, and headed north again on April 10.

He and his wife had left with the first caravan in October and made it to Tijuana, across the border from California. They obtained Mexican humanitarian visas that allowed them to temporarily live and work locally, but decided to cross the border and turn themselves over to U.S. border agents to request asylum.

It didn’t go well and they were detained in facilities in different states. He was deported first and his wife was still locked up when he started the journey again, this time with his children.

“I think it will go better this time; it looks like a lot of people are getting together,” he said by phone near the Honduras-Guatemala border.

It’s not clear who is launching the chats. The AP called the number of the person who created one of the WhatsApp chats. The woman who answered said her husband had lived in the U.S. for eight years, was deported and now wanted to return. After a few minutes, a male voice was heard and then she suddenly hung up and no one answered again.

In that group, members give bits of advice: Everyone should bring their passports and those thinking of traveling with children or coming from far away should arrive a day before the caravan leaves. “To take a child you just need a passport and permission if the mother isn’t going.” ″Take a photo with the mother and the baby.”

Some chats appear to be created for a set departure date. Others remain active from earlier caravans or with an eye toward future ones. They usually have various administrators who give advice from points on the route. WhatsApp group members’ phone numbers are from Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico and even the United States. Friends and relatives share invitations.

People aren’t afraid to ask delicate questions in the chats: “Group, in Mexico can you find someone to take you to the other side?” And suspicions come out: “Don’t trust.” ″Remember that in Mexico there are a lot of kidnappings.” ”’There are no coordinators, that’s what people have to say so there aren’t problems.”

The messages also explore ways to seek protection against the robberies, extortion, kidnappings that have long plagued those crossing Mexico. Some express fear that the gangs have tried to infiltrate: “This dude works with the Zetas, a friend of mine from Olancho told me he knows him and that he’s still with them,” said someone who shared a photo of the alleged criminal.

Attention to the recent caravans soared in late March, when Mexican Interior Secretary, Olga Sánchez Cordero met with then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, and without giving details, said that “the mother of all caravans” was forming with more than 20,000 people.

Shortly thereafter, Trump threatened again to close the border with Mexico and suspend aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

While some in the group that left San Pedro Sula referred to it as “the mother of all caravans,” it had fewer than 3,000 people when it arrived at the Mexican border.

The caravans often grow when they reach Mexico because other migrants who are already waiting in the border area tend to join. As of mid-April, there were more than 8,000 migrants, including those who left San Pedro Sula on April 10, at various places in the southern state of Chiapas, according to Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission.

For those hoping to join, the chats provide information in real time about where to meet up — “Caravan where are you going?” ″We’re waiting for you here” — and also about roadblocks, places in Mexico where visas are being processed or sites where there’s been a problem.

Members also upload photos and videos to let their families know where they are and how they’re doing.

And though the April 10 caravan is still in southern Mexico, people in some groups are about forming others: “Another is leaving April 30, Salvadoran friends.”

___

Over 10,000 non-detained Illegal Aliens in America

Posted on April 19, 2019April 19, 2019 by Denise Simon

Hat tip

ERO-LESA Statistical Tracking UnitFor Official Use Only (FOUO)

Pre-decisional 2018-ICFO-32380 Non-Detained Illegal Aliens on the National Docket, as of 06/02/2018

Country of Citizenship Final Order Pending Final Order Total

IRAN 6,331 NORTH KOREA 21 SUDAN 1,860 SYRIA 2,128

The Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) revealed Friday that it has received documents under the Freedom of Information Act that show that the illegals have either been ordered deported or have pending final orders of removal, but are still in the U.S.”

IRLI reported, “In response to an IRLI Freedom of Information Act request, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) provided records that showed that as of June 2018, there were over 10,000 non-detained illegal aliens on ICE’s National Docket from Iran, Syria, Sudan, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). Iran led the pack with over 6,000 or 61 percent of their citizens with removal orders followed by Syria with 20 percent, Sudan with 18 percent, and North Korea with less than a percent.”

The report quoted ICE Director Thomas Homan expressing his concern, asserting, “My biggest concern isn’t how many terrorists have been arrested entering the country illegally, but how many got through? How many did Border Patrol not catch? That’s what Americans should be thinking about.”

IRLI’s director, Dale L. Wilcox, added:

It’s simply unacceptable that we also have more than 10,000 aliens here from terrorist states that are sworn enemies of America. We saw on 9/11 the damage that only 19 sleeper cell terrorists could cause. This is just the latest example of the disaster of sanctuary laws, which force ICE agents to operate with one hand tied behind their backs while making our communities inherently more dangerous.

PJ Media noted, “State and local law enforcement agencies once coordinated with ICE to remove people on the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) list who were wanted on an administrative warrant for removal from the U.S., but sanctuary laws prevent such coordination. ICE has still removed an average of about 44 known or suspected terrorists per year in fiscal years 2017 and 2018, IRLI reported.”

The Washington Free Beacon reported in April 2018, “Iranian agents tied to the terror group Hezbollah have already been discovered in the United States plotting attacks.” The Beacon quoted various intelligence officials and former White House insiders saying Iran could use Hezbollah agents in America to mount a strike. Michael Pregent, a former intelligence officer, said, “They are as good or better at explosive devices than ISIS, they are better at assassinations and developing assassination cells. They’re better at targeting, better at looking at things … Hezbollah is smart. They’re very good at keeping their communications secure, keeping their operational security secure, and, again, from a high profile attack perspective, they’d be good at improvised explosive devices.”

Emanuele Ottolenghi, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, added, “The answer is absolutely. We do face a threat. Their networks are present in the Untied States … It doesn’t take many of them to penetrate this country and be a major threat. They can pose a major threat to our homeland.” He concluded, “Iran’s proxy terror networks in Latin America are run by Tehran’s wholly owned Lebanese franchise Hezbollah. These networks are equal part crime and terror and have the ability to provide funding and logistics to militant fighters. Their presence in Latin America must be viewed as a forward operating base against America’s interest in the region and the homeland itself.”

Anyone Fretting over the Real Russian Hacking from the Mueller Report?

Posted on April 19, 2019April 19, 2019 by Denise Simon

Remember the timeline, it was the Comey FBI, the Brennan CIA, the Lynch Department of Justice and the Obama White House. So, Obama only expelled a pile of Russians and closed 3 dachas. Remember? When the dust settles just a little, President Trump has some work to do to clean up this hacking mess via Russia. Congress has some work to do also by defining some kind of hacking legislation.

The Mueller Report’s conclusions about Russian operations are unambiguous: the GRU’s Unit 26165 did the hacking, and the Internet Research Agency managed the influence campaign. The Report also concluded that the GRU’s Unit 74455 retailed the results of the doxing through its subsidiaries DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0, and through a sympathetic WikiLeaks.

What is Unit 26165, Russia's elite military hacking centre?

Boris Zilberman on Twitter: "DOJ indictment against the ...

At one point, the Russians used servers located in the U.S. to carry out the massive data exfiltration effort, the report confirms.

Much of the information was previously learned from the indictment of Viktor Borisovich Netyksho, the Russian officer in charge of Unit 26165. Netyksho is believed to be still at large in Russia.

The operatives working for the Russian intelligence directorate, the GRU, sent dozens of targeted spearphishing emails in just five days to the work and personal accounts of Clinton Campaign employees and volunteers, as a way to break into the campaign’s computer systems.

The GRU hackers also gained access to the email account of John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign chairman, of which its contents were later published.

Using credentials they stole along the way, the hackers broke into the networks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee days later. By stealing the login details of a system administrator who had “unrestricted access” to the network, the hackers broke into 29 computers in the ensuing weeks, and more than 30 computers on the DNC.

The operatives, known collectively as “Fancy Bear,” comprised several units tasked with specific operations. Mueller formally blamed Unit 26165, a division of the GRU specializing in targeting government and political organizations, for taking on the “primary responsibility for hacking the DCCC and DNC, as well as email accounts of individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign,” said the Mueller report.

The hackers used Mimikatz, a hacking tool used once an intruder is already in a target network, to collect credentials, and two other kinds of malware: X-Agent for taking screenshots and logging keystrokes, and X-Tunnel used to exfiltrate massive amounts of data from the network to servers controlled by the GRU. Mueller’s report found that Unit 26165 used several “middle servers” to act as a buffer between the hacked networks and the GRU’s main operations. Those servers, Mueller said, were hosted in Arizona — likely as a way to obfuscate where the attackers were located but also to avoid suspicion or detection.

In all, some 70 gigabytes of data were exfiltrated from Clinton’s campaign servers and some 300 gigabytes of data were obtained from the DNC’s network.

Meanwhile, another GRU hacking unit, Unit 74455, which helped disseminate and publish hacked and stolen documents, pushed the stolen data out through two fictitious personas. DCLeaks was a website that hosted the hacked material, while Guccifer 2.0 was a hacker-like figure who had a social presence and would engage with reporters.

Under pressure from the U.S. government, the two GRU-backed personas were shut down by the social media companies. Later, tens of thousands of hacked files were funneled to and distributed by WikiLeaks .

Mueller’s report also found a cause-and-effect between Trump’s remarks in July 2016 and subsequent cyberattacks.

“I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” said then-candidate Trump at a press conference, referring to emails Clinton stored on a personal email server while she headed the State Department. Mueller’s report said “within approximately five hours” of those remarks, GRU officers began targeting for the first time Clinton’s personal office.

More than a dozen staffers were targeted by Unit 26165, including a senior aide. “It is unclear how the GRU was able to identify these email accounts, which were not public,” said Mueller.

Mueller said the Trump campaign made efforts to “find the deleted Clinton emails.” Trump is said to have privately asked would-be national security advisor Michael Flynn, since convicted following inquiries by the Special Counsel’s office, to reach out to associates to obtain the emails. One of those associates was Peter Smith, who died by suicide in May 2017, who claimed to be in contact with Russian hackers — claims which Mueller said were not true.

Does that implicate the Trump campaign in an illegal act? Likely not.

“Under applicable law, publication of these types of materials would not be criminal unless the publisher also participated in the underlying hacking conspiracy,” according to Elie Honig, a CNN legal analyst. “The special counsel’s report did not find that any person associated with the Trump campaign illegally participated in the dissemination of the materials.”

Preezy Candidates Gillibrand and Buttigieg, What?

Posted on April 19, 2019April 19, 2019 by Denise Simon

We already know about Bernie Sanders praising Fidel Castro and the communist takeover of Nicaragua. Yet, he still seems to appeal to the millennial class while enjoying their campaign contributions. This demonstrates the failure of the education system for decades. Okay, so how about Kirsten Gillibrand and Pete Buttigieg?

Gillibrand: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand: “If We Are Not Helping People, We ...

BuzzFeed reported Tuesday that the New York senator will endorse a new report recommending steps to reduce the racial wealth divide, including policies such as a commission to study slavery reparations.

“A draft of the report, titled ‘Ten Solutions to Bridge the Racial Wealth Divide,’ will be jointly released this week by the Institute for Policy Studies, the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, and the National Community Reinvestment Coalition,” they report. Gillibrand told BuzzFeed News that she was “proud” to support the document.

One of the organizations Gillibrand is “proud” to partner with, the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS), was infamous during the Cold War for its defense of Communist governments and for its kneejerk support of the Soviet line.

Emory Professor and preeminent historian of American Communism Harvey Klehr dedicated an entire chapter of his book “Far Left of Center” to the IPS, which he characterized as “an intellectual nerve center for the radical movement, providing sustenance and support for a variety of causes, ranging from nuclear and anti-intervention issues to support for Marxist insurgencies.”

“IPS fellows have consistently maintained that the Soviet threat is largely non-existent and a product of the military-industrial complex,” he wrote. Klehr detailed how IPS fellows’ partnered with Soviet-funded “peace” organizations, defended USSR and Vietnam from charges of human rights abuses, defended the Sandinistas and other Latin-American terrorists, and denied the existence of the Cambodian genocide, even as two million people died.

Former Communist spy and defector Ladislav Bittman likewise wrote in his seminal book “The KGB and Soviet Disinformation” that the Soviets were “particularly interested” in IPS, whose “nucleus” was composed of “researchers and scholars with Marxist perceptions that Soviet foreign and military policies pose no threat to Western democracies.” More here.

Swell eh? Okay how about lil ol’ Pete Buttigieg?

Buttigieg: Peter Buttigieg emerges as Democratic 'rock star ...

Well he was groomed politically by his father, a Marxist. Yep….

The father of Democratic presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg was a Marxist professor who spoke fondly of the Communist Manifesto and dedicated a significant portion of his academic career to the work of Italian Communist Party founder Antonio Gramsci, an associate of Vladimir Lenin.

Joseph Buttigieg, who died in January at the age of 71, immigrated to the U.S. in the 1970s from Malta and in 1980 joined the University of Notre Dame faculty, where he taught modern European literature and literary theory. He supported an updated version of Marxism that jettisoned some of Marx and Engel’s more doctrinaire theories, though he was undoubtedly Marxist.

He was an adviser to Rethinking Marxism, an academic journal that published articles “that seek to discuss, elaborate, and/or extend Marxian theory,” and a member of the editorial collective of Boundary 2, a journal of postmodern theory, literature, and culture. He spoke at many Rethinking Marxism conferences and other gatherings of prominent Marxists.

In a 2000 paper for Rethinking Marxism critical of the approach of Human Rights Watch, Buttigieg, along with two other authors, refers to “the Marxist project to which we subscribe.”

In 1998, he wrote in an article for the Chronicle of Higher Education about an event in New York City celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Manifesto. He also participated in the event.

“If The Communist Manifesto was meant to liberate the proletariat, the Manifesto itself in recent years needed liberating from Marxism’s narrow post-Cold War orthodoxies and exclusive cadres. It has been freed,” he wrote. More here.

So, now you have a head start on 3 of the candidates for President. How about choosing to do a few others and see what you will find. Here is a tip, Kamala Harris’ father, Donald, a Professor Emeritus of Economics at Stanford straddles between socialism and Marxism himself.