Bringing Congress to the (Wargaming) Table for a Bigger and Better Navy

War on the Rocks – When not in the midst of a pandemic, members of Congress and high-level defense officials travel all over the world and attend all sorts of fancy conferences. Some of these trips are valuable, others less so. None of these trips are as important as the wargame that should take place in Newport in early 2021. Done right, 72 hours with members of Congress and defense leaders locked in a room together examining maps, strategy, forces, and assumptions could bring about the oft-promised naval rebuild that, until now, has yet to materialize. Now that the Pentagon finally has a plan, it is time for Congress to pull up a chair and join it at the table.

China Arming Venezuelan Navy With Anti-Ship Missiles

USNI News – Venezuela’s propaganda videos are showing off warships armed with new Chinese-made anti-ship missiles. The C-802A missile, supplied by Beijing to the Venezuelan Navy, is designed to take out surface ships at ranges of over 100 nautical miles. The sea-skimming missile is generally analogous to the Harpoon. This arms deal should greatly increase the reach and potency of President Nicolás Maduro’s navy.

TIAR 21: Maritime Security, The TIAR, and IUU Fishing in the Western Hemisphere

CIMSEC – An international fishing fleet is currently sailing through international waters in the South Pacific, passing close to Ecuador and Peru, and it is currently sailing close to Chile en route to Antarctica The navies of these countries are on alert and governments are sharing information to monitor the fleet. In light of this development, what more can regional governments do to jointly combat illegal, unreported, or unregulated (IUU) fishing?

China’s Type 055 destroyer has anti-stealth, anti-satellite capabilities

Global Times – China’s domestically developed 10,000 ton-class Type 055 guided missile destroyer can counter stealth aircraft and low-Earth orbit satellites, a state-owned media has recently revealed for the first time, leading Chinese experts to say on Sunday that the capabilities will give Chinese forces a key edge over their opponents in modern warfare.

Are the US Army and US Marine Corps competing for missions in the Pacific?

Defense News – With the U.S. military locked in on what it sees as a long-term competition with the People’s Republic of China for ascendency in the Indo-Pacific region, two services seeking to pivot away from heavy ground conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are looking toward missiles as a ticket to relevance in a potential future conflict.