BBC – A new international treaty aims to support protection of the high seas – what will this mean for deep-sea mining?

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

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The Space Review – The oceans are integral to our global ecosystem. As a source of nutrition and livelihood for much of the world’s population, ocean health is critical for UN development goals. Activities that jeopardize the sustainability of marine resources, particularly illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing, are therefore a major international issue. Fortunately, space capabilities such as satellite radar and multispectral imaging are making it easier for the international community to track, characterize, and combat illegal fishing.

War on the Rocks – Few expressions in the maritime lexicon today are as persistent and pervasive as maritime domain awareness. The term has become a watchword in security and governance debates, a conceptual idiom implying information superiority in the nautical arena. Within the greater scope of maritime domain awareness, however, underwater domain awareness is a new and emerging concept that has piqued the interest of maritime analysts. It rests on the idea that modern-day technology has rendered the sea transparent, making it possible for maritime agencies to track undersea activity.

CIMSEC – The conduct of Russian submarine espionage in the territorial seas of its neighbors presents one of the greatest challenges to avoiding conflict in the Baltic Sea. These incidents reveal the gap between the law of the sea and the use of force in self-defense against an armed attack. The Nordic coastal states must walk a fine line between protecting their territorial integrity and avoiding escalation of an incident that might quickly spin out of control.

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

To see every post you can also follow NOSI via RSS at nosi.org/feed or via email by entering your email address and clicking on the Follow button in the right hand column of the site.

You can also follow us on social media as @nosintel on Facebook at facebook.com/nosintel or on Twitter at twitter.com/nosintel

Defense News – Shaken by an underwater explosion that ripped through the Nord Stream pipelines in September, European nations are waking up to the task of securing the ocean floors that house the continent’s arteries of wealth. But protecting the vast network of energy pipelines and communications cables that line the surrounding bodies of water comes down to a familiar question: Who’s in charge?

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

To see every post you can also follow NOSI via RSS at nosi.org/feed or via email by entering your email address and clicking on the Follow button in the right hand column of the site.

You can also follow us on social media as @nosintel on Facebook at facebook.com/nosintel or on Twitter at twitter.com/nosintel

• The Russian Navy’s overall poor performance in the war with Ukraine in the Black Sea, which was on par with the poor performance of the Russian Army and Air Force. Is the Russian Navy a Potemkin fleet?

• The Ukrainian Navy’s adaptable and creative performance against the Russian Navy in the Black Sea. What additional indigenous weapons will the New Year bring to the Ukrainian Navy?

• The further democratization of commercial space services (communications, imaging, etc.) for military purposes as evidenced in the lead-up to and throughout the conflict in the Ukraine. How will this affect naval warfare in the future?

• The threats to undersea infrastructure with undersea cables to Svalbard and the Shetland Islands cut and the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines cut. What will be an efficient and effective technique for protecting such infrastructure going forward?

• China’s new alliance with Papua New Guinea, which sits astride the U.S. – Australian sea line of communication. Will China build an anti-access area-denial base there?

• Taiwan beginning to reluctantly adopt an anti-invasion porcupine strategy, encouraged in part by events in the Ukraine. With such a strategy could Taiwan survive an invasion by China?

• Stepped up joint Chinese-Russian naval patrols around Japan. Is this the straw that finally broke the camel’s back and led to Japan procuring long range cruise missiles to provide its Self Defense Force with an offensive capability if attacked?

• Lots of nuclear signaling with Western ballistic missile submarines to counter Russia’s nuclear signaling over the Ukraine. Did the West’s message get through?

• The decommissioning of littoral combat ships from the US Navy almost as soon as they are commissioned. Is this the final, inglorious end of the LCS program?

• Pausing of unmanned surface vehicle (USV) work in the U.S. Navy, which has decided to focus on USV technology maturation before USV procurement. Will perfect become the enemy of good enough?

War on the Rocks – NATO still maintains standing naval forces, units that are directly under the bloc’s day-to-day operational command. Yet even in this time of high tension, very few combatants are attached to the alliance’s two major standing naval groups.

Wavell Room – In recent years the idea of leveraging on uncrewed drone technologies for use in naval warfare has been increasing in credibility and varieties.  This is in no small part due to the proliferation of such drone technologies driving down costs, as well as maturing technology components and platforms allowing for greater reliability and stability for such platforms.

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

To see every post you can also follow NOSI via RSS at nosi.org/feed or via email by entering your email address and clicking on the Follow button in the right hand column of the site.

You can also follow us on social media as @nosintel on Facebook at facebook.com/nosintel or on Twitter at twitter.com/nosintel

War on the Rocks – Europe is waking up to the dangers of overreliance on authoritarian powers, but largely lacks the toolkit necessary to mitigate dependencies on the very regimes most willing to exploit them. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and subsequent weaponization of Europe’s energy dependency on Moscow has hit every corner of the continent’s economy. Meanwhile, Xi Jinping has a track record of imposing economic coercion in response to slights against Beijing. While the discussion of these risks has advanced, the policy framework and how it is used to respond to such dependencies needs urgent change. Europe may be rapidly adapting after the fact to Russia’s coercive use of its control over European critical infrastructure and the oil and natural gas that flow through it, but the opposite has happened regarding China’s increasing role in European ports and the shipping services that flow through them. 

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

To see every post you can also follow NOSI via RSS at nosi.org/feed or via email by entering your email address and clicking on the Follow button in the right hand column of the site.

You can also follow us on social media as @nosintel on Facebook at facebook.com/nosintel or on Twitter at twitter.com/nosintel

BBC – Communications to Shetland have been severely disrupted after a subsea cable was damaged.

BBC – At least 50 metres (164ft) of an underwater pipeline bringing Russian gas to Germany is thought to have been destroyed by a blast last month.

We invite you to try War Studies Primer – an introductory course on the study of war and military history. Its purpose is to provide an introduction to the study of war.

War Studies Primer is presented as a lecture curriculum at the university level. It is a free, non-credit, self-study course that consists of 28 topics and over 1,900 slides and is updated on a yearly basis.

Look at slides 2 and 3 in the War Studies Primer for its Table of Contents, and then choose a lecture to read and enjoy.

To see every post you can also follow NOSI via RSS at nosi.org/feed or via email by entering your email address and clicking on the Follow button in the right hand column of the site.

You can also follow us on social media as @nosintel on Facebook at facebook.com/nosintel or on Twitter at twitter.com/nosintel

CIMSEC – When thinking about navies, there is a natural tendency to focus on operations in the open sea and the role of carriers, frigates, and submarines. However, aside from protecting their territorial waters and exclusive economic zones, South American navies have another equally important theater of operation: inland water bodies like lakes and rivers.

War Zone – The controversial Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines, which are supposed to carry Russian gas to Europe, have been breached.