Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations: National Security Law at the Operational Level of War

CIMSEC – In a recent piece for the Center for International Maritime Security (CIMSEC), Brent Stricker provided an excellent overview of legal considerations associated with the Marine Corps’ Force Design 2030, concepts for Stand-in-Forces (SIF) and Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO). Stricker provides a cogent introduction to targeting, deception and distinction questions if using non-standard platforms, and access, basing, and overflight (ABO) of regional states in the Pacific and South China Seas. This essay is intended to expand on additional legal considerations that the School of Advanced Warfighting student class of Academic Year 2022 encountered during the last year of study.

Russia Is Working On A New Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile: Report

War Zone – Reports from Russia suggest the country is the latest to develop an anti-ship ballistic missile, or ASBM, the class of weapon that’s popularly dubbed ‘carrier killer.’ The previously unknown missile project, known by the Russian name Zmeyevik (meaning serpentinite, a type of rock), would potentially add a powerful new dynamic to the Kremlin’s anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) strategy.

U.S. Marines: Manage Your Message To Win In Strategic Competition

1945 – Late last month U.S. Marine Corps headquarters issued MCDP-8, a doctrinal publication titled Information. Sounds like a snoozer, right? And indeed, tracts belaboring military doctrine can be deadly dull. But this one is well-written and interesting on the whole. More importantly, it plumbs the substance of “information operations” in more depth than documents found elsewhere in the joint community.

Navy’s Atlantic fleet mulling new, high-readiness force

Defense News – The U.S. Navy has long sought more flexibility in how its deployable ships are used, but it’s been hard to break out of the mold: the high-demand destroyers, for example, go through maintenance and training, most likely deploy as part of a carrier strike group, have a few months of free time upon their return, and then start the process all over again.

Ukraine Symposium – The Attack on the Vasily Bekh and Targeting Logistics Ships

Articles of War – On June 17, Ukrainian forces successfully used a U.S.-supplied Harpoon anti-ship cruise missile to attack and sink a Russian resupply ship that “almost certainly” carried weapons and reinforcements bound for Snake Island in the Black Sea. Two weeks later, on June 30, Russian troops evacuated the small outpost. Moscow had claimed the retreat from Snake Island was a “gesture of goodwill” in advance of recognizing a humanitarian corridor to permit the safe export of grain from Ukraine. But Ukraine said the Russians were forced out as their position on the barren rock had become untenable without logistical support. Ukraine raised its flag on Snake Island on July 4.

Beyond the Gulf: U.S. Maritime Security Operations in the Mena Region

CIMSEC – Despite rumors to the contrary, the United States is not interested in disengaging from the Middle East. The Indo-Pacific is the new focal point of U.S. foreign policy, but the Middle East remains essential for U.S. interests. However, current patterns of interaction between the United States and its Middle Eastern partners are tied to routines that were hardened during the Global War on Terror. While these routines have proven difficult to escape and a source of political divergence at times, the reality today is that U.S. priorities are more disparate globally—and U.S. presence in the region should not remain locked within previous formulas.

PLA naval activities around Japan intensify amid Tokyo provocation, ‘to become routine’

Global Times – Over the past month, the Japanese Defense Ministry has posted more than a dozen reports on Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) naval activities around the island country, as the last ship in the PLA Navy task force led by the Type 055 large destroyer Lhasa reportedly returned to the East China Sea on Tuesday, wrapping up its voyage that went round Japan almost entirely. The growing capabilities of the PLA Navy will mean that such activities become routine, and their significance goes beyond just sending Japan warnings amid its right-wing provocations, as the PLA Navy aims to become a blue-water navy that will operate farther in distant waters to safeguard China’s sovereignty, security and development interests, experts said on Wednesday.