The D Brief: Meet the Army’s new recon unit; Putin’s Kursk-Pokrovsk gambit; China’s new sub; New Jan. 6 charges; And a bit more.
Take a trip to the pine forests of Louisiana, where U.S. soldiers just tested a fast-moving new recon unit while temperatures soared well into the 90s. Defense One’s Sam Skove tagged along for several days of wargaming on Fort Johnson, formerly Fort Polk, host to one of the Army’s deployment conditioning sites known as the Joint Readiness Training Center.
The new unit, known as the 101st Airborne Division’s Multi-Functional Reconnaissance Company, just launched in March and it’s one of three such new units across the service. Each has been tasked with testing out new gear in real-world conditions and developing new, innovative doctrine, Army officials said.
Much of the new tech is inspired by devices and tactics in use in Ukraine. “There’s so many lessons to be able to take from [the Ukrainians], and a lot of it does come down to the integration of new things, like the proliferation of [drones],” said Maj. Gen. Brett Sylvia, commander of the 101st Airborne Division.
The hunter-killer platoons have as many as six short-range commercially available drones each, a mix of Skydio, Parrot, and Vesper models. And if the hunter-killer platoon finds a target with its Parrot drone, it can use artificial intelligence software dubbed Sentinel AI to recommend how best to angle a cannon to take it out, Skove reports. And electronic warfare capabilities round out the picture, with platoons toting the Beast+ backpack, which can pick up the location of radars.
Read the rest from Louisiana at Defense One, here.
Welcome to this Thursday edition of The D Brief, brought to you by Ben Watson and Patrick Tucker. Share your newsletter tips, reading recommendations, or feedback here. And if you’re not already subscribed, you can do that here. On this day in 1791, the Haitian Revolution began, almost immediately triggering fear in the hearts of plantation owners across the American south, as historian Jill Lepore recounted in her 2018 book, “These Truths.”
Russian officials seem to be at least temporarily resigning themselves to a Ukrainian occupation of the western Kursk region, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War wrote in their Wednesday evening assessment, citing Russian independent outlet Meduza. That window for Moscow’s tolerance of a Ukrainian occupation could extend as far as early October.
The main goal appears to be pressing on with Russia’s invasion of eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, which would likely slow if Russian invasion troops relocated back across the border to repel Ukrainian troops inside Kursk. According to ISW, “Russian state TV channels are notably covering Ukraine’s incursion in Kursk Oblast as a limited operation, while actively contrasting it with Russian advances in the Pokrovsk direction, which Russian media is painting as major victories.”
About Ukraine’s Pokrovsk: It’s a “crossroads” town of about 59,000 people, which leads to the larger cities of Dnipro and Zaporizhia. On Monday, officials advised residents to leave as soon as they can. That’s because while Russian forces have moved as close as 10 kilometers away in recent days, “The regional police and local administration have moved out,” the Economist reported Thursday. “Two supermarkets have closed, and the rest will probably follow.”
Additional reading:
New: The U.S. is investigating Americans who worked with Russian state television, the New York Times reported Wednesday. That includes former United Nations weapons inspector, convicted sex offender, and RT television personality Scott Ritter, whose home was raided by the FBI in August. The FBI also visited the home of Dimitri Simes, former president and CEO of the Center for the National Interest, and a one-time Trump advisor. (He shows up the Mueller report more than 100 times.) Simes this week complained to Julia Ioffe of Puck News, “Even the K.G.B. didn’t behave like this in the 1970s.”
The raids occur against a backdrop of U.S. intelligence officials publicly warning that Russia is attempting to influence the 2024 election in favor of Donald Trump. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence officials this week said that Iran, too, is trying to influence the election to compromise the Trump campaign. As we wrote earlier this month, social media companies are lowering their defenses to foreign influence campaigns.
“Trump anxiety” has been an investment boon for European defense startups. Reuters reported Thursday that former U.S. President Donald “Trump’s unpredictability, combined with the war in Ukraine and tensions in the Middle East” is spurring higher defense spending across the globe. (We covered this topic in a three-part podcast conversation this spring, spanning Russia, the Pacific region, and the wider world).
What’s new: NATO and the Europeans have both started funds to steer money toward innovative defense tech and bolster local capabilities. Read on, here.
Changing winds: The new class of Silicon Valley tech bros are ready and willing to work with the Pentagon. Peter Thiel-backed ventures like Palantir and Anduril are “having a moment,” according to Gizmodo, and reshaping not only how and what the Pentagon buys but the American tech sector as well. “I don’t even know how you explain to the average American that you’ve become a multibillionaire and you won’t supply your product to the D.O.D.” Palantir founder Alex Karp told Maureen Dowd of the NYTs in a recent profile.
Bonus: More are also coming out as Trump supporters, as the Rolling Stone reported last month.
Relatedly: Former congressman Mike Gallagher will lead the Palantir’s defense business. He recently spoke with Defense One’s Lauren C. Williams about his priorities.
“My experience really on the China committee showed me time and again how most of corporate America refuses to defend American values or even think of themselves as American companies, and in many cases, continually would bend the knee to China,” he said.
But old school defense contractors still have some tricks up their sleeves, Defense One’s Patrick Tucker reported Wednesday. That includes the ability to produce microelectronics specific to military purposes as opposed to relying on cheap and plentiful chips out of Taiwan, like much of the consumer tech world does. Northrop Grumman demonstrated why the ability to fabricate their own chips, using modern techniques like digital twinning, is critical. This week they announced a digital radar tech had its first flight. More here.
China’s navy just secretly launched a new kind of submarine, H.I. Sutton reported this week on his site Naval News, after Tom Shugart of CNAS suggested as much with satellite imagery last month on social media.
It’s non-nuclear, and features unusual “x-form rudders,” Sutton writes. “Although some Chinese extra-large uncrewed underwater vehicles (XLUUVs) already have them. They are generally regarded as better for agility, particularly in shallow water,” he adds. Read the rest, here.
New: U.S. authorities arrested a New York man Wednesday on charges of spying for China. He’s a former Chinese dissident whose name is Yuanjun Tang, age 67; he defected from China in 2002. But, according to the Justice Department, for six years beginning in 2018, he allegedly befriended a group of Chinese dissidents and passed their information on to China’s Ministry of State Security. Tang also faces charges of lying to the FBI. The Department of Justice has more, here.
And speaking of the Justice Department, a former Oath Keepers lawyer just pleaded guilty to tampering with January 6 evidence, the New York Times reported Wednesday.
Her name is Kellye SoRelle, and the Times reports she “served as the general counsel of the Oath Keepers and had a romantic relationship with the militia’s leader and founder, Stewart Rhodes, who was found guilty at a trial in Washington of seditious conspiracy” for the January 6 attack.
She stood accused of telling Oath Keepers to delete their text messages after the insurrection. SoRelle admitted to the charges in a federal court Wednesday in Washington. More, here.
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