The D Brief: Why pagers explode; Russian ammo dump blows up; CNO releases guidance; N. Korea tests missiles; And a bit more.
Israeli intelligence operatives appear to have pulled off a legendary and deadly supply chain hack, installing tiny quantities of explosives into at least 3,000 pagers specially ordered by Iran-backed Hezbollah militants across Lebanon and Syria, U.S. officials told Reuters, the New York Times, and the Associated Press over the past 24 hours.
What happened: Thousands of the AR-924 pagers exploded remotely Tuesday around 3:30 p.m. local, killing at least a dozen people, including two children, and wounding around 2,800 others, Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said Wednesday. “Explosive material, as little as one to two ounces, was implanted next to the battery in each pager,” and “A switch was also embedded that could be triggered remotely to detonate the explosives,” the Times reported Tuesday.
The pagers were initially traced to a company in Taiwan, but officials there point to Hungary, where the devices were made under license by a separate company based in Budapest, AP reported Wednesday. That Hungarian firm, known as BAC Consulting KFT, “appeared to be a shell company,” according to AP.
Expert reax: “There are many failure points in supply chains,” noted Decker Eveleth of Virginia-based CNA. “I don’t think we should jump to the conclusion that [BAC was] directly involved or simply a front” for Israeli intelligence, he warned.
“This would easily be the biggest counterintelligence failure that Hezbollah has had in decades,” one former U.S. official told Reuters. Dmitri Alperovitch of the Silverado Policy Accelerator think tank in Washington described it as “Perhaps one of the most extensive physical supply chain attacks in history.”
Among those hurt: Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, who “lost one eye and his other eye is severely injured,” according to the Times.
Q. Is such an attack a violation of international humanitarian law? Apparently, says Shashank Joshi of the Economist—but possibly not, according to the Brits’ interpretation of the laws of armed conflict, he noted on social media with the assistance of others.
Welcome to this Wednesday edition of The D Brief, brought to you by Ben Watson with Bradley Peniston. 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 2014, President Barack Obama offered military gear but denied weapons to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, who had come to Washington seeking help against what the world believed at the time to be Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, though Vladimir Putin later admitted they were in fact Russian military forces without any insignia.
A large Russian ammunition depot erupted in a remarkable series of explosions early Wednesday around 3:30 in the morning. Regional earthquake monitors even picked up the blast, which registered as a “light magnitude” 2.8 quake.
Location: The Toropets Northeast Ammunition Depot, in the Tver region of Russia, which is about 300 miles from the frontlines of Russia’s Ukraine invasion. Six Ukrainian kamikaze drones were allegedly used in the attack, which appears to have caused several intense burn zones that NASA sensors picked up in the agency’s Fire Information for Resource Management System.
In video: Here is some footage taken moments after impact showing the initial blast wave followed by a smaller series of secondary explosions and their waves rolling across the illuminated horizon.
“We’re likely looking at the loss of thousands of tons of explosive materials, shells, and rockets,” one former Ukrainian officer said, noting, “In events of this magnitude, replacement can’t be quick.”
Developing: Norwegian sensors have reportedly detected cesium near the border with Russia, which would seem to suggest Moscow just tested its new nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed cruise missile known as the 9M730 Burevestnik, aka “SSC-X-9 Skyfall” according to NATO.
“The levels are clearly higher than normal, but pose no risk to humans or the environment,” a Norwegian official told the Barents Observer on Tuesday, which noted, “Cesium-137 is formed as a fission product by operating a nuclear reactor.”
It’s “Likely Russia conducted their 13th test of the system,” because that location “correspond[s] to the activity we see in satellite imagery at the Burevestnik missile test site at Pankovo,” said Decker Eveleth.
Get up to speed: Reuters has much more on the particular test site, reporting with satellite imagery in early September, here. The Barents Observers also runs down a few alternate possibilities near the end of their report, here.
CNO releases new Navigation Plan. Announcing her first addition to the long-running series of guidance papers by the Navy’s top officers, Adm. Lisa Franchetti says her top priorities are “readiness for conflict with the PRC by 2027 and enhancing long-term advantage.” She aims to achieve these ends “through two central ways: implementing seven “Project 33” targets and expanding the Navy’s contribution to the Joint warfighting ecosystem.” Project 33—apparently a nod to her status as the 33rd CNO—includes these bullet points:
- Ready the force by eliminating ship, submarine, and aircraft maintenance delays
- Scale robotic and autonomous systems to integrate more platforms at speed
- Create the command centers our fleets need to win on a distributed battlefield
- Recruit and retain the force we need to get more players on the field
- Deliver a quality of service commensurate with the sacrifices of our Sailors
- Train for combat as we plan to fight, in the real world and virtually
- Restore the critical infrastructure that sustains and projects the fight from shore. You can read the 27-page document here (free trial required).
Reax: The new NAVPLAN drew kudos from Cmdr. Salamander, the venerable and oft-cranky navy blogger. He praises especially her focus on “near-term readiness” and a reduction in references to diversity compared to the 2022 version. Read that, here.
Joint Chiefs Chairman Air Force Gen. CQ Brown, Jr., met with four NATO counterparts over the past few days. That included Czech Lt. Gen. Karel Řehka and Turkish Gen. Metin Gürak Saturday in Prague during the alliance’s annual Military Committee Conference. Two days later, Brown spoke with Belgian Gen. Frederik Vansina and Danish Gen. Michael Wiggers Hyldgaard Monday in Copenhagen.
CQ’s CR warning to HASC’s Rogers: Brown warned the top House Armed Services Republican against advancing another temporary funding bill known as a continuing resolution in a letter dated Friday.
“In the race against time, each CR is the equivalent of taking a knee on advancing our defense capabilities as security challenges increase their momentum to challenge our credible combat power,” Brown wrote in his letter. CRs “slow progress and damage our relationships with the defense industrial base, eroding trust driving up costs, and increasing delivery times, as industry hedges against funding inconsistencies,” Brown said.
“Should Congress move forward with a six-month CR, we anticipate detrimental impacts to readiness and modernization across the Joint Force,” the general warned. “Pay and entitlements, nuclear enterprise modernization, shipbuilding and maintenance, aircraft procurement, weapons system sustainment. munitions production, and multiple new starts are just a few examples that will feel the brunt of the lost time and lost buying power caused by a CR.”
“We are living in a consequential time. There is no time to waste,” said Brown.
And lastly: North Korea launched a series of short-range ballistic missiles into the sea off its east coast just before 7 a.m. local time Wednesday, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reports. The missiles flew for about 250 miles before splashing down into the water, Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said afterward.
Indo-PACOM: “The United States condemns these actions and calls on the DPRK to refrain from further unlawful and destabilizing acts,” U.S. military officials said in a statement. “While we have assessed that this event does not pose an immediate threat to U.S. personnel, or territory, or to our allies, we continue to monitor the situation,” they added.
ICYMI: “The North fired several short-range ballistic missiles last Thursday, the first such launch in more than two months, which it later described as a test of a new 600-mm multiple launch rocket system,” Reuters reports. And the launches come just a few “days after North Korea offered a rare view into a secretive facility built to enrich uranium for nuclear bombs as leader Kim Jong Un called for a rapid expansion of his nuclear weapons program,” AP reports.
By the way: “North Korea’s rapid advancement of its nuclear and missile capabilities, combined with its stated ambition to exponentially expand its nuclear arsenal, is the single greatest challenge” facing U.S. and allied forces in the region, said Army Lt. Gen. Xavier Brunson, the nominee to lead U.S. Forces Korea, told lawmakers Tuesday on Capitol Hill. Yonhap has more from that extended exchange, here.
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