With about two months left in its counteroffensive, Ukraine has ‘realistic possibility’ of breakthrough, top DIA analyst says

DIA: ‘SIGNIFICANT’ SUCCESS, WITH ‘REALISTIC POSSIBILITY’ OF BREAKTHROUGH: In what appears to be a course correction in the assessment of Ukraine’s progress in its counteroffensive against dug-in Russian defenses, a senior analyst with the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency is expressing guarded optimism that Ukrainian forces may be able to breach Russia’s third line of defense before weather ends the fighting season six to seven weeks from now.

“Had we had this conversation two weeks ago, I would have been slightly more pessimistic,” Trent Maul, the DIA’s director of analysis, said in an interview with the Economist published yesterday. In recent days, Ukrainian forces have broken through Russia’s heavily-mined first line of defense near the southern village of Robotyne and are attacking the second of three belts. “Their breakthrough on that second defensive belt … is actually pretty considerable.”

Maul called the recent battlefield successes “significant” and provides a “realistic possibility” of breaking through the remaining Russian lines by the end of the year, which would put Ukraine in a good position to resume fighting next year when it will have U.S. M1 Abrams tanks and F-16 fighter jets.

The two most critical factors, he told the Economist, are ammunition and weather. Ukraine needs a constant flow of artillery shells and missiles to keep the pressure on Russia until cold, wet weather freezes the battle lines in place over the winter.

BLINKEN: ‘VERY TANGIBLE PROGRESS’: Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking to NBC news after his Thursday meeting in Kyiv with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, said the counteroffensive is making “tangible progress.”

“I had a chance to spend a lot of time with President Zelensky yesterday. He’d just come back from the frontlines, and I think we’re seeing very tangible progress over the last couple of weeks on the front lines in the east, and in the south is hard,” Blinken told NBC correspondent Richard Engel. “The Russians had a lot of time in this case to prepare for the counteroffensive. They put thousands, tens of thousands of mines in place, other defensive fortifications. The Ukrainians are working their way through it. But at the end of the day, they have a determination. They have a desire that I think will outmatch whatever the Russians put into this.”

“The Russians have to get to a point where they acknowledge that they failed,” Blinken told NBC. “They’ve already failed, and what they were trying to do, which was to erase Ukraine from the map, to end its identity as an independent country, to subsume it into Russia. That’s failed.”

“Putin right now shows no evidence that he’s interested in meaningful diplomacy. I think what he has in his mind is that he can somehow outlast Ukraine, outlast us, outlast the dozens of countries that are supporting Ukraine. He’s wrong about that,” Blinken said.

STOLTENBERG: WE CANNOT TELL THEM HOW TO FIGHT: NATO’s civilian leader told members of the European Parliament yesterday that it’s important for the West to stick by Ukraine whether they are winning or losing on the battlefield.

“There will be bad days and good days. We need to be with Ukraine, not only good times but also bad times, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said in remarks in Brussels. “No one ever said that this was going to be easy, the offensive. It was clearly stated this is going to be a bloody, difficult, and hard offensive.”

“They are making progress. Not perhaps as much as we hoped for, but they are gaining ground gradually, some 100 meters per day. Meaning that when the Ukrainians are gaining ground, the Russians are losing ground,” Stoltenberg said. “The reality is that Ukrainians are actually exceeding expectations again and again. And we need to remember what’s our responsibility, our responsibility to support them.”

“We cannot sit here in Brussels, in the NATO Headquarters or the EU Headquarters, and tell them exactly how to fight. That’s their task. They’re risking their lives, and we just support them. And we praise them for their courage.”

FOR UMEROV, IT’S PERSONAL: Ukraine’s new defense minister, Rustem Umerov, has begun posting on the ministry’s official social media accounts, and in a post yesterday, he talked about his Crimean Tatar roots.

“For me, this war did not begin in 2022, and not even in 2014. For my family and the Crimean Tatar people, the war with Russia began several centuries ago, when Moscow first occupied my native Crimea,” Umerov posted on X. “I was born after my family had been deported, and as a child lived through the hardships brought about by Russian colonialism, which attempted to make indigenous Crimean Tatar people feel as though they were aliens on their own land. They did not succeed back then, and they will never succeed. Our main goal today is to win the war.”

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Good Friday morning and welcome to Jamie McIntyre’s Daily on Defense, written and compiled by Washington Examiner National Security Senior Writer Jamie McIntyre (@jamiejmcintyre) and edited by Conrad Hoyt. Email here with tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else. Sign up or read current and back issues at DailyonDefense.com. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll add you to our list. And be sure to follow me on Threads and/or on X @jamiejmcintyre

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HAPPENING TODAY: The Pentagon will have a ceremony in the building’s five-acre center courtyard at 10 a.m. to observe the 22nd anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks is among the speakers, and the ceremony will be livestreamed on the Pentagon’s website.

McKENZIE DISPUTES KEY DETAIL OF AFGHANISTAN WITHDRAWAL: In a sit-down interview with Fox Pentagon Correspondent Jennifer Griffin, retired Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie denied that the U.S. had a description of the suicide bomber whose attack killed 13 American service members and 170 Afghans.

In March, Sgt. Tyler Vargas-Andrews, who lost an arm and a leg in the 2021 suicide attack at Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport, testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that he had spotted a person matching the description of the expected suicide bomber.

But McKenzie denied that there was any actionable intelligence. “I honor his sacrifice and everybody else who got injured or killed as a result of the Abbey Gate attack, but I can tell you there was no ‘be on the lookout’ for a person meeting that description on that day or prior to that day in Afghanistan.”

“The day of the attack and the day prior, we were dealing with four significant threats,” McKenzie told Griffin. “We were dealing with the threat of a vehicle-borne IED, a car with a bomb in it that we thought was being worked to attack us. We were dealing with the possibility of a suicide vest attack, but without specific description of the person. We were dealing with the possibility of an indirect fire attack, either rockets or mortars, but I do know that there was no intelligence to support the assertion that we knew what the bomber looked like.”

When Griffin asked how he could explain Vargas-Andrews’s clear recollection that the troops at the gate were told to look for a bomber who was clean-shaven, wearing a black backpack with three yellow arrows on it, and traveling with an older companion, McKenzie said he couldn’t. “I can’t explain that. All I can tell you is the intelligence that was in play at that time, and I’m pretty confident of that.”

McKenzie also denied an account in a new book, Kabul: The Untold Story of Biden’s Fiasco and the American Warriors Who Fought to the End, that said a request for a drone strike to be carried out on a hotel where the bomber was believed to be was down. “That is not true,” McKenzie said.

MARINE WOUNDED IN KABUL AIRPORT BOMBING SAYS ‘NO ONE WAS HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR OUR SAFETY’

MCKENZIE: ‘I AM HAUNTED’: McKenzie said he has many regrets about the ignominious end to the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, beginning with President Joe Biden’s decision to pull all the troops, something he strongly recommended against.

“I believe history is going to view the decision to come out of Afghanistan and the way that we did and the manner that we were directed to come out as a fatal flaw, and I think that history is going to be very hard on that,” McKenzie said.

A key mistake, he said, was failing to begin the evacuation of American Embassy staff and Afghan partners as soon as Biden announced the U.S. was leaving. “I go back to the basic decision to wait so very late to begin to bring people out, after we had already given away Bagram Airfield, after we had already drawn down to a very low footprint in the country. I think those were the decisions that led to the scenes at the airport and in Kabul.”

“You always look back anytime you lose people, and you wonder if you could have done things differently, and I am haunted by that,” he said. “I think about it quite a bit. It’s one of the many regrets that I have. I examine everything we did. I think about it, particularly in the month of August of every year. For the rest of my life, I’m going to. I’m going to think about this very hard.”

GEN. FRANK MCKENZIE CALLS DELAYS IN AFGHANISTAN WITHDRAWAL AN EXAMPLE OF ‘AMERICAN ARROGANCE’

WHY TUBERVILLE WON’T BUDGE: Despite the Pentagon’s full-court pressure campaign, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) is showing no sign that he will cave on his demand that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin rescind his abortion travel policy before Tuberville will lift his hold on 319 military promotions. Here’s why:

He sincerely believes he has the moral high ground: Tuberville believes that abortion is the taking of a life and that nothing the government does should facilitate it. “We’re pro-life, and we should be. I mean, we’re the Republicans,” he said on Fox this week.

He’s convinced the Pentagon policy is illegal: Tuberville continues to argue that the Pentagon policy that reimburses troops and dependents for travel and time off violates the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits the use of federal funds to perform abortions. The Biden Justice Department says funding travel is not the same as funding abortions. Unusually, these kinds of disputes about the intent of Congress are resolved by the courts.

He’s getting a lot of support: “I’m getting more and more. It’s kind of building,” Tuberville told Fox host Laura Ingraham. Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy has endorsed Tuberville’s stand, and his office says more than 5,000 veterans expressed their support in a letter.

Mitch McConnell is AWOL: Usually, these kinds of one-man stands are ended with pressure from leadership within the party. “The bottom line is this is a problem created by Republicans and it’s up to them to solve it,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). “Senator McConnell, Senator Thune have said they disagree with Tuberville. It’s now up to the Republican Party to get him in line.” But McConnell’s recent health problems have not only weakened him physically, but also politically. While the minority leader says he opposes Tuberville’s blanket holds, he’s made no move to force an end to the impasse.

He’s in denial about the harm to officers and their families: The Pentagon thought by highlighting the hardship to officers, their spouses, and their children, Tuberville might relent. But the stories of missed school enrollment, housing problems, and out-of-pocket expenses borne by hundreds of officers haven’t moved him.

He doesn’t believe national security is affected: Tuberville scoffs at the dire warnings that the inability to promote generals and admirals is having a direct deleterious effect on America’s military readiness. Tuberville says the Pentagon has too many generals as it is.

“Pentagon is way too big as it is. We need to send more money back down to the people actually do the work, because we got way too many leaders at the top, and it is getting way out of control,” he said on Fox.

“They’re saying readiness is being hampered here. They’re saying the generals and admirals are most important. Most important people we have in the military are the sergeants, the corporals, the privates, the second lieutenants, the first lieutenant. The people actually do the work, not the people right around these black limousines in Washington, D.C., and have a nice office over in the Pentagon.”

TOMMY TUBERVILLE KNOCKS JOINT CHIEFS NOMINEE OVER DIVERSITY PUSH

The Rundown

Washington Examiner: Pentagon pushes back on Russian claims that depleted uranium causes cancer

Washington Examiner: Tommy Tuberville knocks Joint Chiefs nominee over diversity push

Washington Examiner: Gen. Frank McKenzie calls delays in Afghanistan withdrawal an example of ‘American arrogance’

Washington Examiner: Deadline nears for key players to answer questions on ‘disastrous’ Afghanistan withdrawal

Washington Examiner: North Korea launches first nuclear submarine: Report

Washington Examiner: The Middle Kingdom meets the Middle East

Washington Examiner: Chinese state-affiliated social media users successfully impersonating US voters, Microsoft warns

Washington Examiner: Opinion: The Taiwan trade-off debate is key, but Biden is right to send these weapons to Ukraine

New York Times: Drone Strike Jolts Home Of Russian Military Base

Washington Post: In Kharkiv, Trying To Figure Out Russia’s Next Move

USNI News: U.K. Defense Chief Bullish On Ukraine’s Spring Offensive

AP: India seeking greater voice for developing world at G20, but Ukraine war may overshadow talks

AP: Al-Qaida-linked insurgents in Mali kill 49 civilians and 15 soldiers in attacks, military says

Bloomberg: Tuberville Military Blockade Muddles New Nuclear Oversight

C4ISRNET: Marine Corps Leader Eyes Drone Swarm Launched From Above, Beneath Waves

Task & Purpose: Pentagon Admits Some ‘Non-Essential’ Personnel Have Left Niger

The War Zone: Poland Eyeing F-15EX Buy Amid Weapons Buying Spree

Air Force Times: Air Force Pushes for Quickstart Plan to Launch Programs Without Budget

Defense News: Allies Target Early AUKUS Milestones to Keep 20-Year Plan on Track

Breaking Defense: General Atomics LongShot Drone for DARPA to Start Flight Tests in December

Air & Space Forces Magazine: USAF, DOD Working on New Target Drones to Simulate 5th-Gen Threats

Defense One: Pentagon CIO Prepares to Take Over 5G Network Portfolio

Breaking Defense: Army Scrubs Latest Test of New Dark Eagle Hypersonic Weapon after Pre-Flight Checks

Air & Space Forces Magazine: F-15E Maintainers Ready to ‘Show Why We Are the Best’ at William Tell Fighter Meet

Space News: New Report Recommends Space Force Change How It Buys Commercial Satellite Services

Air & Space Forces Magazine: Space Force Unveils New Mission Statement, Underscoring Guardians’ Distinct Identity

National Defense Magazine: National Academies Report Urges Air Force to Name AI Testing ‘Champion’

DefenseScoop: DOD to Review Agencies’ Zero-Trust Proposals over the Next Few Months

Calendar

FRIDAY | SEPTEMBER 8

8:30 a.m. 1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW — Billington Cybersecurity annual Cybersecurity Summit, with Anne Neuberger, White House deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology; and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines https://billingtoncybersummit.com

10 a.m. — Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance virtual discussion: “Can’t See It, Can’t Shoot It – Why We Require Overhead Persistent Sensors,” with Lt. Gen. Daniel Karbler, commanding general of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command; retired Lt. Gen. Jon “Ty” Thomas, former deputy commander of Pacific Air Forces; Maj. Gen. Charles “Corky” Corcoran, former assistant deputy chief of staff for operations at the Air Force headquarters; and Riki Ellison, chairman and founder of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance https://www.youtube.com/watch

11 a.m. — Foundation for Defense of Democracies book discussion: Beijing Rules: How China Weaponized Its Economy to Confront the World, with Axios China reporter Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian; Liza Tobin, senior director for economy, Special Competitive Studies Project.; F. Scott Kieff, former commissioner, U.S. International Trade Commission; and Craig Singleton, FDD senior fellow https://forms.monday.com/forms

12 p.m. New York, N.Y. — Korea Society’s Policy and Education Department discussion: “Chinese Views of North Korea’s Uncertain Future,” with Sungmin Cho, professor at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, a U.S. Defense Department institution; and Jonathan Corrado, Korea Society policy director https://docs.google.com/forms

MONDAY | SEPTEMBER 11

9 a.m. 9/11 Pentagon Memorial — Annual September 11th Observance Ceremony for families and invited guests. To accommodate the event, the memorial will be closed to the public on Sept. 10 and will reopen at 2 p.m. Sept. 11 https://www.pentagonmemorial.org

9:15 a.m. 165 Waterfront St., National Harbor, Maryland — Air and Space Forces Association Air, Space & Cyber Conference, with Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall; Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr.; and Gen. Duke Richardson, commander of Air Force Materiel Command https://2023asc.expotracker.net/index.aspx

TUESDAY | SEPTEMBER 12

8:25 a.m. 165 Waterfront St., National Harbor, Maryland — Air and Space Forces Association Air, Space & Cyber Conference, with Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, chief of space operations; William LaPlante, undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment; Gen. Anthony Cotton, commander of U.S. Strategic Command; Thomas Bussiere, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command; and Chief Master Sgt. of the Space Force Roger Towberman https://2023asc.expotracker.net/index.aspx

8:30 a.m. 58 E 68th St., New York, N.Y. — House (Select) Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party Committee field hearing: “Systemic Risk: The Chinese Communist Party’s Threat to U.S. Financial Stability,” with testimony from Jay Clayton, former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission; Jim Chanos, president and founder of Kynikos Associates; and Anne Stevenson-Yang, founder of J Capital Research https://selectcommitteeontheccp.house.gov/

9:15 a.m. 9/11 Memorial & Museum, New York, N.Y. — House Homeland Security Emergency Management and Technology Subcommittee field hearing: “Evolving Threats: Security and Safety in a Post-9/11 World” https://www.youtube.com/channel

9:30 a.m. — Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on the nomination of Gen. David Allvin to be chief of staff of the Air Force http://www.armed-services.senate.gov

1 p.m. — Stimson Center virtual discussion: “U.S. Policy Toward Afghanistan,” with Tom West, U.S. special representative and deputy assistant secretary of state for Afghanistan; Elizabeth Threlkeld, senior fellow and director, South Asia Program, Stimson Center; and Brian Finlay, president and CEO, Stimson Center https://www.stimson.org/event/us-policy-toward-afghanistan

1 p.m. 1616 Rhode Island Ave. NW — Center for Strategic and International Studies virtual and in-person discussion: “Next War Online: Using Cyber Games to Understand Emerging Threats,” with Ben Jensen, CSIS senior fellow for gaming, future war, and strategy; Lt. Col. William Chesarek, senior program manager, General Dynamics Information Technology; John Foti, public-private partnership wargame and exercise lead, Booz Allen Hamilton; Nina Kollars, associate professor, Cyber and Innovation Policy Institute, U.S. Naval War College; Jacquelyn Schneider, director, Wargaming and Crisis Simulation Initiative, Hoover Institution; Yasir Atalan, graduate fellow, Center for Data Science, American University; and Emily Harding, deputy director and senior fellow, CSIS International Security Program https://www.csis.org/events/next-war-online-using-cyber-games

WEDNESDAY | SEPTEMBER 13

8:15 a.m. 165 Waterfront St., National Harbor, Maryland — Air and Space Forces Association Air, Space & Cyber Conference, with Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force JoAnne Bass; and Adm. Christopher Grady, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff https://2023asc.expotracker.net/index.aspx

10 a.m. 2128 Rayburn — House Financial Services Committee hearing: “Oversight of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States and Other Efforts to Strengthen National Security in the United States” http://financialservices.house.gov

THURSDAY | SEPTEMBER 14

9:30 a.m. G-50 Dirksen — Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on the nomination of Adm. Lisa Franchetti to be chief of naval operations http://www.armed-services.senate.gov

10 a.m. HVC-210, U.S. Capitol — House Foreign Affairs Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia Subcommittee hearing: “Iran’s Escalating Threats: Assessing U.S. Policy Toward Iran’s Malign Activities,” with testimony from Norman Roule, former national intelligence manager for Iran; Behnam Ben Taleblu, senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies; Masih Alinejad, author and activist; and Suzanne Maloney, vice president and director of foreign policy at the Brookings Institution http://foreignaffairs.house.gov

FRIDAY | SEPTEMBER 15

9:30 a.m. 2401 M St., NW — George Washington University Project for Media and National Security Defense Writers Group conversation with Mieke Eoyang, deputy assistant secretary of defense for cyber policy. RSVP: Thom Shanker [email protected]

11 a.m. — Center for a New American Security virtual fireside chat of CNAS report: “‘Production is Deterrence’: Investing in Precision-Guided Munitions to Meet Peer Challengers,” with William LaPlante, undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment; and moderator Stacie Pettyjohn, senior fellow and director of the CNAS Defense Program https://www.cnas.org/events/virtual-fireside-chat-the-honorable-dr-william-laplante